I remember those days....


POV-Ray for Windows version 3.7 beta 1 is now available from our beta
page
(http://www.povray.org/beta/).

The EXE's available from the above page will expire on the 30th of
April
2005. Note that the file contains two EXE's, one for Windows 32-bit
and one
for Windows XP 64-bit edition or Windows Server 2003 64-bit edition
(AMD64).

Use of this POV-Ray beta software is covered by the same license as
that
which applies to version 3.6.1 (the current full release).

Note that to run the beta software you require the standard POV-Ray
installation files for your chosen platform. You can get these from
the
download page if you do not already have them.

This version is a major change from version 3.6 in that the internal
structure of the renderer has been radically altered. You can expect
there to
be many issues and incompatibilities that we will need to work out. We
will
discuss the internal changes in more detail later if anyone is
interested.

The primary advantage of version 3.7 over past versions is support for
multi-
threaded rendering, which will be of most use to those users who
currently
have SMP machines, or who intend either purchasing one or upgrading
their
existing motherboard to a dual-core CPU such as the upcoming Athlons.
Depending on the scene, and excluding parsing/photon building time, a
dual-
core system can increase rendering speed by almost 100%, and
frequently in
the 70-90% range.

Here is a quick summary of some of the changes. Be sure to read this
before
using the software.

Intentional changes for POV-Ray 3.7
-----------------------------------

- The version directive and command-line setting no longer provide
compatibility with most rendering bugs in versions prior to POV-Ray
3.5.
However, compatibility with the scene language is provided for scenes
as old
as POV-Ray 1.0 just as in all previous versions of POV-Ray.
Nevertheless, we
strongly recommend you update scenes at least to POV-Ray 3.5 syntax if
you
plan to use them in future versions of POV-Ray.

- This version uses multi-threaded rendering by default. You can
render in
only one thread by using the '/THREADS 1' switch in the Windows
version.
Note that parsing and photon building will only use one thread.
However
photon scenes will benefit from multiple threads once photon building
has
completed.

The ability to render in more than one thread is primarily of use to
those
users who have SMP machines (i.e. more than one CPU).

Known limitations of POV-Ray 3.7.beta.1
---------------------------------------

- Dispersion is currently not available as close investigation of the
source
code showed some serious defects that can only be addressed by
rewriting
this feature.  This will take time, so please be patient, we are
currently
committed to continue this feature, but time is required to evaluate
our new
design for this feature.  We will try to maintain SDL for this feature
exactly as it was in POV-Ray 3.6 and earlier.

- Anti-aliasing method 2 currently takes up to 20% more samples than
it used
to take in POV-Ray 3.6 and earlier.  This will be corrected prior to
final
release of POV-Ray 3.7.

- Light and vista buffers are not longer generated. There are
currently
plans to replace the whole automatic bounding algorithm in POV-Ray 3.7
with
another algorithm that will yield generally better performance.
Details
about this change will be made available once it makes its way into
one of
the beta versions.

- Animation rendering is not yet supported. This feature is expected
to be
back for one of the next few beta versions.

- Redirecting text message output to files is currently not available.
It
will be provided again, likely around the same time the mac and Unix
version
make beta versions available.

- Mosaic preview is currently not available. We are currently
investigating
how to best continue support for this feature. It will be
back,possibly in
changed for in some later beta version.

- Some Windows features such as re-rendering the insert menu, running
the
benchmark, and similar, do not work as expected. This will be fixed
shortly.

- The Windows version is not compiled using the Intel compiler and
will be
slower than 3.6.1 in many areas.

- Image output and input has been changed significantly and has not
been
thoroughly tested.

- The SYS image input type (BMP files) does not currently work when
specified
in height fields or image maps.

Known bugs of POV-Ray 3.7.beta.1
--------------------------------

- Photon rendering may occasionally not function as expected. This is
a
known bug and we will address it as soon as possible.

- Radiosity rendering does not work. This is a known bug and we will
address it together with a modernization of some of the radiosity
code.

- Some statistics and options are not displayed correctly.  Equally,
some
error and warnings are current not issued, but they may very well
cause
malfunctions.  These are known bugs and will address them as time and
other
priorities permit.

- Preview image output is currently not gamma corrected. Your scenes
may
appear darker or lighter compared to other versions of POV-Ray.  We
will
address this problem soon.

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