Raspberry Pi: Open source graphics driver is there - Quake 3 with 133 FPS

After Broadcom recently released and released the documentation for the video core “VideoCore IV” contained in the Raspberry Pi, the Raspberry Pi project wrote a contest for the development of a free-of-charge graphic writer for the popular credit card-sized single-board computer. The action was intended as a “gift” to the second anniversary of the launch of the Raspberry Pi. Over 2.5 million copies of the one-chip computer have now been sold.


The developer Simon Hall can now claim the prize money of 10,000 US dollars for himself. He succeeded as the first driver to present the game Quake 3 in good quality on the Raspberry Pi playable - according to the competition. The new quell-open driver delivers even more and exceeds this requirement significantly with 133 frames per second (frames per second). If you want to use the new driver, you have to compile it. The Raspberry Pi project offers more information about the competition, the driver and how to compile it on the official website.


For the open source world, the new, open driver is of some importance. It may not be too long before the Raspbian project and other Linux distributions make the driver available. The same "ARMv6" core is also found in devices such as the Samsung Galaxy series and numerous other mobile devices. With the information now available, drivers for Android can also be created.