Does the Intel 82945G Express Chipset Family Support Hardware T&L?

In computer games and 3-D graphics, Transforming and Lighting (T&L) is the act of calculating the positions of objects in a 3-D environment, rendering the items the player can see from her character's current position and lighting the items realistically. Most modern video cards can perform T&L calculations, while older video cards and integrated video chipsets rely on the computer's processor to perform T&L; this is called "software T&L." The Intel 82945G Express chipset does not support hardware T&L.

Supported Games

Many games that support software T&L will work with the 82945G Express chipset. In 2005, Intel compiled a non-exhaustive list of games tested in Windows XP and verified to run on the 82945G Express chipset. The games that ran successfully included "Age of Empires III," "Civilization IV," "Half-Life 2" and "The Sims 2."

Unsupported Games

If a game scans the system for hardware T&L support before running, it will not work with the Intel 82945G Express chipset. Some of the games that do not work include "The Punisher," "Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion," "Dungeon Lords" and "Joint Operations: Typhoon Rising." In some cases, however, it's possible to alter a game's configuration file to force support for software T&L. This is true of the game "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King."

Adding Hardware T&L Support

You can add hardware T&L support to a motherboard with the 82945G Express chipset by installing a new video card. However, you may still encounter poor performance in newer computer games; while the 82945G Express chipset supports PCI Express x16 video cards, the processors it supports include the Pentium 4 and Core 2 Duo. Intel has since replaced those processors with the Core i series.

82945G Express Motherboards

Some of the motherboards using the 82945G Express chipset include the Intel D945GPM, the RadiSys Endura EM945G and the Gigabyte GA-945GM-S2. Some of the features of these motherboards include support for dual-channel DDR2-SDRAM, and built-in networking and sound. The SATA controllers of the Intel and RadiSys motherboards support RAID, while the Gigabyte motherboard does not.

References

• Intel: 82945G Express Chipset: Game Playability on Microsoft Windows XP
• PC Magazine: Definition of T&L
• Intel: 82945G Express Chipset: The Punisher Game is Not Playable
• Intel: 82945G Express Chipset: Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Game Does Not Start
• Intel: 82945G Express Chipset: Dungeon Lords Game Installs Successfully but Fails to Start
• Intel: 82945G Express Chipset: Joint Operations: Typhoon Rising Game Will Not Run
• Intel: 82945G Express Chipset: Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King Game Will Not Run
• Intel: 945G Express Chipset
• Intel: Desktop Board D945GPM Technical Product Specification
• RadiSys: Endura EM945G Product Manual