What takes more oomph, gpu and cpu, af or aa?

AF should be more or less trivial on today's cards. Even 16x AF doesn't take much of a hit.

AA, by far, has a larger impact on performance.
 
It depends on the type of method used to perform AA and AF and also on memory bus.

I believe angle-independent AF on a say, 128-bit bus will take slightly more hit than multisample AA on the same 128-bit bus.

SuperSample AA is teh bandwidth eater, causes the biggest performance loss. :D
 
Neither involves any CPU work at all.
(MS)AA consumes primarily bandwidth, and also requires more memory.
AF consumes only texel fillrate.

Thus the relative costs depend on the balance of your particular GPU. On something like a Geforce 7600GS with a very high ratio of texel fillrate to memory bandwidth, AF can be relatively cheap while AA is very expensive.
Cards with more bandwidth have fewer issues with high amounts of AA. This may make it appear as if AF is more expensive than AA, but that's just an artifact of the solved memory bottlenecks.

Of course the cost also depends on the demands of the game.

What's the story of this question?
 
I have two dx8 opengl games that should run at 100fps (vsynched) at all times at 10x7x32, Tribes and Tribes2. They did on my 9700, at least. I like af a lot more than aa, but the 6800 does not seem to run these games very well. If I disable aa and af, the card runs even less well than with, so I run 2xaa and 2xaf, performance setting for image quality. I would run the latest drivers but I can't find the vsynch override, they seem to have eliminated that option, so I run a 66xx driver. I am ready to dump this card.


Just get new games right?
 
I have two dx8 opengl games that should run at 100fps (vsynched) at all times at 10x7x32, Tribes and Tribes2. They did on my 9700, at least. I like af a lot more than aa, but the 6800 does not seem to run these games very well. If I disable aa and af, the card runs even less well than with, so I run 2xaa and 2xaf, performance setting for image quality. I would run the latest drivers but I can't find the vsynch override, they seem to have eliminated that option, so I run a 66xx driver. I am ready to dump this card.


Just get new games right?

The vsync option should still be there in the 9x.xx drivers -- you definitely need to ditch thsoe 66.xx drivers. I'll look for it tonight if I remember.

If the drivers don't help anything, there's something else messed... the 6800 should give you a couple hundred FPS in those at 1024x768, probably!
 
T2 plays smoothly but not at 100, T1 plays less smoothly in certain circumstances, it stutters. I am too fast for the card I guess. Cs1.6 plays just fine and dandy tho, pegged at 100. If you find a vsycnh override let me know please.
 
Easy.

DXTweaker - http://www.ocworkbench.com/2006/articles/DXtweaker/

Latest Nvidia drivers (you'd have to be insane not to) - http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_91.47.html

And be sure you're running the absolute latest chipset drivers. Many a time when I found certain games to be stuttering, or pausing every so often, a chipset driver update/reinstall solved all my problems. DXTweaker can force Vsync and triple buffering (which of course is a necessity if you're using vsync).

Let us know how it goes!
 
I wouldn't think so, what with it being DXTweaker and all...

Rivatuner could probably take care of that though if the Nvidia supplied options are refusing to work. If the option is missing from the nvidia control panel, install Coolbits 2.0, that should unhide it.

http://www.guru3d.com/newsitem.php?id=1666
 
Hi Sobek, does that vsynch lock work under opengl?

The 91.33 drivers I have allow for forced vsync. Non specific to opengl/d3d it seems too. I believe it's from coolbits hack though (simple registry hack that you can DL from guru3d or any of those other sites like it).

It's under the Performance & Quality Settings area of the 'old' style properties screen after you install it.
 
Ok so I added more recent drivers and did the coolbits. I got better performance, and it's enriched with triple buffering too.

Now for a like subject, what effect does triple buffering have on latency?
 
Concerning triple-buffering (and yes, I agree that it is an AWESOME feature.. god bless DX Tweaker :smile: ), has anyone heard whether or not Microsoft has fixed the issue for DirectX10? To be included by default, I mean?
 
Now for a like subject, what effect does triple buffering have on latency?
Well, since no one else has answered, I'll take a stab at it.* AFAIK, triple buffering adds another frame buffer in between your input and the resultant screen output, so at 60fps that's another 16.7ms, and at 100fps that's another 10ms.


* Making myself look stupid.
 
That would explain my current inability to hit targets that I found easy to hit previously. I have to lead them much more now. Oh well adds to the challenge I guess.
 
If someone can notice/feel the difference b/w a constant 30 and 60fps (33ms - 17ms = 16ms), surely they can notice the delay due to triple buffering (17ms)?
 
It seems I am a sitting duck with triple buffer enabled, I get creamed by all and sundry, even nubs. I also can't seem to hit them when I know they were in my crosshairs. By the time I see them and fire I am dead. But sans tb I can hit as well as before, and evade return fire. If you played the game/mod I play you would understand the latency issue being crucial. It involves hitting moving airborne targets, who are shooting back at you, when the max airspeed is some 550m/s in game, and everyone is maxed out by boosting. The terrains are scale kilometers in size. Some 1500k typicaly and larger, and a chase may cover a lot of that in a few seconds. There are flags involved too. Gatta be fast. I think I can tell when I am lagging even 10ms more than usual, been at this a while now. In slower games like Tribes2 tb isn't so bad as it's a much slower paced game. At least the Tribes2 mod I play.
 
It seems I am a sitting duck with triple buffer enabled, I get creamed by all and sundry, even nubs. I also can't seem to hit them when I know they were in my crosshairs. By the time I see them and fire I am dead. But sans tb I can hit as well as before, and evade return fire. If you played the game/mod I play you would understand the latency issue being crucial. It involves hitting moving airborne targets, who are shooting back at you, when the max airspeed is some 550m/s in game, and everyone is maxed out by boosting. The terrains are scale kilometers in size. Some 1500k typicaly and larger, and a chase may cover a lot of that in a few seconds. There are flags involved too. Gatta be fast. I think I can tell when I am lagging even 10ms more than usual, been at this a while now. In slower games like Tribes2 tb isn't so bad as it's a much slower paced game. At least the Tribes2 mod I play.

Turn off Triple Buffering then! Problem solved. Just keep vsync on. =o
 
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