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It's getting to the point that whatever graphics wise AMD throw out nvidia can just squash like a cockroach if they wish. Looking back at history the nvidia FX was one miss wonder and the ATi R300 was a one hit wonder. The nv30 debacle did nvidia more of a favour then they ever new at the time.
Cpu wise I do not even want to think of Shangai v Nehalem, it's too depressing,
You know, I don't think the problem is companies and the products they bring to market, because after all this is just the way things work in competitive industries. Some companies get a leg up on the competition for awhile, and if the competition is actually competitive it'll turn the tables for awhile. Back and forth. That's business. PR actually plays such a small role in the scheme of things, because the bottom line is and always has been that companies sink or swim based on the products they produce. (This isn't the forum for examining the issues of much larger, richer companies kicking around much smaller, poorer ones by essentially buying their market positions during the periods when their product lines are less than competitive with the better products brought to market by those smaller companies, so I won't touch on that aspect of things here.)
I'll tell you what is beginning to "emotionally" impact me a bit, however. And that is the attitude I am seeing more and more of from various people on technical web sites. Listening to some of them sanctimoniously comment negatively on what are essentially trivial things, or else things that are entirely superficial, it's as though these people consider themselves so high up in the food chain that they actually imagine they are qualified to run and manage the companies they so viciously and eagerly criticize.
First off, most of the criticisms I've read to date seem to stem from nothing more important than either bruised feelings or bruised egos--emphasis on the latter--as though these hypercritical pundits of tech companies were thoroughly incensed to discover that the 3d and cpu industries do not exist for their personal convenience or personal financial welfare. It's a pity that most of these people still to this day do not understand the degree to which they themselves are manipulated, even as they heap scorn on the purely promotional efforts of various companies. Hello--if you aren't sufficiently experienced so as to know how to *discount* PR, regardless of its source, and go straight to a thorough analysis of the products you review, then you prove only that you are not qualified to do the reviews you are attempting to do. OK, well what's a "thorough" analysis?
What it isn't is illustrated brilliantly by all of the HD 3870 reviews I've read on the Internet to date--I can't think of a single exception. If there are exceptions to what I'm about to say, please, someone point me in that direction...I couldn't find a single review of these products that did anything apart from reach all of its major conclusions based on the handful of i[benchmark frame-rate bar charts]i the reviewer reportedly ran.
It wasn't that long ago that the real benchmark by which all other 3d-card reviews could be judged was established right here on B3d, where lots and lots of comparative information was compiled along
with benchmark frame-rate bar charts. More or less, the amount of information compiled and presented was so plentiful and varied that frame-bar charts assumed their proper position in the scheme of things--a
minor position.
What about image quality as a consideration of benchmark frame-rate bar chart results? Somebody point me to a recent review where that subject is approached in anything resembling a thorough manner. I cannot recall when I read the last such 3d-card review, except to say that it was most likely right here on B3d. Long ago.
So what happened? Why are we back the stone-age of cookie cutter gpu hardware reviews which essentially all follow the following basic format:
1) Reviewer begins with an "overview" that consists entirely of his opinion on where various companies and products stand today in relation to each other. Most reviews these days begin with this sort of mini-editorial rant that ads nothing to the review itself.
2) Pages and pages of the obligatory PR regurgitation that the companies who make the products being reviewed supply to the reviewer--slides, diagrams, and whatnot. At this point the reviewer is repeating exactly what the PR arm of the company wants him to repeat and publicize.
3) Selected benchmark frame-rate bar charts. Maybe six to 10 games are selected. Sometimes, only three or four.
4) Conclusion--based primarily on the handful of benchmark frame-rate bar charts the reviewer elected to run and publish.
And viola! Another cookie-cutter 3d-card review is published.
Really, 1&2 above don't bother me as much as 3&4. The problem I have with this template is that for me, image quality is my greatest concern, but in terms of the reviews I've read they either do not mention IQ at all, or only mention it by saying something silly like, "We couldn't see any difference in the image quality we observed between the products"--which is the same as to say to me, "We didn't care to look for any such differences in doing our review."
Excuse me, but reviewers can easily detect differences in performance and power consumption, for instance. That's probably because they
looked for them, if you know what I mean...
Yea, that's got to be it.
Is it really logical to think that when doing a comparative review of products designed and engineered by different companies, products which are using software drivers written and compiled by different programmers for the respective hardware to which they belong, that the image quality produced by all of the products tested always should
be the same? I guess if you think it's also reasonable that there should be "no observable difference" between the power consumption and performance of these products then you would be nothing except consistent by saying that comparative IQ among them is all the same, too. But nobody does
that, do they? Nope, it's only on the subject of IQ that people consistently err and get away with representing a zero difference between all of these products.
I think that it is no more rational to expect a zero difference in the image quality these contrasted and compared products produce than it is to expect them to also achieve the same frame-rates in the benchmarks used or to achieve the same levels of power consumption. Why? Because they are
different from each other, that's why. Sometimes, they are much different from each other, even if they are the gpus manufactured by the same company. Is there, for instance, zero IQ difference between GF6, GF7, and GF8 products? According to the reviews I've read recently--nope, there's no difference deserving of any observation and comment whatever. But let's not let that stand in the way of publishing our frame-rate bar charts anyway.
Last, I really think that only a novice would not know that there is an inverse relationship and correlation between IQ and frame-rate performance. There is, always has been, and always will be. Here's a clue: if a tested gpu doesn't perform as well as a competitor in terms of frame-benchmark results, when you objectively might think that they theoretically should be performing closely, or else that the loser in the match in terms of frame rates ought to actually be the winner, then it is at that point that an exhaustive and thorough look at IQ needs to be conducted. A reviewer who neglects a serious look at IQ during the normal part of any 3d-card review might as well announce that he's decided to wear a blindfold and use a braille keyboard to conduct and write his review, as far as I am concerned. Such reviews are just about worthless to me as a 3d-card consumer.
I could go on and on about it--things like the odd resolution choices reviewers use when there's nothing about the reviewed products that would prevent him from using *many* other resolutions and publishing those results, too. How many bar charts are published with frame-rate results from tests using no AA and AF? (Answer, quite a few.) I mean, even on merely such superficial levels as resolution choices and filtering settings it is obvious that many reviewers today simply could care less about image quality and do not consider it a relevant observation to make when reviewing 3d cards. Considering that 3d is all about what we see on our screens that's nothing short of remarkable. The
fact is that one driver may be producing noticeably superior IQ but accordingly *inferior* frame-rate performance as a direct result. That's 3d 101. If a given reviewer doesn't look at that as thoroughly as he looks at frame-rate performance and power consumption then you can take his review, crumple it up, and toss it in the trash, for all the good it will do you.
So, to all the pundits who consider themselves of such an elevated position in the scheme of the 3d industry to be able to heap scorn on the companies responsible for creating the very 3d markets their sites cater, I have but one thought: it's best not to throw stones if you live in a glass house...
