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25 Comments
- chemrat, on 07/16/2008, -0/+14At least prices on video cards are plummeting!
- da_bradler, on 07/16/2008, -0/+10The exact opposite is true when it comes to graphics cards. They NEED standards like Direct X and open GL. the reason Physics acceleration isn't developed into more game is because developers don't want to have to choose between supporting one kind of card over another.
Nvidia is saying "We will give you the technology for free you just have to figure out how to run it on your cards"
Now it would have been nice if Microsoft could have been the ones to do something like this because at least then you get a 3rd party controlling the standard and not someone who has a competitive reason to screw things up for one or the other. (well at least in theory, Microsoft gave Nvidia the shaft back in the Direct X 9 early days)
ATi most likely doesn't want to implement Cuda and physx because what happens when Cuda 2/Physx2 comes along? is Nvidia going to tell ATI it's time to pay up or maybe introduce features that put ATI at a serious performance disadvantage(thus making there cards look slow). Who knows, hopefully some sort of deal can be worked out. - inactive, on 07/15/2008, -0/+9Wasn't AMD coming out with their own CUDA or something? I know that Nvidia wouldn't mind having AMD cards run CUDA, but I can understand why AMD doesn't if they have there own program coming out soon.
- KingFog, on 07/16/2008, -2/+9Considering most car manufacturers swap parts around freely, (for example a Mitsubishi Carisma, and a Volvo S40 are exactly the same under the skin) that's a really bad analogy...
- exec0extreme, on 07/16/2008, -0/+6Remember when people were paying money to buy PhysX addon cards, and then they announced that it could just be run with drivers from the GPU manufacturers? It was a good WTF moment. good times, good times
- da_bradler, on 07/16/2008, -0/+6it's still a little gimmicky. There are about 100 games so far that use PhysX technology. Technically all Unreal engine 3 games have the underlying support for PhysX so that's most likely the biggest advantage they have. But most games just add some extra flying rocks and such.
http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_physxgames_home. ... - wTheOnew, on 07/16/2008, -1/+6Intel opened up to AMD for the Havok engine any way, which IMO is better then PhysX. nVidia is going to screw themselves into a corner here once Larrabee comes out...
- Anpheus, on 07/16/2008, -0/+3Nvidia wants to implement it with AMD's help, because they know that unless both parties play nice, this will never take off.
- MarkusX, on 07/16/2008, -0/+3Thanks,... but this is not the opposite.
You said exactly what I said, only with more words. :-) - hypogenic, on 07/16/2008, -3/+6One of the main reasons of getting a new Radeon card was the promising future ability to run the same Physx and CUDA as Nvidia cards. If they are not gonna do it, then ***** 'em, I'm switching back.
- shredswithpiks, on 07/16/2008, -0/+2comment in wrong spot. not sure how. :( boo
- MarkusX, on 07/15/2008, -4/+6They don't like it because developers don't like proprietary interfaces, that never make it to a standard. Open standards are much better, because developers can focus on the actual programing task rather than satisfying all the interfaces it has to work on (if it even can).
- boobsbr, on 07/16/2008, -0/+2"ATi most likely doesn't want to implement Cuda and physx because what happens when Cuda 2/Physx2 comes along? is Nvidia going to tell ATI it's time to pay up or maybe introduce features that put ATI at a serious performance disadvantage(thus making there cards look slow)."
that's why MarkusX said we need open standards... - dafunkmonster, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1Perhaps you should read up on WHY a Scion has a toyota engine, or why the new audi R8 was designed by people at volkswagen. Then, maybe, you'd understand what you're talking about.
- inactive, on 07/16/2008, -0/+1Are any games actually using Physx yet? Apart from the woeful token level or two in UT3? I was under the impression the tech was still at the 'Nice Gimmick' stage.
- eddie72, on 07/16/2008, -1/+2Yeah quite a few: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1141844
- dafunkmonster, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1Sorry, you lose. Tire dimensions are standardized. Physics engines are not.
- p3ngwin, on 07/16/2008, -0/+1yeah, it had CTM, (close to the metal). refering to programming directly to the hardware with as few abstraction layers as possible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_to_Metal - Fergy, on 07/17/2008, -0/+1TG Daily: What are AMD's thoughts about GPU-accelerated physics?
Cheng: There is a time and place for everything, including GPU-accelerated physics simulation. The model that AMD is pursuing is a balanced platform approach and offloading to the GPU where it makes sense. There are a few factors that we considered when we formed this strategy:
The primary technical challenge today for video games is rendering. Rendering will remain the limitation for realism and gameplay for the foreseeable future. It would be better to focus the GPUs on rendering to provide the best game play. Also remember that when you create more objects or rigid bodies with physics simulation, it further taxes the rendering system. There are scenarios where GPU physics simulation actually slows down gameplay and decreases the experience.
With the proliferation of quad-core CPUs from AMD and Intel, there is ample horsepower to run physics simulation on the CPU. Most games today can take advantage of two cores effectively, scaling to the third and fourth core yields diminishing performance. The game developers are realizing that there is available horsepower with the third and fourth cores for physics simulation.
Game developers will write code for the biggest installed base of hardware to ensure a big market for their games. The only certainty for the developers is that there will be a multi-core CPU in modern PCs. To write a game that supports a proprietary GPU-based physics API would mean a vastly different code base for the game developer as well as relegating this type of game experience to a small percentage of the computers. Clearly, this is not the desirable path for game developers and AMD.
Our strategy is to optimize our CPUs to run Havok’s API and libraries and then to investigate how we can improve gameplay with offloading certain forms of physics simulation to the GPU. We have our theories and models, but we will not announce our product plans until we are ready to roll them out. - kaskoosek, on 07/16/2008, -3/+3It is totally different.
Nvidia can charge AMD for using the code. If it were open source I would have agreed. - MarkusX, on 07/16/2008, -1/+1You analogy is great, because...
Ford and Audi both kind of agreed to run their cars on... TIRES. - etx313, on 07/16/2008, -2/+12g Mitsubishi eclipse = Dodge Avenger
- AdmiralAcbar, on 07/16/2008, -2/+1And this is why I go with NVidia. I like AMD processors, but I've always hated ATI cards. I bought one once, but the box had blatant false advertising on it... Fully Supports Directx 9.0c my ass...
- dafunkmonster, on 07/16/2008, -5/+3Who cares? It's not like Nvidia is falling over themselves trying to get their cards to support AMD-branded technologies.
Frankly, AMD using Nvidia's physics technology would be like Ford asking Audi for some tips on building suspension. - RaulMuadDib, on 07/16/2008, -6/+1Spoiler: ATI dies at the end.
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