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NoelC1
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Does VMware Workstation 12.5 support OpenGL 3.3?

I've reached a point where test software I need to run requires a higher level of OpenGL than the VMware 11 I'm running provides.

Can VMware Workstation 12.5 Pro provide actual OpenGL 3.3 support?  There seems to be some question on the forums about whether it is 3.0 or 3.3.

In my case it'll be needed in Win 7 x64, 8.1 x64, 10 x64 guests on a Win 8.1 x64 host with ATI Radeon card and native driver that provides OpenGL 4.4.

-Noel

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rcporto
Leadership
Leadership

Support for OpenGL 3.3 was added in VMware Workstation 12, see the release notes: VMware Workstation 12 Pro Release Notes

  • Advanced graphics
    Support has been added for the following standards:
    • DirectX 10
    • OpenGL 3.3
---

Richardson Porto
Senior Infrastructure Specialist
LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/richardsonporto
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NoelC1
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thanks, but not quite the confirmation I was looking for.

I want to know if it's really there.  There are too many threads claiming it's not.

-Noel

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RDPetruska
Leadership
Leadership

Well, you can install the 30-day trial version of Workstation 12 and test it out for yourself!  Just make sure to either create a new VM, or upgrade the virtual hardware to the latest version, and upgrade the VMware Tools, in order for the newest graphics support.  (and back up your existing VM first if you are going to modify it, and later decide that the upgrade to version 12 isn't worth it, and you will revert back to Workstation version 11).

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NoelC1
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thanks.  That's in my plans.  I was unsure about how much trouble it would be to restore to version 11 if necessary, and wanted to be a little more sure it would be worth doing before starting.  As I recall, VMware WS uninstalls its older versions when installing new ones.

I hadn't skipped upgrading to a new version for a long time before version 11, but I had everything I needed from 11 at the time 12 came out.  I didn't know when some of the new features would become attractive.  I guess that question has been answered for me now.

-Noel

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JohnHutch111
Contributor
Contributor

I am running 12.5.7 and this version does not support (100%) v3.3.  The formal version (when querying OpenGL) is v3.0.  I have attempted to get an answer as I am developing and need OpenGL v3.3 or greater.  The best I have got is that there is some support for v3.3 and the application needs to test if a particular function is available.

I believe they should only be promoting v3.0 as this is supposed to be 100% compliant support with all v3.0 functionality available.

Its been a bit frustrating, and I am hoping the next release will be better.  I think VMWare is relying on the MESA library which is said to be OpenGL 4.0

NoelC1
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thank you for sharing your experience.  What does the realtech VR GLView application say is supported?  It's a free app, and is what I'd use to check compliance.

I'm still waiting to upgrade, and I haven't found time yet to test it myself.

-Noel

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bluefirestorm
Champion
Champion

See a screenshot below of the Realtech VR GLView with a Windows 1703 guest VM on a VMware Workstation Pro 12.5.7/Windows 10 1703. The graphics adapter is Nvidia GTX 960M.

I recently switched the vmx configuration to let Workstation use OpenGL as its render engine instead of DX11. Comparing the capabilities in the log file, using OpenGL looks like gives the guest better graphics capabilities.

pastedImage_0.png

NoelC1
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thank you for that.  Several different ways to host the graphics yielding different capabilities could well explain the disparities in reports about how much of 3.3 is supported.

Is the configuration option you mention specific to 12.x?  I don't recall seeing anything like it in 11.

-Noel

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JohnHutch111
Contributor
Contributor

It seems the GLView I have been using doesn't report the correct version (nor does GPU Caps Viewer by the way) or reports different versions.  The screen shot below has both versions of GLView running on the VM.  It seems you need to test the support provided by checking the extensions??   It still seems a bit confusing, but I will investigate the meaning of the "Forward Context".

pastedImage_3.png

pastedImage_1.png

I then tried the other settings in the Drop Down of the OpenGL Extensions Viewer and got v3.0

pastedImage_2.png

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JohnHutch111
Contributor
Contributor

Sorry,but part of the image was trimmed.  This is the other part

pastedImage_0.png

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bluefirestorm
Champion
Champion

I didn't get to use Workstation 11. I jumped from version 10 to version 12. Also it is only beginning with version 12.5 that I started to look at the vmware.log files and pay attention to what the VMware does under the hood. So I don't know what Workstation 11 uses under the hood for the graphics rendering.

You can refer to this recent thread response I gave here VMware Workstation unrecoverable error: (svga) on how to switch between DX11 and OpenGL (note that this was for version 12). But it doesn't hurt to try the vmx configuration in Workstation 11. The AMD vendor ID would be "0x1002".

As for the difference in guest SVGA 3D capabilities between using DX11 and OpenGL in Workstation 12, I pasted below some of the interesting ones. It would look as though anti-aliasing capabilities is a key difference if I interpret the log correctly. The ones prefixed by < is DX11 and the ones prefixed with > is OpenGL.

<   cap[ 22]: 0x00000800 (MAX_TEXTURE_REPEAT)

<   cap[ 23]: 0x00000800 (MAX_TEXTURE_ASPECT_RATIO)

---

>   cap[ 22]: 0x00004000 (MAX_TEXTURE_REPEAT)

>   cap[ 23]: 0x00004000 (MAX_TEXTURE_ASPECT_RATIO)

<   cap[ 63]: 0x00000010 (MAX_VERTEX_SHADER_TEXTURES)

---

>   cap[ 63]: 0x00000020 (MAX_VERTEX_SHADER_TEXTURES)

<   cap[ 70]: 0x00000000 (MULTISAMPLE_NONMASKABLESAMPLES)

<   cap[ 71]: 0x00000000 (MULTISAMPLE_MASKABLESAMPLES)

---

>   cap[ 70]: 0x00000004 (MULTISAMPLE_NONMASKABLESAMPLES)

>   cap[ 71]: 0x0000808b (MULTISAMPLE_MASKABLESAMPLES)

<   cap[ 73]: 0x00000000 (SUPERSAMPLE)

---

>   cap[ 73]: 0x00000001 (SUPERSAMPLE)

<   cap[ 87]: 0x00000000 (LINE_AA)

<   cap[ 88]: 0x00000000 (LINE_STIPPLE)

<   cap[ 89]:   1.000000 (MAX_LINE_WIDTH)

<   cap[ 90]:   0.000000 (MAX_AA_LINE_WIDTH)

---

>   cap[ 87]: 0x00000001 (LINE_AA)

>   cap[ 88]: 0x00000001 (LINE_STIPPLE)

>   cap[ 89]:  10.000000 (MAX_LINE_WIDTH)

>   cap[ 90]:  10.000000 (MAX_AA_LINE_WIDTH)

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NoelC1
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

With VMware Workstation Pro 14 I'm seeing this:

ScreenGrab_W10VM_2017_10_01_121734.png

-Noel

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