I have to agree with V and say working with PC controlled Audio and Video while it is comming the processing demands for a real time 3D  enviroment would be unreal!

I am not a huge Linux fan but the way some of the OS versions are designed It will probably be most likely to happen there first!

EX.........

Video rendering tests I have done

*XP-sp2 64 bit single core AMD processor....90min video encoded to mpeg4 from avi. took 2hrs and 15min ..new $1200

(56 processes running)

*Vista 64 bit core2 Quad Intell processor.....90min video encoded to mpeg4 from avi. took 45min................new $2500

(62 processes running)

*Linux KDE Dual core AMD processor...........90min video encoded to mpeg4 from avi. took 27min................new $800

(9 processes running)

This is due mainly to the fact that mostservices in windows run all the time where as Linux is more of an on demand kinda system

Anyway untill we can do it for real these might help give you a good feel!

AZUL 3D Windowblind

3D Metal Windowblind

Yes but it would be temporary. They will fix it soon.

Official Website (french) - Download

Madotate is a program that allows users to put their programs/applications in a perspective view. If you don't know what I mean when I say perspective view. Checkout the screenshot above or you can view this one.

Of course you can bring them back to regular size as well. As seen in the video below (from youtube url).

Screenshot


Click Here: to see the program in action, or copy, and paste the url below into your web browser.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFeNF29J6AI

System Requirements
* Windows 98/98SE/2000/XP
* 5 MB of RAM
* Size: 390 KB

You may also want to checkout Yod'm 3D out. Which is known as DeskSpace now, but back in the day it was free, and I've managed to find the latest free software they had out, before they made it so you haft to pay for it.

Link removed.....link to their site...not to a file directly. [Admin]

Actually, any 3D desktop interface would use the GPU to accelerate and render this with pixel shaders for any special render operations.  There'd be no CPU or tradional scan-line rendering required.

Thanks for pointing this out!  It's a shame the windows aren't anti-aliased.  It has some very nice functionality.  Is it being actively updated?

Actually it would mostly effecct the Open GL and Direct3D while the GPU would see the load of the work there WILL be an increase in CPU usage !

But if you read the area you quoted was actually 1 point in the statement That I think you will see 3D destops in Linux before windows becuase of considerably less processing requirements to run  the OS and Video the leaving more available speed and power for your 3D rendering!

If it's hardware accelerated you should be able to force antialias in the driver control panel... But considering it's last updated 2004 as far as I can tell, I wouldn't have high hopes on updates...

If fences becomes little more flexible ie xyz orientation, customizable shapes, different icon sizes for different fences.

It can give us 3D desktop then and its light too.

If you do, it will be simple because there are a lot of programmers who are experimenting with it in Linux as shareware/open source. 

There is no "resource issue" between any of the modern OS's that would make any one of them more or less suitable.  OpenGL, DWM/DirectX10, and the OSX graphics libraries (old and new) are all more than capable of hardware accelerating these operations.

And there will be little or no hit to the CPU, unless the interface uses a lot of physics (like bumptop), but A) modern CPUs can handle these kinds of calculations without breaking a sweat, this is a perfect use of extra/multiple CPU cores, and C) modern GPUs have physics acceleration capabilities now (re: PhysX).

Trust me, ALL of the major OS vendors are working on 3d desktops. 

From my knowledge no, but I heard their working on one to work with Windows Vista, and Windows 7, but I'm not sure.

Nope, superman, that is 3DNA. It is cool, but just a toy. Very cool, and a little resource hungry, but not really something to use everyday. More like your PC in a video game. 

Sorry to say but that screenshot in my post was from www.download.com for 3D Wonder 3D Desktop and I don't think they would show a false screenshot.

Actually, Both 3D Wonder and 3DNA have the same scrrenshots even at their homepages...

I would love to see a program that'll enable users to edit the opacity of their icons for their desktop, for either individual ones, and/or all of them.

Also a program or a registry file that'll hide the icon text for your icons on your desktop. (I know one way to do it, but I can't do it on my laptop)

You can make transparent Desktopx objects and use them as icons..

I don't use DesktopX as I used up the free trial, and I have no money to really get anything, and I gotta wait to get a job. (Don't ask why)

Alright dear,I looked one for you... ActivIcons 3.37. It will allow you to make icon labels transparent, change their color etc. and also save their positions. Also, you can go here for your daily dose. You might get something which you need at some point.

Thanks for the info man, but looking at the system requirements. It says it's not compatible with Windows Vista, and I'm not gonna take any chances of screwing my pc up again.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. Hopefully someday there will be a truly 3d desktop like 3dna that works well and has better graphics. In the meantime, Madotate looks like a cool program. Im going to try it out.