Nvidia 8600m GT and OpenGL 3.0 support?

I have a Dell m1530 with an Nvidia 8600m GT card. I downloaded the desktop 182.06 drivers with a modified inf file so setup would recognize my card. I’m able to create an OpenGL 3.0 context, but I’m unable to initialize any extensions.

If I create the context and then call glGetString(GL_EXTENSIONS), it always returns NULL. If I initialize a normal OpenGL 2.0 context, all extensions are returned properly.

Has anybody had any luck with the 8600m card and OpenGL 3.0? Is there a compatible notebook driver? I’ve tried 179.48, but it doesn’t have support for OpenGL 3.0.

Also, on a side note, I’m using glew and calling glewInit returns no error under both 2.0 and 3.0. But GLEW_ARB_vertex_buffer_object is always false and so is every other extension.

Try setting glewExperimental to GL_TRUE before glewInit().

Thanks randall, GLEW_ARB_vertex_buffer is now no longer null. But calling glGetString(GL_EXTENSIONS) still returns NULL :-/

Are you creating full context of forward compatible? In forward compatible context GL_EXTENSIONS is deprecated argument for glGetString. Instead of glGetString you should use glGetStringi(GL_EXTENSIONS, i).

I just noticed by removing the following attribute from the call to wglCreateContextAttribs:
WGL_CONTEXT_FLAGS_ARB, WGL_CONTEXT_FORWARD_COMPATIBLE_BIT_ARB

I get all extensions now. That’s very odd. Any ideas? Also, if I keep these flags in, when I attempt to render geometry using VBOs nothing gets rendered. But in a 2.0 context or by commenting out the flags above, geometry is rendered.

Here’s the code.

void display()
{
	glClear(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT | GL_DEPTH_BUFFER_BIT);
	
	glMatrixMode(GL_MODELVIEW);
	glLoadIdentity();

	float colors[] = {
		1.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f,
		0.0f, 1.0f, 0.0f,
		0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f
	};

	float vertices[] = {
		0.0f, 0.0f,
		100.0f, 0.0f,
		100.0f, 100.0f
	};

	unsigned int indices[] = {
		0, 1, 2
	};
	
	static GLuint vao = 0;
	static GLuint cbo = 0, vbo = 0;
	if (!cbo && !vbo) {
		if (!GLEW_ARB_vertex_buffer_object) 
			printf("vertex_buffer_object not supported
");
		
		/*glGenVertexArrays(1, &vao);
		glBindVertexArray(vao);*/

		glGenBuffersARB(1, &cbo);
		glBindBufferARB(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER_ARB, cbo);
		glBufferDataARB(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER_ARB, sizeof(colors), colors, GL_STATIC_DRAW_ARB);

		glGenBuffersARB(1, &vbo);
		glBindBufferARB(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER_ARB, vbo);
		glBufferDataARB(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER_ARB, sizeof(vertices), vertices, GL_STATIC_DRAW_ARB);
	}	
	
	
	glEnableClientState(GL_COLOR_ARRAY);
	glBindBufferARB(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER_ARB, cbo);
	glColorPointer(3, GL_FLOAT, 0, 0);

	glEnableClientState(GL_VERTEX_ARRAY);
	glBindBufferARB(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER_ARB, vbo);
	glVertexPointer(2, GL_FLOAT, 0, 0);

	//glBindVertexArray(vao);
	//glDrawElements(GL_TRIANGLES, 3, GL_UNSIGNED_INT, indices);
	glDrawArrays(GL_TRIANGLES, 0, 3);

	gltSwapBuffers();
}

Thanks, I didn’t know that about glGetString being deprecated. But I still get null for each call to glGetStringi

And yes, I am adding the forward compatible context attribute to my list of attribs when calling the CreateContextAttribs method.

Are you using correct values for i? i can change from 0 to glGetInteger(GL_NUM_EXTENSIONS)-1.

If you get nothing rendered try checking the error codes of each OpenGL call with glGetError. In forward compatible context lot of stuff is deprecated - read OpenGL 3.0 spec Appendinx E. For example - fixed functionality, vertex arrays, GLSL 1.10 and 1.20 - all of this is deprecated and can not be used.

I’m querying the extensions like this.

        GLint n, i;
	glGetIntegerv(GL_NUM_EXTENSIONS, &n);
	for (i = 0; i < n; i++) {
		printf("%s
", glGetStringi(GL_EXTENSIONS, i));
                printf("ERROR: %s
", gluErrorString(glGetError()));
	}

gluErrorString is printing out “Invalid enumerant” for every glGetStringi call.

Maybe error already happened before glGetStringi? Try calling glGetError before extension queries.

I have no problems querying extensions in this way on my laptop with 8400M GS video card.

I have the same problem with 8800GT. glGetError returns 0, but glGetStringi returns NULL pointers on forward compatible context. I started a thread not too long ago about GL 3.0 here with source code in it.

BTW, I’m also from Latvia

Heh, I tried to install 182.06 version driver. Now I also get NULL value from glGetStringi. Previously I was using 181.00 driver.

Great. Now you broke my OGL3 applications

I noticed that using normal context creation(not 100% for default initialization but with wglChoosePixelFormat it worked for me) results in a 3.0 context being created.Check it out. Now, I know this shouldn’t happen…but anyway it’s there.

Just saw that no context is created when calling glCreateContextAttribsARB with forward compatible bit set. Can anyone verify this? If it happens to another maybe we can post a driver bug.

EDIT:
No problem after all, just forgot to end my attribute list with 0. Sorry for the hassle. I will post if I find any problems with extensions.

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