Egg on ATI's face?

[Ostsol]

The only new texture compression standard I heard ATI was working on was a variant on DXT5 to be used for HILO normal maps.

 

[anaqer]

I still have a hard time believeing the X800SE specs - either the 128bit or the 300USD part is very wrong. It has to be wrong.

 

[tEd]

No, but I am kind of suprised with people claiming 70% gains with X800pro over NV40... especially given the above specs...

I agree.

There is one possible explanation for that kind of gain with respect to the specific benchmark (Far Cry.):

http://www.oc.com.tw/article/0404/readgoodarticle.asp?id=2533

Question three:Radeon in the X800 product, ATi has developed a new 3Dc technology, what significance said such technical representative to ATi? Also will the future be able to consider in will support such technical at the game to join the correlation support Logo? But at present supports this specification the product not to be as if many, can ATi worry such technology, can become likes nVIDIA CG to be same, becomes the specification which applauds does not attract a large audience?

ANS:At present more and more many games, in order to pursue the better picture effect and in order to let the picture 滑順, needs more and more many to use to paste the chart material quality, but these can quite take the memory body support, we construct construct the 3Dc such material quality compression technology, provides the user in not to take under the condition which the memory body supports, but also may have 滑順 picture nature. At present including Half-Life 2, game and so on Far Cry all has joined to the 3Dc support, after simultaneously we estimated this May E3 computer game unfolds, will be able to have the more games merchant publication correlation to support 3Dc the game, we also will be able above to consider will use such Logo in the merchant cooperates. Moreover 3Dc is a new specification, always unavoidably can have some questions, but here 1. which explained with you is, compares uses the seal room to CG the overhead construction to say, 3Dc is with a Windows accommodating standard, to the game merchant said we are the completely open overhead construction, to the game merchant said must use it quite to be also easy, therefore we believed it except applauds, but also can attract a large audience only then rightly.

That article talks about ATI supporting "3Dc", which appears to be a new (texture?) compression standard. And it mentions that both half-Life2 and Far Cry will support it.

It may be that such a gain as 70% can be seen in titles that support 3Dc?

i think it's the new compression format for normal maps

 

[jimmyjames123]

but I am kind of suprised with people claiming 70% gains with X800pro over NV40

70% gains would not be surprising when comparing the NV40's 8xAA to ATI's highest implementation. This is because the NV40 uses a mix of SS and MS in their 8xAA mode, which slows down performance tremendously. In fact, the NV40 in 8xAA mode is barely faster, and at times slower, than the 9800XT and 5950.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

If incase the R42x is 70% faster than the NV40.. can/could we expect another NV30 senario?? What I mean is will Nvidia drop the NV40 and try to release the NV45 soon??

Which begs another question.. isn't the current NV40 supposed to be the NV45?? Rumours have suggested it is.

US

 

[991060]

If incase the R42x is 70% faster than the NV40.. can/could we expect another NV30 senario?? What I mean is will Nvidia drop the NV40 and try to release the NV45 soon??

Which begs another question.. isn't the current NV40 supposed to be the NV45?? Rumours have suggested it is.

US

NV40 would become to NV30 if everyone uses 8xAA, otherwise it'll be just fine.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Yes.. performance wise I would think the NV40 would still fine for consumers(if the prices was set right). But would Nvidia be happy with being second in the graphics industry? They weren't with the NV30.

Of course they still would have the only SM3.0 H/w out atm and we've all seen that they seem to be marketing SM3.0 for dear life atm.

US

 

[DemoCoder]

I have my doubts 8x will be that important. Most people don't run in 6x right now. 8x would exceed the bandwidth of 1.2Ghz GDDR3 by a hefty margin. It'll be good for bragging rights in screenshot contests tho.

I think we'll have to wait for a TBDR before we start efficiently scaling to hi-AA. Will PVR please get off their butts?

 

[991060]

Yes.. performance wise I would think the NV40 would still fine for consumers(if the prices was set right). But would Nvidia be happy with being second in the graphics industry? They weren't with the NV30.

Of course they still would have the only SM3.0 H/w out atm and we've all seen that they seem to be marketing SM3.0 for dear life atm.

US

Well, you can say a product is in 2nd place because it has inferior performance, but what about those additional features? Are they be there for nothing? Most of us weigh a product's value using many factors, performance could be the most important one, but it's never the solo one.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

True 991060.. but we also had Nvidia say that the R300 was an overkill because it had PS/VS2.0 when it wasn't needed in the market at that moment and therefore asking people to buy their cards.

Do you think Nvidia will turn around now and say.. "don't buy our card now cause it's not really needed at this moment"..?? No I certainly don't.

I expect people and developers to buy the card for the features .. but still I ask.. Would Nvidia be happy with second place in the graphics arena??

US

 

[Stryyder]

Yes.. performance wise I would think the NV40 would still fine for consumers(if the prices was set right). But would Nvidia be happy with being second in the graphics industry? They weren't with the NV30.

Of course they still would have the only SM3.0 H/w out atm and we've all seen that they seem to be marketing SM3.0 for dear life atm.

US

Well, you can say a product is in 2nd place because it has inferior performance, but what about those additional features? Are they be there for nothing? Most of us weigh a product's value using many factors, performance could be the most important one, but it's never the solo one.

Since we have no idea what features R4xx will support all this is premature.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

True.. guess we'll find out on Monday.

Damn .. I wish monday was tomorrow already .. but I also don't want to miss the GP this weekend.

US

 

[joe emo]

I have my doubts 8x will be that important. Most people don't run in 6x right now. 8x would exceed the bandwidth of 1.2Ghz GDDR3 by a hefty margin. It'll be good for bragging rights in screenshot contests tho.

I think we'll have to wait for a TBDR before we start efficiently scaling to hi-AA. Will PVR please get off their butts?

ATi's 6x AA is usefull in some games, especially if you've got a 9800XT. Because of poor font scaling in several titles, I use 1024x768 & 6X AA if cranking the res brings the font size to small.

 

[Doomtrooper]

Especially comparing PS 2.0 to SM 3.0 vs SM 3.0 to PS_2_b, I would be more concerned about VS 3.0.

 

[WaltC]

Well, I'm puzzled about the title of this thread.

I did just read, however, a little tidbit written by the Inquirer (have temporarily misplaced the link, sorry) which tells a story of SirEric waking up this morning, walking over to his bedroom window and throwing it open, inhaling a lungful of clean, fresh air, and then bellowing out to the bustling street below, "Good morning world! What a great day it is to be alive! How marvelous, how wonderf--"

When he is hit in the face by a flying cheese omelet hurled from a passenger riding atop a passing double-decker bus.

Is that what you're talking about here?

 

[AlphaWolf]

70% gains would not be surprising when comparing the NV40's 8xAA to ATI's highest implementation. This is because the NV40 uses a mix of SS and MS in their 8xAA mode, which slows down performance tremendously. In fact, the NV40 in 8xAA mode is barely faster, and at times slower, than the 9800XT and 5950.

The 70% claim was made in regard to TR:AoD not far cry. Although people were attempting to extrapolate the farcry fraps shot into something also.

200-500% would not be surprising if comparing to nv40 8xAA. The 8xAA on nv40 is really really slow compared to other performance. The 9800xt with 6xAA will usually outperform (by a fair margin) the n40's 8xAA.

 

[joe emo]

If I'm not mistaken SM stands for shader model and incorporates pixel & vertex shader -- SM2.0 means PS2.0, 2.x, et al + VS2.0; SM3.0 means PS3.0 + VS3.0.

 

[Doomtrooper]

ATi's 6x AA is usefull in some games, especially if you've got a 9800XT. Because of poor font scaling in several titles, I use 1024x768 & 6X AA if cranking the res brings the font size to small.

I use 6XAA on Dungeon Siege, NFSHPS 2, NHL 2004, Mafia, Max Payne 2..and I have a 9700 Pro.

 

[Doomtrooper]

If I'm not mistaken SM stands for shader model and incorporates pixel & vertex shader -- SM2.0 means PS2.0, 2.x, et al + VS2.0; SM3.0 means PS3.0 + VS3.0.

You can support VS 3.0 seperatley without support PS 3.0.

 

[trinibwoy]

ATi's 6x AA is usefull in some games, especially if you've got a 9800XT. Because of poor font scaling in several titles, I use 1024x768 & 6X AA if cranking the res brings the font size to small.

I use 6XAA on Dungeon Siege, NFSHPS 2, NHL 2004, Mafia, Max Payne 2..and I have a 9700 Pro.

What's the rest of your system look like? I have a hard time believing some of that unless you have a killer rig behind that 9700 PRO

edit: and what res are you running those games at?