Sony ID Buffer *spawn*

[Shortbread]

I think SB's statements that "almost none wants to use the ID buffer," that its "difficult to use," and the option towards the "shortcomings in the hardware" are somewhat hyperbolic, rather than actual fact.

The CBR method (ID buffering) by PS4-Pro might not be favorable for all game engine pipelines, not all hardware solutions are. But a blanket statement of essentially calling the solution terrible, doesn't even compute with Dictator's responses and sources on the matter. If anything, it's just developers choosing what best fits their engine and needs. GG went with their own method, while SMS went with Sony's CBR method.

 

[iroboto]

Since this is supposed to be the hardware prediction thread, I will make a very bold hardware prediction.

PS5 will have ID buffer, and fp16 RPM.

Anyone disagree?

I believe there is ID buffer equivalence in X1X but MS chooses not to discuss it. As Fp16 is already with Navi; this seems locked unless they want to custom remove it.

 

[Rootax]

Can Sony even remove ID Buffer if they want "easy" backward compatibility ?

 

[MrFox]

I believe there is ID buffer equivalence in X1X but MS chooses not to discuss it. As Fp16 is already with Navi; this seems locked unless they want to custom remove it.

Sony's ID buffer implementation seems very specific. Custom hardware added to write poly/obj ID at the same time as the Z.

What's MS implementation?

 

[iroboto]

Sony's ID buffer implementation seems very specific. Custom hardware added to write poly/obj ID at the same time as the Z.

What's MS implementation?

It was mentioned but never revealed. I honesty don’t know what it is; or how deep the solution goes. (If it has ever been used)

I do recall on scorpio launch that they had checkerboarding solutions. I’ll need to go look it up.

 

[DavidGraham]

Sounds like ID Buffer is sort of being treated similarly to tiled resources. There is a hardware implementation, but the developers would rather use their own due to flexibility and control over it. I recall Gears 4 having Tiled Resources option (one of the very few), was that feature removed for Gears 5?

No, it's still there.

 

[MrFox]

It was mentioned but never revealed. I honesty don’t know what it is; or how deep the solution goes. (If it has ever been used)

I do recall on scorpio launch that they had checkerboarding solutions. I’ll need to go look it up.

My understanding is that checkerboard and hardware ID buffer are not that directly related. Journalists conflated the two a bit too much. Anything can do CBR, and the ID buffer is useable for much more than just CBR, it's for any temporal sampling, finding edges, and some forms of AA. And there are many ways to do CBR without using an ID buffer.

 

[PSman1700]

If games like Spiderman look as good or even better without ID buffer, i wouldn't know why devs would use it in the PS5. FP16 is standard in AMD GPU's since 2016?

 

[AlNom]

https://forum.beyond3d.com/threads/id-buffer-and-dr-fp16.60209/

I dee with a little buffer, something that is threaded.

(The texture gradient adjustment seems more interesting anyway)

(something something miserable little pile of three sides triangles)

 

[MrFox]

If games like Spiderman look as good or even better without ID buffer, i wouldn't know why devs would use it in the PS5. FP16 is standard in AMD GPU's since 2016?

Where's this insomniac engine with CBR+ID Buffer to compare with? How do you know how it looks?

Otherwise you should also ask yourself if GT Sport and God of War, and Detroit, look better using ID buffer, why doesn't everybody use it?

It seems to be a complicated decision, game dependent, engine dependent, and some development effort to get it right. It's not some flag to enable at compile time.

 

[see colon]

ID buffer will most likely not make a return for the PS5, due to it's limited success.

Wouldn't they have to have ID Buffer to maintain compatibility? Unless PS5 is just going to run those PS4 games in non-pro mode, which would sort of be a) Terrible and b) Sort of a Sony thing to do that both makes sense, and doesn't make sense at the same time.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Wouldn't they have to have ID Buffer to maintain compatibility? Unless PS5 is just going to run those PS4 games in non-pro mode, which would sort of be a) Terrible and b) Sort of a Sony thing to do that both makes sense, and doesn't make sense at the same time.

ID buffer is doing something that can be done in compute, so possibly they could emulate its function. But according to posters here, practically no-one is using the ID buffer anyway.

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

If Sony is serious about VR next gen, they'll have the ID buffer (and some other customization) to accelerate TSS. By reusing shaded polys for the second viewport they can get the frame time for both eyes way, way down.

 

[chris1515]

If Sony is serious about VR next gen, they'll have the ID buffer (and some other customization) to accelerate TSS. By reusing shaded polys for the second viewport they can get the frame time for both eyes way, way down.

And people forget ID buffer can be useful for other things than CBR and it was not on base PS4... I think if Sony must retain one lesson from the mid-gen console, fancy features aren't so important because everything not available on the base consoles will be underutilized same thing for FP16(in Xbox One X too) or RPM. It is better to "brute force" the architecture of mid-gen console. I expect better utilization of some of the mid-gen features in next-generation games than current-gen and cross-generation games...

 

[Recop]

It may have an impact on performances, but until now we don't see a particular advantage quality wise in actual games. I mean games using reconstruction techniques just look as good on MS consoles.

 

[Shortbread]

It may have an impact on performances, but until now we don't see a particular advantage quality wise in actual games.

The whole reasoning behind CBR is to save and/or gain back shader/pixel performance without breaking the bank on high resolution rendering (such as native 4K). If consoles could brute force native 4K (and above) without impacting performance targets (i.e., framerates), then CBR methods wouldn't be necessary in most cases. Point being, CBR is a solution for providing higher resolution imagery without a great cost to performance. So there is an advantage to having CBR this generation and the next-generation.

 

[BRiT]

I think part of the nuance of having discussion is some use CBR to mean any reconstruction techniques (even those without checkerboarding) while some use it to mean specifically using the ID Buffer hardware assist.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

If Sony is serious about VR next gen, they'll have the ID buffer (and some other customization) to accelerate TSS. By reusing shaded polys for the second viewport they can get the frame time for both eyes way, way down.

Unless they have eye-tracked foveated rendering which is even more important. Then VR is far more efficient than TV gaming.

 

[iroboto]

I think part of the nuance of having discussion is some use CBR to mean any reconstruction techniques (even those without checkerboarding) while some use it to mean specifically using the ID Buffer hardware assist.

Agreed. I have been using CBR as a catch all term for all reconstruction. Mainly because I don’t know how to short form reconstruction to a 3 letter acronym.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

All we really need is a new acronym for CBR that resolves to generic reconstruction. Compute-Based Reconstruction.