Unreal Engine 3 on R420 at GDC

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SpellSinger

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When visiting Epics meeting room at GDC I got the chance to see their new engine on NV40 and R420.

It looked like they were showing NV40 at 640x480 and it was very choppy with very low detail.

I was very impressed with R420 as it was obviously running with a much higher framerate and at 1024x768 or higher. The details in the models was much higher and it was very smooth. The only issue I notice were some minor artifacts which Epic put down to 24-bit FP.

It was very cool to see both parts but the R420 was by far the more impressive of the two. Epic claimed they are both equal in performance but would not show me their FPS counter. I believe this was NV marketing dollars speaking because I spent 20 minutes viewing each showing and the delta was clearly evident.

Anyone else here get the chance to see both? As far as I could tell ATI is gonna rule!!!

The ATI card looked like a 9800XT using the exact same board layout. I did not see the NVidia card but rumors around the show claimed it has two power connections, requires a 500W power supply and is extremely hot. Maybe NV should bundle a power supply with the board, instead of Doom3 :rolleyes:

I can't wait to get a chance to play with an R423 and PCI Express. Hopefully ATI will send boards out to developers soon!!!

ATI was also promoting hardware Normal Map Compression. What I heard sounded extremely cool and simple to use. No specs yet though. :D
 
FP24 artifacts bugga. Good to hear atleast the R420 has PS3.0 and is comparable in speed to the NV40.
 
SpellSinger said:
When visiting Epics meeting room at GDC I got the chance to see their new engine on NV40 and R420.

It looked like they were showing NV40 at 640x480 and it was very choppy with very low detail.

I was very impressed with R420 as it was obviously running with a much higher framerate and at 1024x768 or higher. The details in the models was much higher and it was very smooth. The only issue I notice were some minor artifacts which Epic put down to 24-bit FP.

It was very cool to see both parts but the R420 was by far the more impressive of the two. Epic claimed they are both equal in performance but would not show me their FPS counter. I believe this was NV marketing dollars speaking because I spent 20 minutes viewing each showing and the delta was clearly evident.

Anyone else here get the chance to see both? As far as I could tell ATI is gonna rule!!!

The ATI card looked like a 9800XT using the exact same board layout. I did not see the NVidia card but rumors around the show claimed it has two power connections, requires a 500W power supply and is extremely hot. Maybe NV should bundle a power supply with the board, instead of Doom3 :rolleyes:

I can't wait to get a chance to play with an R423 and PCI Express. Hopefully ATI will send boards out to developers soon!!!

ATI was also promoting hardware Normal Map Compression. What I heard sounded extremely cool and simple to use. No specs yet though. :D

ROFL .... :LOL:

Really nice joke ...................... :!: or ATI PR Machine ?
 
I don't think the R420 supports PS3.0. I asked where SM3.0 effects were being used in the game but they were not able to really point out any differences.

I having a hard time seeing where PS3.0 would really affect visual quality or why anyone would support such a small market (0 right now). With all the SM2.0 parts out there I'm not sure anyone will support 3.0 unless ATI or NVidia pays for it. Now SM4.0 would be very cool.
 
Evanescence said:
ROFL .... :LOL:

Really nice joke ...................... :!: or ATI PR Machine ?

No joke dude and no PR. Just the facts. We'll definitely see both in the next few months but not Epics engine or a game using it. It would be cool to see some current games running to get an idea of how each perform. Unreal Engine 3 will not be released for another 18 months in a game.
 
SpellSinger said:
McDusty said:
Well, this guy was very impressed with the nv showing. However he didn't see the r420.

http://www.homelanfed.com/index.php?id=21917

Do you agree with his statements?

I definitely agree that the engine was impressive but with NV40 the framerate was obviously not more the 5-10 FPS and the resolution was below 1024x768. It looked like 640x480 to me.

Ok, so the R420 runs the new Unreal Engine at playable framerates, say 30+fps at 1024*768 or higher and the NV40 only manages 5-10 fps at 640*480 ?

That would make the R420, what, 10X faster ? Let's just say that i have my doubts :)
 
Bjorn said:
Ok, so the R420 runs the new Unreal Engine at playable framerates, say 30+fps at 1024*768 or higher and the NV40 only manages 5-10 fps at 640*480 ?

That would make the R420, what, 10X faster ? Let's just say that i have my doubts :)

Like I said they would not show FPS. The ATI board was running the demos much smoother than the NV board and at a higher resolution. I'd love to get the demo and check the FPS out myself to confirm but we are more than a year out from doing this an both ATI/NV will be a couple products past what Epic was using.
 
DaveBaumann said:
The ATI card looked like a 9800XT using the exact same board layout.

If it was a 9800XT I'm definitely not going to get a NV40. I'll stick with my 9800 PRO :)

If it was a R420 ATI has done a pretty damn good job. I was thinking the board would need a much larger cooling system. ;)
 
I made a post about this on the rage3dboard if you don't mind, maybe there are other people who have seen this.
 
No, you're probably right first time. There would have been a few differences though (i.e. did you, for instance, notice any RAM cooling?)
 
Couple more things I notice...

The NVidia system was heavily branded by NV, even painted green. The ATI system was a crappy AMD show system that was being used on many GDC booths. Not sure if this is important but thought that if NV had to provide a complete system they must have clocked the sh&& out of whatever they gave Epic.
 
SpellSinger said:
Couple more things I notice...

The NVidia system was heavily branded by NV, even painted green. The ATI system was a crappy AMD show system that was being used on many GDC booths. Not sure if this is important but thought that if NV had to provide a complete system they must have clocked the sh&& out of whatever they gave Epic.

Hmm, did you check the back of the monitors? Maybe Epic guys messed up the wires... :LOL:
 
991060 said:
Didn't you even ask Epic guys why there was such a big difference? I would do so if I was there.

I definitely asked. They said both were running the same config and at almost equal performance. I just didn't trust this due to the NV demo being so choppy and the NV marketing dollars Epic has taken. $1Million dollars for a contest noone ever wins has left me a bit sceptical. Also, Epic released UT2003 with the NV opening animation even though the 9700 was better.
 
They were happy to show the engine running at 5fps on NV40?!

That wouldn't have been much of a presentation or value for nVidia PR money.

SpellSinger said:
$1Million dollars for a contest noone ever wins has left me a bit sceptical.

:?: :!:
 
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