ATI B.S Bingo FUD

[karlotta]

I think the thing about R300 is that it introduced a lot of new features (like SM2.0) that were actually very usable from the the get-go.

Thats what i was talking about. No SM2 was around anywhere from the getgo. Now the R300 has lasted longer than any card and did /does play the SM2 titles you bring up. As for what NVDA dev department says.. well you should post links. Then we can get into "full SmX usage in X titles that we have no real info on how SM"x" will be used.

 

[trinibwoy]

HL2, Far Cry, Halo off the top of my head are all playing SM2.0 surprisingly well on R3x0 cards, but there are a few others

Not to nitpick but my overclocked 9800PRO didn't exactly play Far Cry or Halo 'surprisingly well' - I had to drop res to 10x12 and run at medium settings. I think karlotta's point is that we could be doing this in tomorrow's games on today's SM3 hardware.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Not to nitpick but my overclocked 9800PRO didn't exactly play Far Cry or Halo 'surprisingly well' - I had to drop res to 10x12 and run at medium settings. I think karlotta's point is that we could be doing this in tomorrow's games on today's SM3 hardware.

I can't explain Far Cry, but NO pc ran Halo "surprisingly well"....the game suffered from consolitis more than any I can remember aside from DE:IW.

BTW-I still game a lot at 1028x768, I use 1280x960 as my max since I'm limited by my monitor....what setting is "10x12"?

 

[Fodder]

1280x1024 (5:4 LCD resolution), I expect. I do find it a little odd though that people so often can't seem to type in the correct numbers in the correct format when listing their resolution ... there are only a handful to remember.

 

[bigz]

HL2, Far Cry, Halo off the top of my head are all playing SM2.0 surprisingly well on R3x0 cards, but there are a few others

Not to nitpick but my overclocked 9800PRO didn't exactly play Far Cry or Halo 'surprisingly well' - I had to drop res to 10x12 and run at medium settings. I think karlotta's point is that we could be doing this in tomorrow's games on today's SM3 hardware.

You can play FarCry at 1024x768 with 0xAA 4xAF on a stock 9800 Pro / 3500+ with VHQ set on everything apart from Water and Shadow quality, which were set to high, frame rates outdoors averaged in the 45-50 frames per second area.

It depends whether you feel that AA is important or not.

 

[Moloch]

Speaking of far cry, I get almost the same frame rate on my 2500+@ 3200 with my 6600GT on the supplied training demo with 2x aa and 4x aa(with 16X AF at 1024).
At what point does the game become gpu limited?
I have 512ram.. I do notice a few stutters, but it's the framerate outside that's killing the fps- it goes around 18-30fps.
I also didn't notice much of a difference going from stock cpu clocks(1833) to 2.2ghz speeds.
I don't notice my HDD be accessed either
Other levels seem to run better, cept regulator.

 

[bigz]

your average is around 18-30fps outside?

In the past, I have run FarCry at 1024 with 0xAA 8xAF VHQ ('cept water quality set to High) on a 6600GT AGP @ reference clocks with a 2500+ @ 3200+ with 1GB of RAM... playable at 40-50fps average in all outdoor levels. Minimum frame rate is around 20-23fps, but that occurs on an autosave.

If you want to use AA at 1024 on a 6600GT with a smooth frame rate, you're going to have to lower the in-game details to HQ. Also, why do you need 16xAF? I don't see a great difference between 4xAF and 16xAF in the real-world, certainly in FarCry's outdoor, vegetation-heavy levels - I'd opt for 8xAF if you're fussy.

 

[Blastman]

In my testing I found that the big frame rate killer in Farcry is the … Environment Quality … setting -- on the outdoor levels. Set that to medium and you can turn some of the other settings up past medium even on a 9600XT with good frame rates. The Environment settings AFAIKT just adds a lot more vegetation to the environment which really loads the GPU, but doesn’t really look any better IMO.

I also found 4AF runs much faster than 8/16AF and provides almost the same IQ (at least the difference appeared much less than in other games).

Edit- I ran med-settings in Farcry then …

Textures = Very High
Shadows = Low
Lighting Q. = High

With performance 4AF (set in CP), with good frame rates on my 9600XT at 10x7. I thought this was the best combination of IQ vs performance.

 

[Moloch]

your average is around 18-30fps outside?

In the past, I have run FarCry at 1024 with 0xAA 8xAF VHQ ('cept water quality set to High) on a 6600GT AGP @ reference clocks with a 2500+ @ 3200+ with 1GB of RAM... playable at 40-50fps average in all outdoor levels. Minimum frame rate is around 20-23fps, but that occurs on an autosave.

If you want to use AA at 1024 on a 6600GT with a smooth frame rate, you're going to have to lower the in-game details to HQ. Also, why do you need 16xAF? I don't see a great difference between 4xAF and 16xAF in the real-world, certainly in FarCry's outdoor, vegetation-heavy levels - I'd opt for 8xAF if you're fussy.

In Regulator I only get 31fps- so 2X AA for the vegitation heavy maps.
With 2X aa and 8AF, here are my results.

Maximum quality option, Direct3D renderer
Level: Regulator, demo: Regulator.tmd
Pixel shader: default model
Antialising: 4×
Anisotrophic filtering: 8×

Score = 38.21 FPS (Run 1)
Score = 46.31 FPS (Run 2)
Average score = 42.25 FPS

Btw, I also have to say, far cry looks alot better than half life 2, as far are world detail goes, facial animations(and detail) still goto HL2, but the Hl2 world looks very bland compared to far cry.
I already beat the game, so I just use it for benchmarking.
I was using forced refresh rates, I disabled them as I installed Hl2.. and needless to say, it ran like shit.
Now it runs ok, a little chopy in some places.
I use 8AF now, dont notice a big diff, even in HL2.

benchies for you, note- first canals bench is no sounds/ reflect world, 2nd is reflect all, and third is with 5.1 sound, rest use 5.1 and reflect all.
HL2 loves AA, too bad my card is borderline acceptable at 1024, which what those benchmarks are at.

 

[Mark]

I thought I'd just throw this in... kinda skimmed over most of the posts so pardon if it's mad OT.

Anyway, recently got through checking out a 6600GT and in Chronicles of Riddick. Enabling the "Shader Model 3.0" path absolutely kills framerate on the 6600GT, something like 50% slower when compared to the SM2.0 path, even when using low resolutions. I'm wondering if anyone has a higer-end 6-series card to check it out with?

There's a timedemo here to test with. The Riddick console opens with ctrl-alt-~

 

[Moloch]

this thread is now about game performance with 6600GTs.
dont have that game- i hate vin crapsel, whats the deal with pasaphire? trying to make it big?
It seems odd SM3 would slow it d own, since its supposed to speed stuff up.
Btw, can you do most of the stuff in you can do in DX9 with a DX8.1 card, just it will be much slower?
I noticed with HL2, there isn't a ton of difference, theres like subtle differences(compared to 8500).
I do think far cry looks much better btw, I haven't seen far maxed in dx8.1 mode- is there a way I can force that mode?

 

[London Geezer]

A PDF containing a game of 'BS Bingo' landed in the inbox of many of these attendees from an anonymous sauce

What, Bolognese or Spicy Chicken? Must be one hell of a sacue if it can even send emails...
Gotta LOVE the Inquirer...

 

[ChrisRay]

I thought I'd just throw this in... kinda skimmed over most of the posts so pardon if it's mad OT.

Anyway, recently got through checking out a 6600GT and in Chronicles of Riddick. Enabling the "Shader Model 3.0" path absolutely kills framerate on the 6600GT, something like 50% slower when compared to the SM2.0 path, even when using low resolutions. I'm wondering if anyone has a higer-end 6-series card to check it out with?

There's a timedemo here to test with. The Riddick console opens with ctrl-alt-~

Theres a SM 3.0 path? I thought it was a SM 2.0++(Soft Shadow) mode though. It does slow the game down significantly for all nvidia hardware. I dont think it has anything to do with SM 3.0 though.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Theres a SM 3.0 path? I thought it was a SM 2.0++(Soft Shadow) mode though. That does what you say. But on any hardware that it currently supports. Which I think is Nvidia only atm.

You're thinking rightly. SM2.0++ and nVidia only atm in Riddick.