State of the Graphics Industry Rant

[darkblu]

You are treating this like it doesn't render at 45 degree angles, atleast it seems so to me.

not at all. i'm not treating it like that, as even if it produced a blank frame that would still be 'rendering'.

Their options are to live with the tradeoffs. The same as with the other tradeoffs mentioned in this thread. What about the GF user that has to go to a lower resolution to use anisotropic filtering at all and get acceptable performance? Your example ignores that aspect of the issue. That is my understanding of Joe's point for the user's viewpoint.

what about them? - they switch to a lower res and have both acceptable performance and proper visuals.

See, you are proposing a statement like "the visuals for those flight-sim players were never met" as if that statement is a valid objective criteria.

those customers of that title never saw the visuals as those were originally meant to be seen. that's a fairly objective criterion to me.

Does the definition even cover whether they do or do not have to consistent anisotropic filtering coverage? Does it say anything about angles? I thought it was established that rip mapping (which the 8500 doesn't do), which has a much more noticeable set of limitations for rendering, fits the definition of anisotropic filtering...this seems to make your argument a bit invalid doesn't it?

it doesn't say anyting about primitives' roll angles, and that's exactly the essence of the problem - anisotropy degree is not supposed to be affected by that. it is supposed to be affetced by tilt angles, as it is stated in the specs accordingly.

as re ripmapping - let's get it streight. ripmapping is an anisotropy -aiming technique, but nowhere it is stated it 'fits the definition of anisotropic filtering' - it's a particular approximation, which, if implemented with proper interpolation across the ripmaps, and given an exhaustive set of ripmaps supplied, together with an adequate handling of the 45-degr extremal case, could produce angle-agnostic results.

To me it reads like you are using definitions backwards. In any case, I think this is a separate argument from the user's visuals "never being met". I'd be interested in your take on my rip mapping comment, however.

yes, it's the same argument. visauls are not met because developers' expectation about the output of device X were not met, which, on its turn was becasue device X did not have a consistent implementation of feature Y.

 

[darkblu]

It's all about market share. If "every" IHV decided to go the Radeon8500 aniso route (as you imply would happen), then that would by definition create a market for a new vendor to create a card that would get 100% market share of the flight-sim market, by virture of having a differentiated product.

so the consumer ends up with one card for flight sims, one card for fps', one for rpg's, etc. basically you end up with lots and lots of niche products. it somehow counters the topic of our discussion - mainstream consumer products, i believe.

That's the "magic" of a free economy and competition. It regulates itself (for the most part).

for the most part, it does. do those self-regulations come at no price for the consumer, though?

Says who? I could just as well argue that "basic flight sim" quality requirements are handled with bilinear filtering. Ansio just gives "comfort".

says the developer who produced his title with, say, aniso 4 and not bilinear in mind.

As I said...hardware is made with developers in mind to the extent that developers use them to also sell products to consumers.

JC can say all he wants...that doesn't seem to impact the tons and tons of TNT's, Rage Pros and GeForce MX cards being sold....

i never said he could impact the sells of each and every card under the sun. still, he could impact the sales of some cards, to a degree that IHV are very cautious about him. or no?

Uh...yes. Correctly rendering the console. I wouldn't be fond of the drivers either if they couldn't get past the console without breaking down. Or do you think R200 didin't "aniso" the console correctly, and at this, Carmack wasn't pleased?

aniso is irrelevant to this point, and i think you got that point very well, no need to try dragging astray now.

Technically, yes, it would be OK. But will consumers be "pleased" when they fire up Doom3, and are greated with red sphere's, no textures, etc? No.

neither were consumers pleased when they fired up their favorite flight-sim and saw broken aniso in the middle of the screen. still, you think it was quite alright.

Aside from me thinking you would apply some common sense to the issue, my point is, there are of course limits to what consumers would be "pleased" with. If one IHV believes that just skipping textures and replacing all meshes with rectangular red blocks at 10000 FPS would be "pleasing enough" to consumers, best of luck to them.

yep. and still, somebody has to hint the repsective IHV of their wrong choice, no?

 

[Joe DeFuria]

so the consumer ends up with one card for flight sims, one card for fps', one for rpg's, etc.

Alternatively, the consumer ends up being able to choose from several cards all about the same, none of which do any one thing very well..."jack of all trades / master of none."

for the most part, it does. do those self-regulations come at no price for the consumer, though?

No more price than "forcing" regulations that limit vendors from trying to differentiate their products with unique approaches.

says the developer who produced his title with, say, aniso 4 and not bilinear in mind.

And what of the user who can't use aniso 4, because it's too slow, and thus must use aniso 2?

It's all about TRADEOFFS. Why can't you appreciate that?

still, he could impact the sales of some cards, to a degree that IHV are very cautious about him. or no?

Sure. No IHV wants to make a card that "doesn't run a Carmack game"...but ultimately, that's because CONSUMERS demand that the card runs Carmack games. Understand?

aniso is irrelevant to this point, and i think you got that point very well,

Yes, the point is, if the driver / hardware has GROSS ERRORS in terms of what is displayed, that is a bad thing, and Carmack is not very tolerant of it. (Because consumers won't be tolerant of it.) The point is not "if some implementation trades some quality for speed, Carmack is intolerant of it."

yep. and still, somebody has to hint the repsective IHV of their wrong choice, no?

Yes. Ultimately, consumers will decide if they like the product.

Case(s) in point: the original PowerVR Apocalypse 3D, and the Matrox Mystique.

IIRC, Neither of these cards supported bilinear filtering, just point sampling. In addition, the Mystique did not support alpha blending, but what they called "screendoor transparency" (basically dithering 100% opaque and 100% transparent pixels).

Neither of those products lasted very long against the competion, once consumers saw boards with bilinear filtering and alpha blending (like the Voodoo and Redition boards.)

 

[KimB]

The Radeon 9700 ANIS is even better then the Geforce, quite impressive really.

Not that impressive, and the reason should be obvious. The Radeon 9700 supports 16-degree anisotropic, and now that the problems have been fixed, it is able to always produce superior anisotropic than the GeForce 3/4 (assuming 16-degree aniso is enabled, of course).

If you ask me, it's somewhat disappointing, as all that ATI did was "fix" their anisotropic implementation. They did nothing to improve it (i.e. they didn't move to 32-degree anisotropic). Not that ATI did anything bad, it's just that it seems they could have done better (ex. I would be more than just a little disappointed if the NV30 only supported the same aniso available in the GF3/4's...that is, 8-degree max).

 

[Snap]

If you ask me, it's somewhat disappointing, as all that ATI did was "fix" their anisotropic implementation. They did nothing to improve it (i.e. they didn't move to 32-degree anisotropic).

Yes, what a disappointment - they provide the highest quality with the least performance hit on the highest perfoming board making it useable across virtually any title. Man, thats such a disapointment.

 

[demalion]

You are treating this like it doesn't render at 45 degree angles, atleast it seems so to me.

not at all. i'm not treating it like that, as even if it produced a blank frame that would still be 'rendering'.

The problem here in my view is that your definition of objective is your own set of subjective criteria. This statement is regarding you treat the lack of aniso in this circumstance as something as absolute as a lack of rendering...your "blank frame" statement strikes me as sophistry. I'll clarify as I go along.

Here is a quote of your words that immediately preceded that to provide a context for my next quote:

why, what would make those IHVs deliver that variety? why would they need conforming to the specs if their non-comformant product received higher fps benchmarks ratings and generally was selling well? what options would fligh-sim players have in this case?

Their options are to live with the tradeoffs. The same as with the other tradeoffs mentioned in this thread. What about the GF user that has to go to a lower resolution to use anisotropic filtering at all and get acceptable performance? Your example ignores that aspect of the issue. That is my understanding of Joe's point for the user's viewpoint.

what about them? - they switch to a lower res and have both acceptable performance and proper visuals.

Do you see how it strikes me as odd that you do not consider your dismissing of the lowered quality in this case as contradictory to your statements about the 45 degree orientation limitation? How your definition of "proper" is subjective yet proposed as objective?

See, you are proposing a statement like "the visuals for those flight-sim players were never met" as if that statement is a valid objective criteria.

those customers of that title never saw the visuals as those were originally meant to be seen. that's a fairly objective criterion to me.

"originally meant to be seen" by what criteria? There is no such criteria beyond rendering the objects in a recognizable form and that is what the minimum specs for a game are for. Anisotropic filtering is a comfort criteria for subjective evaluation, just like fps above a certain level (and that level being subjective as well...though 1 fps is pretty safely unnacceptable for gaming) and higher resolutions (again above a certain level that is subjective as well...though I'm not sure if there are supported resolutions low enough to be disqualified except for the case of text rendering).

You are caught in mistaking your own standard as some sort of stated industry standard.

Does the definition even cover whether they do or do not have to consistent anisotropic filtering coverage? Does it say anything about angles? I thought it was established that rip mapping (which the 8500 doesn't do), which has a much more noticeable set of limitations for rendering, fits the definition of anisotropic filtering...this seems to make your argument a bit invalid doesn't it?

it doesn't say anyting about primitives' roll angles, and that's exactly the essence of the problem -

That is the essence of your problem...you are filling in the blanks yourself.

anisotropy degree is not supposed to be affected by that.

I thought it wasn't mentioned?

it is supposed to be affetced by tilt angles, as it is stated in the specs accordingly.

But it is affected by tilt angles, isn't it?

as re ripmapping - let's get it streight. ripmapping is an anisotropy -aiming technique, but nowhere it is stated it 'fits the definition of anisotropic filtering' - it's a particular approximation,

Hmm, and here I thought all these algorithms were approximations.

which, if implemented with proper interpolation across the ripmaps, and given an exhaustive set of ripmaps supplied, together with an adequate handling of the 45-degr extremal case, could produce angle-agnostic results.

Looking at the definition here on the Beyond3D glossary, I still see no justifications for the assumptions you make (including following 2 links in the process). As far as I can tell, there is isotropic filtering, and there is anisotropic filtering, and both rip-mapping and the Radeon (pre 9500+) method are 1) not isotropic 2) fit the technique described as not being isotropic and addressing the shortcomings of isotropic filtering .

Are we on the same page with rip maps having problems rendering textures not oriented orthogonally? I assume your "adequate handling of the 45-degree extremal case" is in relation to orientation around the Z axis (which wasn't my point) and not orientation of the texture to the viewer (what I had in mind, or is my understanding of the problem with rip-mapping inaccurate?).

To me it reads like you are using definitions backwards. In any case, I think this is a separate argument from the user's visuals "never being met". I'd be interested in your take on my rip mapping comment, however.

yes, it's the same argument.

Hmm...I think I've provided a clear delineation of why its not the same argument. A simpler way of stating this is to ask you to poll consumers who play flight sims and getting past whatever percentage don't even know what anisotropic filtering is and that they can turn it on, I'd ask you how many regard the 8500's problem any differently than having to lower anisotropic filtering settings or turn them off completely on a GF 3 for similar framerates, for example. I.e., as a tradeoff. The illustration of the difference would be that I would also ask you to poll developers for this part of the argument.

visauls are not met because developers' expectation about the output of device X were not met, which, on its turn was becasue device X did not have a consistent implementation of feature Y.

You don't differentiate "you" from a broad and unsubstantiated "developers' expectation". If you have the definition of anisotropic filtering that all developers subscribe to it would be helpful if you posted it.

 

[RussSchultz]

I think IHVs should be able to make up whatever criteria they want for output, that way the customer has all sorts of choices.

 

[darkblu]

Here is a quote of your words that immediately preceded that to provide a context for my next quote:

why, what would make those IHVs deliver that variety? why would they need conforming to the specs if their non-comformant product received higher fps benchmarks ratings and generally was selling well? what options would fligh-sim players have in this case?

Their options are to live with the tradeoffs. The same as with the other tradeoffs mentioned in this thread. What about the GF user that has to go to a lower resolution to use anisotropic filtering at all and get acceptable performance? Your example ignores that aspect of the issue. That is my understanding of Joe's point for the user's viewpoint.

what about them? - they switch to a lower res and have both acceptable performance and proper visuals.

Do you see how it strikes me as odd that you do not consider your dismissing of the lowered quality in this case as contradictory to your statements about the 45 degree orientation limitation? How your definition of "proper" is subjective yet proposed as objective?

and what strikes me as odd, demalion, is that you don't make a difference between proper rendition and customer's comfort criteria. read on.

"originally meant to be seen" by what criteria? There is no such criteria beyond rendering the objects in a recognizable form and that is what the minimum specs for a game are for.

see, demalion, problem is human vision is a very sophisticated apparatus developped and constantly improved in the course of billions of years - it can recognize objects, shapes and patterns under absolutely extreme conditions. and yet, demalion, doom3 requires dot3 tex_op, even though people would not have any problems recognizing all the shapes and figures in the game even w/o dot3.. strange, no?

Anisotropic filtering is a comfort criteria for subjective evaluation, just like fps above a certain level (and that level being subjective as well...though 1 fps is pretty safely unnacceptable for gaming) and higher resolutions (again above a certain level that is subjective as well...though I'm not sure if there are supported resolutions low enough to be disqualified except for the case of text rendering).

You are caught in mistaking your own standard as some sort of stated industry standard.

funny.. whatever, back to proper rendition and comfort criteria.

proper rendition is when using an API's feature X to get the expected results as specified in the api documentation. it has nothing to do with customer's comfort. for instance - you may want that this particular object gets point sampling filtering for its textures, even though it would have looked much "nicer" with trilinear. point is, you are the 'artist' who decide what means convey your original idea and concept best. and if you specify point sampling then it's the duty of the underlying, API-conformat hardware to deliver that, in each and every individual frame for which the feature is active. just as with aniso.

comfort criteria - display refresh rate, resolution, effective framerate. usually those fall in some ranges acceptable per title. that's why the developer usually allows some variance for those which are within his control, i.e. the title runs at resolutions from x to y and is playable at framerates from z to n. display refresh rate is usually beyond the developer's control.

Does the definition even cover whether they do or do not have to consistent anisotropic filtering coverage? Does it say anything about angles? I thought it was established that rip mapping (which the 8500 doesn't do), which has a much more noticeable set of limitations for rendering, fits the definition of anisotropic filtering...this seems to make your argument a bit invalid doesn't it?

it doesn't say anyting about primitives' roll angles, and that's exactly the essence of the problem -

That is the essence of your problem...you are filling in the blanks yourself.

there are not supposed to be blanks in technical documentation. it's not like a fantasy novel, you know.

anisotropy degree is not supposed to be affected by that.

I thought it wasn't mentioned?

exactly because it was not mentioned. neither it was deliberately mentiond it was independent of the day of the week, or the color of the eyes of the reader, and yet it is independet of those!
see, there's a simple logical rule which states that when you make consistent definitions you enumerate the relevant factors, not the irrelevant factors, as the latter are infinite in number, and your definition could never be conistent in a finite space.

it is supposed to be affetced by tilt angles, as it is stated in the specs accordingly.

But it is affected by tilt angles, isn't it?

yes, and?

Looking at the definition here on the Beyond3D glossary, I still see no justifications for the assumptions you make (including following 2 links in the process). As far as I can tell, there is isotropic filtering, and there is anisotropic filtering, and both rip-mapping and the Radeon (pre 9500+) method are 1) not isotropic 2) fit the technique described as not being isotropic and addressing the shortcomings of isotropic filtering.

a technique A addressis a problem B but does not succeed in solving it consistently - we say the technique is flawed. so what is ati's anisotropic filtering - just the same as a non-angle-agnostic ripmapping implemantation - a flawed technique. geez, what's so hard to understand here?

Are we on the same page with rip maps having problems rendering textures not oriented orthogonally? I assume your "adequate handling of the 45-degree extremal case" is in relation to orientation around the Z axis (which wasn't my point) and not orientation of the texture to the viewer (what I had in mind, or is my understanding of the problem with rip-mapping inaccurate?).

you assume wrong. i addressed exactly the u/v-to-viewplane angle problem of ripmapping. i think the real problem here is your understanging of the technique is limited to what yopu read on the net.

Hmm...I think I've provided a clear delineation of why its not the same argument. A simpler way of stating this is to ask you to poll consumers who play flight sims and getting past whatever percentage don't even know what anisotropic filtering is and that they can turn it on, I'd ask you how many regard the 8500's problem any differently than having to lower anisotropic filtering settings or turn them off completely on a GF 3 for similar framerates, for example. I.e., as a tradeoff. The illustration of the difference would be that I would also ask you to poll developers for this part of the argument.

you seem to think of anisotropic filtering as a comfort factor - it's not! it's an api feature which was made available as a comfort factor for the older titles. as a developer i can specify anisotropic of degree N for my title and i would expect it, being an api feature, to behave consistently.

visauls are not met because developers' expectation about the output of device X were not met, which, on its turn was becasue device X did not have a consistent implementation of feature Y.

You don't differentiate "you" from a broad and unsubstantiated "developers' expectation". If you have the definition of anisotropic filtering that all developers subscribe to it would be helpful if you posted it.

i doub't it would be helpful. but if you really want that you can check in my earlier posts, and then carry out a personal survey among several devs.

 

[Joe DeFuria]

darkblu,

You continually fail to see the point that three of us are now trying to tell you.

Every person has different tolerances for quality, performance, and price, and every person will have their own idea of what their ideal balance is between the three.

It is up to the IHVs to determine how they want to balance the three, and then deliver their product. It is up to the CONSUMER to determine if they feel the IHVs product meets their needs. The consumer will vote with his dollar.

problem is human vision is a very sophisticated apparatus developped and constantly improved in the course of billions of years -

Uh, yeah. And I bet that human's yearning to have the best "value" in whatever he receives for his effort / dollar has NOT changed over the course of billions of years.

doom3 requires dot3 tex_op, even though people would not have any problems recognizing all the shapes and figures in the game even w/o dot3.. strange, no?

And that's exactly why SOME consumers will be willing to PAY MORE for video cards that support dot3. Because some consumers will want to play Doom3. What's your point?

proper rendition is when using an API's feature X to get the expected results as specified in the api documentation...

Argh....AGAIN, where is the API documentation for the "expected results" for anisotropic filtering?!

- you may want that this particular object gets point sampling filtering for its textures, even though it would have looked much "nicer" with trilinear.

Let me put it this way. Remember when I said the video cards are primarily "for the consumers" and not the developers?

If they were not for the conusmers, then why are all of those control panel settings in the drivers for AA settings, LOD, aniso, etc. Oh my gosh! The IHV is giving some control over FILTERING settings directly to the consumer! BLASHPHEMY!

And why is this done? DESPITE the "ideal" that every rendered image should appear exactly the same as some "reference software rasterizer" across every single piece of hardware, CONSUMERS DON'T NECESSARILY WANT SOMEONE ELSE'S IDEA OF "CORRECTNESS".

Some cannot afford to buy a card that would render someone else's idea of "correctness" with acceptable performance levels.

Heck...let's just forget the idea of GPUs altogether and just run this all on CPUs. Developers will get consistent results all the time. Problem solved, right?

see, there's a simple logical rule which states that when you make consistent definitions you enumerate the relevant factors, not the irrelevant factors, as the latter are infinite in number, and your definition could never be conistent in a finite space.

???

a technique A addressis a problem B but does not succeed in solving it consistently - we say the technique is flawed. so what is ati's anisotropic filtering - just the same as a non-angle-agnostic ripmapping implemantation - a flawed technique. geez, what's so hard to understand here?

WE UNDERSTAND YOUR POINT.

YOU do not understand ours. For the 15th time using Radeon vs. GeForce aniso as the example:

Radeon's Aniso can be considered "flawed" for partical purposes because it is not consistent.

GeForce's Aniso can be considered "flawed" for practical purposes because it takes such a large performance hit that you would have to lower the anistophy level (relatively speaking) to get similar performance.

IN SHORT: On can consider ATI's method "flawed" from a quality perspecitve, and one can consider nVidia's method "flawed" from a performance perspective.

IT IS SIMPLY A MATTER OF MAKING A TRADE-OFF.

you seem to think of anisotropic filtering as a comfort factor - it's not!

Eh? Says who? If it's not a "comfort factor" then why is the type of filtering used:

1) Given as an option to force in control panels
2) Given as an option to adjust within the application in nearly every game on the planet.

Is there ANY GAME on the market, that forces anisotropic filtering, and does not provide the option for bilienar? If anything it's completely the opposite.

i doub't it would be helpful. but if you really want that you can check in my earlier posts, and then carry out a personal survey among several devs.

I have a better idea. Why don't you carry on a personal survey among several consumers. They are the ones buying the products.

As I said, of course from a DEVELOPER perspective, they would LOVE for each and every card out there to produce consistent, identical results. But then, developers aren't the ones IHVs are SELLING their products to.

Again, as a CONSUMER, I would LOVE to have infinite performance, "infinite" quality, all for zero price. However, I am also realistic. And I'm thankful that we have IHVs taking different approaches to balancing the three. That gives me CHOICE.

 

[Sabastian]

Hrm I know this may be sort of OT from what some here are discussing but I do think that it is relevent to the topic at hand. Here we have a site that declares a double standard in favor of nvidia...... go figure. (PS. I copy pasted this from another board I frequent, just in case it looks familliar.)

"Nvidia Playing the 3DMark Game?

http://www.3dchipset.com/news.shtml#newsitem1030639337,5718,

Nvidia Playing the 3DMark Game? - Thursday, August 29 | Solomon

Reports are coming in that the supposed, "Up to a 25% increase in performance" is only showing in 3DMark2001 benchmark. While playing games, Quake 3 is appearing darker then usual. More and more reports will be coming in regarding the new Detonator 40 driver. From the looks of it, it's not what people where really interested in as you can't play 3DMark2001.

More reports to come...

UPDATE: http://www.3dchipset.com/news.shtml#newsitem1030653283,62055,

Nvidia Detonator 40 Results - Thursday, August 29 | Solomon

I received word from VR Zone that they have tested a couple of games as well as the ever popular 3DMark2001. A minor improvement in games as typical with a new revision release, but the increase in 3DMark2001 is some what questionable.

I'm going to jump on a limb here and say what I have to say because most web sites usually will not talk about Nvidia. I believe these drivers are very controversial. Funny how the only program that gets a huge gain is a native benchmark used across many sites as the definite benchmark. Is this just a mere coincidence? I highly doubt it, but alot of people won't say shit about it. Now if ATi did this sort of thing, sites across the net would just be analyzing and picking the driver set apart so they can point the finger. Just think about this. Compare the 9700 pro reviews at launch to say Nvidia video card launches, then you can basically come to the conclusion that alot of sites are padded by Nvidia. Say what you will, but it's quite obvious that only a few forum users are complaining about the huge increase in the popular 3DMark2001 benchmark program and not in their games that they are playing in. Oh well.. You either bendover and take it up the brown eye and enjoy it or be taken to the back room and suffer the hammer to the fingers! I wonder if ATi got used to the hammer? :-\

UPDATED: http://www.3dchipset.com/news.shtml#newsitem1030658608,48961,

More Detonator 40 Results - Thursday, August 29 | Solomon

I swear Nvidia should just rename this release as, "3DMark2001 Detonators". More results are pooring in and it's basically the same as the other one from VR-Zone. These are only for 3DMark2001. Seems Nvidia just wants to boost up their 3DMark2001 score to help out it's cause against the ATi Radeon 9700 pro. Will it be enough to persuade the viewers? PC Extreme has their results up in German. So for those folks who can't read German bust out the translator if you want to read the words from the benchmarker/reviewer. Or just stare at the charts and results as those are universal."

 

[Sabastian]

The Radeon 9700 supports 16-degree anisotropic, and now that the problems have been fixed, it is able to always produce superior anisotropic than the GeForce 3/4 (assuming 16-degree aniso is enabled, of course).

If you ask me, it's somewhat disappointing, as all that ATI did was "fix" their anisotropic implementation. They did nothing to improve it (i.e. they didn't move to 32-degree anisotropic).

Yes, what a disappointment - they provide the highest quality with the least performance hit on the highest perfoming board making it useable across virtually any title. Man, thats such a disapointment.

I expect that sort of coment from Chalnoth, no surprise really. He had to compensate somehow for declaring that the Radeon 9700 was superior in some way...A rare thing for him to suggest indeed.

 

[darkblu]

Joe,

<sidenote>
i seem to notice a disturbing tencency in your postings - you start quoting sentences out of their context (i.e. out of the paragraph they belong to) and then ask what the original point was. please, we'd save each other time if we try not to do so.</sidenot>

You continually fail to see the point that three of us are now trying to tell you.

Every person has different tolerances for quality, performance, and price, and every person will have their own idea of what their ideal balance is between the three.

It is up to the IHVs to determine how they want to balance the three, and then deliver their product. It is up to the CONSUMER to determine if they feel the IHVs product meets their needs. The consumer will vote with his dollar.

i understand that. honestly, i do. if you check my postings in this thread, i never said the r200 was a bad product, did i? so, as you know, the consumer generally wants the higher quality for his buck. yep, r200 is a good product. but i, for one, and i'm sure others too, would have rather seen the r200 having better aniso quality (in terms of consistence, that is). and my point was there may have been developers among those people, and so i tried to explain why. simple, no?

problem is human vision is a very sophisticated apparatus developped and constantly improved in the course of billions of years -

Uh, yeah. And I bet that human's yearning to have the best "value" in whatever he receives for his effort / dollar has NOT changed over the course of billions of years.

see, the want to receive a more consistent aniso for that buck is innate

doom3 requires dot3 tex_op, even though people would not have any problems recognizing all the shapes and figures in the game even w/o dot3.. strange, no?

And that's exactly why SOME consumers will be willing to PAY MORE for video cards that support dot3. Because some consumers will want to play Doom3. What's your point?

now, here's an example of a sentence taken of its context. read the original para again to catch the context and then you'll see my point.

proper rendition is when using an API's feature X to get the expected results as specified in the api documentation...

Argh....AGAIN, where is the API documentation for the "expected results" for anisotropic filtering?!

you want me to quote to you each and every account on aniso filtering from both d3d and ogl to show you that nowhere it is stated that a pixel exhibiting aniso of degree N can get a different filtering depending on the roll angle of the polygon in screen space? excuse me, but wouldn't it be much easier if you show me just one quote from the docs where it's stated aniso may depend of the roll (i.e. around the z-axis) angle of the poly. sorry for passing the ball on to you, but i hope you realise that if i had come across any such info myself i'd not be in this argument now, would i?

- you may want that this particular object gets point sampling filtering for its textures, even though it would have looked much "nicer" with trilinear.

Let me put it this way. Remember when I said the video cards are primarily "for the consumers" and not the developers?

If they were not for the conusmers, then why are all of those control panel settings in the drivers for AA settings, LOD, aniso, etc. Oh my gosh! The IHV is giving some control over FILTERING settings directly to the consumer! BLASHPHEMY!

those oprions were put there to add extra comfort for the consumer, who could this way
1) improve the visuals of older titles, at the time of which writing certain features were not available so the developers had never had the ability to use those in the original title implementation, and, potentially, missed a better expression of their artistic point.
2) tweak the setting of the modern titles for various other reasons (e.g. performance)

still, that does not imply that the developer did not mean something by using this particular feature in this particular way in his title, and the fact that the consumer has the ability to screw up the original visual form of the title does not imply he is supposed, or even less required do so.

And why is this done? DESPITE the "ideal" that every rendered image should appear exactly the same as some "reference software rasterizer" across every single piece of hardware, CONSUMERS DON'T NECESSARILY WANT SOMEONE ELSE'S IDEA OF "CORRECTNESS".

sure, consumer may do whatever he's pleased of his hw and sw. still, don't you think the consumer has the right to see the title in its originally intended form first, before deciding he likes better somehting else?

Some cannot afford to buy a card that would render someone else's idea of "correctness" with acceptable performance levels.

pitty indeed. what can i say here?

Heck...let's just forget the idea of GPUs altogether and just run this all on CPUs. Developers will get consistent results all the time. Problem solved, right?

or alternatively, play games on consoles

see, there's a simple logical rule which states that when you make consistent definitions you enumerate the relevant factors, not the irrelevant factors, as the latter are infinite in number, and your definition could never be conistent in a finite space.

???

now, what exactly did you miss here?

WE UNDERSTAND YOUR POINT.

YOU do not understand ours. For the 15th time using Radeon vs. GeForce aniso as the example:

Radeon's Aniso can be considered "flawed" for partical purposes because it is not consistent.

GeForce's Aniso can be considered "flawed" for practical purposes because it takes such a large performance hit that you would have to lower the anistophy level (relatively speaking) to get similar performance.

IN SHORT: On can consider ATI's method "flawed" from a quality perspecitve, and one can consider nVidia's method "flawed" from a performance perspective.

IT IS SIMPLY A MATTER OF MAKING A TRADE-OFF.

cool. i understand your point

you seem to think of anisotropic filtering as a comfort factor - it's not!

Eh? Says who? If it's not a "comfort factor" then why is the type of filtering used:

1) Given as an option to force in control panels
2) Given as an option to adjust within the application in nearly every game on the planet.

re 1) - see a couple of paragraphs above.
re 2) how do you know the next greatest title won't require aniso N?

Is there ANY GAME on the market, that forces anisotropic filtering, and does not provide the option for bilienar? If anything it's completely the opposite.

you've seen all titles, past, present and future, for all time? wow!

i doub't it would be helpful. but if you really want that you can check in my earlier posts, and then carry out a personal survey among several devs.

I have a better idea. Why don't you carry on a personal survey among several consumers. They are the ones buying the products.

i might

As I said, of course from a DEVELOPER perspective, they would LOVE for each and every card out there to produce consistent, identical results. But then, developers aren't the ones IHVs are SELLING their products to.

Again, as a CONSUMER, I would LOVE to have infinite performance, "infinite" quality, all for zero price. However, I am also realistic. And I'm thankful that we have IHVs taking different approaches to balancing the three. That gives me CHOICE.

valid point. i agree. and at the end of the day yet i guess your choice would be towards the higher quality if you could affor it, no?

 

[Joe DeFuria]

i seem to notice a disturbing tencency in your postings - you start quoting sentences out of their context (i.e. out of the paragraph they belong to) and then ask what the original point was. please, we'd save each other time if we try not to do so.

I can assure you that if I quote something, and it appears that by my comments I have teken it "out of context", then I do not understand what you are trying to say, so you need to clarify what you are trying to say. I just don't want to requote EVERYTHING all the time. We are "requoting" too much as it is, so I only "quote" that which I'm directly responding too, and put it in the context that I believe you are talking about given any surrounding text that I did not quote.

i never said the r200 was a bad product, did i?

No, nor did I accuse of of saying that. What you are saying, correct me if I'm wrong, is that

1) you would have preferred that ATI implement aniso on Radeon 8500 similar to GeForce.
2) You claim your preference is for technical quality reasons, Because there is some "strict definition for aniso quality" (that you have yet to relay to us) aniso is therefore "not a comfort feature" in your opinion, it is therefor not something that should be comprimised at all in terms of quality. Apparently, it doesn't matter to you what cost benefits or performance benefits "non conforming" implementions bring, there is no excuse for deviating from "the standard."

Again, correct me if I'm wrong.

i, for one, and i'm sure others too, would have rather seen the r200 having better aniso quality...

And I, for one, AGREE...I would always want better quality. given the same cost and performace. That being said, you have not demonstrated that you understand that delivering better quality does not come without SACRIFICING either cost, or performance, or both. So who are you to "demand" that it be implemented one way...the way YOU prefer it?

now, here's an example of a sentence taken of its context. read the original para again to catch the context and then you'll see my point.

I read the original paragraph (Doom3 and Dot3), and do not get your point. Please explain.

you want me to quote to you each and every account on aniso filtering from both d3d and ogl to show you that nowhere it is stated that a pixel exhibiting aniso of degree N can get a different filtering depending on the roll angle of the polygon in screen space?

No, I want you to quote to me ONE ACCOUNT where applying aniso by definition demands it be applied consitently.

For that matter, I want to find me ONE ACCOUNT that defines something more tangible, such as where the texture sample positions, and what math and precision is required for anisotropic filtering. The the API does not define how "aniso" should be calculated even at 0 degree rotation, that makes aniso pretty much open, does it not?

"ANISOTROPIC FILTERING" does not mean ANYTHING MORE than "non isotropic filtering." It's wide open.

those oprions were put there to add extra comfort for the consumer, who could this way
1) improve the visuals of older titles at the time of whose writing certain features were not available so the developers had never had the ability to use those....

Surely, if the developer did not have aniso in mind, then turning on aniso delivers an image NOT INTENDED by the developer?

What I'm trying to say is that you are contradicting yourself. You are trying to draw a line between aniso being a "comfort" only for old titles, but not a comfort for new ones?

Name me ONE title where the only filtering option provided by the developer is anisotropic, so that in order to get a speed boost by doing bilinear, it must be forced by the driver.

2) tweak the setting of the modern titles for various other reasons (e.g. performance)

Well, exactly.

A feature such as aniso is meant to done one thing: reduce artifacts. The only "true artisitic intent" would be to have infinite resolution and sampling. All the AA and aniso methods are there simply to get closer and closer to that goal.

still, don't you think the consumer has the right to see the title in its originally intended form first, before deciding he likes better somehting else?

Yes, but again, you are IGNORING COST. It COSTS MONEY to implement and support all possible things. So your question is loaded. I can similarly reword it like this:

"Don't you think the consumer has the right to only pay $100 for a card, vs. $150."

I keep repeating myself over and over to you. Yes, it would be WONDERFUL if every card supported identical image quality (even as an option.) But you have to consider that doing such things costs money, and if the IHV feels that 95% of its audience would prefer "cheaper, lower quality and faster" than "more expensive, higher quality and slower", why should the IHV add that option?

2) how do you know the next greatest title won't require aniso N?

I don't. And if it does, then CONSUMERS will decide if IHV's implementation of Aniso N is acceptable or not. Again with the GeForce example:

1) GameX "requires" Aniso 4X
2) GeForce3 owners can't fully enjoy it, because at aniso 4X, performance isn't good enough. Quality is lovely though in all cases.
3) Radeon 8500 don't get "full Aniso 4X" quality, but can at least play it with acceptable performance.

Isn't it a good thing that there's a choice between the Radeon and GeForce?

you've seen all titles, past, present and future, for all time? wow!

No, I'm making a common sense statement. Where is there ANY title that requires aniso, and bilinear can only be accessed via control panel forcing?

and at the end of the day yet i guess your choice would be towards the higher quality if you could affor it, no?

NOT NECESSARILY!!

At the end of the day, I might prefer PERFORMANCE to higher quality. If I can afford BOTH, then I'll get both. If I can afford one or the other, I'd like to have a CHOICE. Either more quality for my dollar, or more performance.

 

[mboeller]

seems Joe is "in heat"

We saw this quite often in the old forum. Sometimes he didn't stop before the thread was locked (sometimes not even that helped ).

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Heh....nothing gets me in "heat" more than someone repeatedly failing to have demonstrated to "see my point", after having repeated it several times. (Why I go on repeating it is another question altogether.)

I must find an emoticon for "bangs head against the wall..."

 

[RussSchultz]

Actually, you seem to have problems with people having differing points of view.

Darkblu clearly understands that you think corner cutting optimizations are OK, since it gives you a choice and if they're 'bad' they'll fail in the marketplace.

He also quite clearly feels that (as a developer) that it is a "morally" bad thing, as it makes his job harder and consequently (and extrapolated to the rest of the market) makes games worse because developers have to spend more time trying to work around quirks of particular chips.

He understands your point, he just doesn't agree with it.

Both of you have said your peace, and there's obviously nothing that will sway you. You're just going to have to accept that neither one of you will eventually validate each others opinions.

 

[demalion]

Heh....nothing gets me in "heat" more than someone repeatedly failing to have demonstrated to "see my point", after having repeated it several times. (Why I go on repeating it is another question altogether.)

I must find an emoticon for "bangs head against the wall..."

Ask Doom about the emoticon I mean. I'm positive I've seen one for exactly that floating around somewhere.

It would be redundant, at this point, to reply, as my attempts at trying to provide a slightly different way of illustrating my point, or our point as far as I understand what you are saying, don't seem to be effective, and would be pure repetition. Maybe I'll interject at another juncture again.

 

[demalion]

Actually, you seem to have problems with people having differing points of view.

Darkblu clearly understands that you think corner cutting optimizations are OK, since it gives you a choice and if they're 'bad' they'll fail in the marketplace.

He also quite clearly feels that (as a developer) that it is a "morally" bad thing, as it makes his job harder and consequently (and extrapolated to the rest of the market) makes games worse because developers have to spend more time trying to work around quirks of particular chips.

He understands your point, he just doesn't agree with it.

Both of you have said your peace, and there's obviously nothing that will sway you. You're just going to have to accept that neither one of you will eventually validate each others opinions.

The point of dispute is not the validity of their subjective evaluations Russ, atleast as I see it. The issue, to me atleast, is that darkblu believes his evaluation is an objective and absolute criteria...I haven't understood Joe as making that claim.

Explaining further would be repeating myself.

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Actually, you seem to have problems with people having differing points of view.

No, I don't.

I have problems with people who appear to disagree with me, while not having demonstrated they actually understand my viewpoint.

There is a difference there. (In other words...I'm not even CERTAIN if we disagree, because I'm not certain he's understood my view.)

When I don't think someone actually understands my viewpoint, that's when I get all long-winded and repetitive. If I think someone does understand my viewpoint, and disagrees with it, then I have no problem just "agreeing to disagree."

When someone tells me that I'm having a "change of heart", etc, then I don't believe they understand my position. When someone asks more and more questions that to me have obvious answers if you do understand my position, then I don't think he understands my position.

When I think someone else is being inconsistent with their arguments, them I'm not satisfied that they understand my position.

Both of you have said your peace, and there's obviously nothing that will sway you. You're just going to have to accept that neither one of you will eventually validate each others opinions.

On the contrary, I have already validated his. I have said several times that from a developer perspective, I can appreciate that "consistency across platforms" and "technical correctness" makes things much easier and is a highly desired trait.

On the other hand, it appears to me the he's been arguing that CONSUMERS also, on the whole, also desire/demand consistency and "correctness" over a choice of "comprimise" methods that try to balance performance / quality / price.

That's the crux over our "disagreement" IMO.

 

[RussSchultz]

i understand that. honestly, i do.

cool. i understand your point

valid point. i agree.