MSAA + HDR benchmarks ?

[Apple740]

Rys, if you have some time can you post some nice screenies, 1280x1024/6xAA/8xAF?

(it seems that you're not sure yet if it's 6xAA what your seeing, but maybe we can help.)

It's the second time i've done this request, but still no reaction. Is there something to hide?

 

[PatrickL]

You are confusing request and order. Rys will prolly do when he will have enough free time.

 

[Tridam]

I tried this patch some days ago and AA was not working at all on my system. HDR rendering with X1800 was similar to Nvidia's rendering but performance was disappointing(6800GT faster than X1800XL in my demo).

 

[Skrying]

I tried this patch some days ago and AA was not working at all on my system. HDR rendering with X1800 was similar to Nvidia's rendering but performance was disappointing(6800GT faster than X1800XL in my demo).

Odd, that makes no sense at all compared to what I've read at other sites as far as HDR performance on other sites.

From my knowledge, the patch does not allow you to adjust the amount of AA, rather its set already. Are you sure that's not the case right now?

 

[Tridam]

Odd, that makes no sense at all compared to what I've read at other sites as far as HDR performance on other sites.

From my knowledge, the patch does not allow you to adjust the amount of AA, rather its set already. Are you sure that's not the case right now?

I can see if AA is working or not
Maybe the patch I got is buggy or something.

 

[Reverend]

Because few apps enable it due to the HDR path being coded on NV4x/G70.

Crytek are working on a Far Cry patch and some of us now have a very Beta version that we can look at, but from the performances it appears that its not changing AA depth when you change the numbers. We're looking at in the 30FPS range at 1600x1200 with HDR + MSAA, but I don't know what level of AA that is if Crytek has hardcoded it.

Why should/would it be need to be unadjustable? It'll be a patch where we cannot adjust AA, or the patch is a tech demo?

 

[Reverend]

(as even ATI haven't been able to do much in the way of driver optimisation)

Why?

It's cool you've been the ATI spokesperson on a number of matters (it's all been like interviews, really) but it'd be better if ATI personnels that have seen fit to participate here actually let us (or me, whatever) hear it from them. ATI is a public company, selective disclosure is illegal.

 

[DemoCoder]

Careful, I got nailed in the past for bringing this up. (How dare I notice the distribution of talking points from within ATI thru Dave point out it looks like IHV bias)

 

[rwolf]

Why?

It's cool you've been the ATI spokesperson on a number of matters (it's all been like interviews, really) but it'd be better if ATI personnels that have seen fit to participate here actually let us (or me, whatever) hear it from them. ATI is a public company, selective disclosure is illegal.

I don't think that prevents companies from talking to their customers about their products.

 

[IgnorancePersonified]

What's the fuss?

If nvidia were not so anally retentive on their relationships with "teh community" and fostered open dialogue(any dialouge) maybe there wouldn't be any of these misinterpretations of the situation here floating around?? I don't expect a call from <insert IHV here> PR explaining the intricacies of a particular technicality that just got discovered or uncovered(depending on your level of cynicism) but would expect they gave a call to "someone" and that further light was shed on that technicality. It's being open without revealing industry secrets and fosters a more mature relationship with customers.

I am reading the thread about the MR unit and thoroughly enjoying it. There are more interesting tidbits there than any driver release notes I have ever read. I also like hearing things muttered by little birdies into "anybodies" ear clearing up issues.

I think it's a good thing. I wish more of it. Why doesn't it happen more?

I don't think there is a fine line between being too open or too closed with product information in any case nvidia regularly proves they can't see the line or have very little concept it's there. Isn't PR - and life - a favours game anyway? "it's not what you know but who you know" and all those sayings. So someone here knows more people in better places and so gets more data - I am struggling to see individual problem's with that

Sounds like an attempt to further mans creation of the laws underlying the Grand Unified Conspiracy Theory.

 

[Dave Baumann]

Why should/would it be need to be unadjustable? It'll be a patch where we cannot adjust AA, or the patch is a tech demo?

Under most circumstances, its fairly normal for AA to be adjustable, which is why it should be adjustable on the patch. The patch is just fairly beta at the moment, although I have heard that the AA is adjustable, just very sensitive to the ordering of the commands.

Why?

It's cool you've been the ATI spokesperson on a number of matters (it's all been like interviews, really) but it'd be better if ATI personnels that have seen fit to participate here actually let us (or me, whatever) hear it from them. ATI is a public company, selective disclosure is illegal.

Thats not really the ways things work though, is it. However, having known when R520 came back I was the one that had created the impression that drivers are likely to be fairly optimised - having subsequently spent more time getting to chat with various people over the tech weekend I learnt more about the issue they had and understood why performance optimisation wasn't necessarily able to be pursued; as the subsequent patch released yesterday bears testament to. All of this is just information, information can be interesting to the people here and it helps create a more interesting story in the articles.

 

[Rys]

I can see if AA is working or not
Maybe the patch I got is buggy or something.

Yeah, it is quite buggy. You can make it work though with a combination of variable settings and how you launch the .exe, along with a .dll swap.

I'll PM you with my methods to make it work. You're right with your comments on performance too, it's not very fast right now.

For everyone else that hasn't seen Wavey's article image, here's one just to prove it works. 1600x1200, 6xAA, HDR7. Sorry for any JPEG compression artifacts, unblemished PNG on request.

 

[cho]

Yeah, it is quite buggy. You can make it work though with a combination of variable settings and how you launch the .exe, along with a .dll swap.

I'll PM you with my methods to make it work. You're right with your comments on performance too, it's not very fast right now.

For everyone else that hasn't seen Wavey's article image, here's one just to prove it works. 1600x1200, 6xAA, HDR7. Sorry for any JPEG compression artifacts, unblemished PNG on request.

can you provide a g70 screenshot at same view point

 

[Sharkfood]

Because few apps enable it due to the HDR path being coded on NV4x/G70.

I'm a little confused here also, and stand with Rev concerning "Why is this even needed?"

For application pref/AA support, it makes sense. Obviously, if it's coded for NV4x, if you have HDR + AA selected in the application, AA will be disabled in code (multiple render target FP16 anways, like Far Cry) as the NV4x cannot do this.

But the question is- why can AA simply be forced in drivers and work? It would beg two conclusions:
1) HDR +AA (RTT/MRT) only works for application controlled AA (not forced/driver level)
2) Forced/driver level AA is ignored if the application specifically disables AA.

Are 1,2 or both the case with the R500-series + drivers at current?

 

[Xmas]

It's 1). Driver-forced AA only affects the framebuffer, no other render targets.

 

[Kombatant]

I'll PM you with my methods to make it work. You're right with your comments on performance too, it's not very fast right now.

Heh, I still remember people in Ibiza juggling with the options in order to make it work; it seemed to have a mind of its own Glad to see that you've found a definite method that Just Works(tm)

 

[KimB]

1) HDR +AA (RTT/MRT) only works for application controlled AA (not forced/driver level)

As Xmas said, forced AA only works on the framebuffer. Just bear in mind that this means that AA is still being applied to the framebuffer, even if the game uses RTT. This means that while you won't get any benefit from the AA (since the geometry data has already disappeared by the time anything is rendered to the framebuffer), but you do get the performance hit.

 

[Apple740]

Yeah, it is quite buggy.

Any news yet if a good working patch is coming soon?

 

[SugarCoat]

Seriously, if ATI wants some good press. DevRel or whoever it is that does the "Get into the Game" Program, needs to get its finger out and work with devs who have HDR in the game.

Getting a good number of Titles working with HDR+AA and then getting with some tops sites (not [H]) and highlighting this feature and saying the competition doesnt have it and there is hardly any drop in FPS.

Im sure it would do more good than anything else.

But wait, surely someone at ATI PR thought of this.. hmm....

Nvidia certainly had no clue how to do it on a hardware level only a few months ago, and if they didnt know, im sure not many if any game developers knew either. Im a little bit miffed at how useful this will prove to be in the end. I mean if it takes them a year to actually get definitive stability and patches, maybe Nvidia's idea of doing AA+HDR in engine together to get it off the GPU wasnt so dumb after all. Im sure they're in fast persuit of ATI for their own type, though i have no idea how long that would take with the stance of non-possability earlier this year, but still usefulness remains to be seen.

I cant help but feel that we need to stick with something; as i see us heading the way of multiple ways to accomplish the same objective but causing confusion to end users and programmers. Personally; as far as how HDR stands now, Valve's method is proving to absolutly be the most effective for compatability, accomplishing what its suppose to, and ease of use.

Rather then have popular titles get released and needing specific patches for Nvidia and/or ATI hardware alike, i think i'd prefer a universal way, which is why i still think Kirks earlier thoughts about AA/HDR being in-engine, are still very attractive. Mostly because it free's transisters up for other things.

I see this as something ATI may have on Nvidia well into 2006, again though, i see anything that one company has over the other, especially something that may play a major role in future game engines, as being detrimental to us, the gamers, in the end. I hope ATI could actually let Nvidia in on how they did it, they did open 3DC after all, sort of get a standard going. I just really dont want to see 3 or 4 completely different ways to do HDR + your specialty with ATI doing half, Nvidia doing the other, and us waiting for patches for either/or on speciifc games.

 

[Humus]

I mean if it takes them a year to actually get definitive stability and patches, maybe Nvidia's idea of doing AA+HDR in engine together to get it off the GPU wasnt so dumb after all.

Oh it's pretty dumb. Multisampling isn't going anywhere. It will still be the most efficient way to deal with polygon edges. And it's easy to use as well. My dollars are on that it's still the preferred method to deal with edge aliasing ten years from now.