HL2 And ATI tech

HelliKoid

Member
Sep 3, 2004
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Hi there !

A tech seller told me that tha HL2 will have some special textures only seen with an Ati card(and better), and that nVidia owners will have to get patches to play HL2 properly.(that ati pays a lot Valve to make tha game work better with their cards!)

Is that true?! i´m worried i´m havin a 6800 gt
 

gururu

Platinum Member
Jul 16, 2002
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he may not know what he's talking about, but he may mean one of two things:
1) utilization of 3Dc texture compression for huge maps
2) no DX 9 for FX cards

if 3dc is available, then ATI will probably enjoy some nice performance gains and either nvidia cards will have to use a 'lookup table'(LOL) or other form of compression, perhaps less efficient, to avoid crippled fps at high texture settings. I also heard 3dc was open source so that nvidia could use it if they wanted, but not sure if they'd have to make hardware that can use it. as far as dx9, this is old news.

if he truly means special 'texture' maps, I wouldn't be surprised. They may want to showcase 3DC in some way.
 

HelliKoid

Member
Sep 3, 2004
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then someone with a x800 will have better quality image on HL2 ? than one havin a 6800gt? really!??
 

ZobarStyl

Senior member
Mar 3, 2004
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All that happened was Valve worked really closely with ATi for a promo deal where they sold ATi cards with HL2 vouchers a while back, then problem is the game just never showed up on time so they stopped putting them in there. Either way, the two remain in bed with one another and Valve has tailored the game to run better (read: faster) on ATi hardware. However, nVidia hardware will be able to run it just fine out of the box, though FX series cards will only run DX8 paths. Your GT is more than sufficient to play HL2, and they will likely look exactly the same. Unless you have some complex where you have to run at 16x12 with all the trimmings at 250 fps (and a lot of people around here do :beer: ), you'll be more than happy with HL2 on your card.
 

Rage187

Lifer
Dec 30, 2000
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Your GT will be able to run it at 1600x1200 4aa 8as at 45+ fps; there is nothing to worry about.
 

VIAN

Diamond Member
Aug 22, 2003
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reaaaaaaaaaally doubt it
I reaaaaaaaaaally don't. There is a significant difference. And the performance will be better so.

The other thing I think the Tech was talking about was that HL2 will feature the "Get In The Game" ATI logo, meaning it runs better on ATI cards. Although, when Nvidia did this with the FX, the logo didn't mean crap most of the time.

Your GT will be able to run it at 1600x1200 4aa 8as at 45+ fps; there is nothing to worry about.
Maybe true, but if 3Dc is enabled, ATI cards will look better. However, I would wait and see if this feature is actually applied and also see if ATI's presentation of 3Dc is actually the real performance of the card.

I might only be worried if I got a FX card, but even then you will still be able to play it in DX8, just not as the developer intended it in DX9 which kinda sucks. You'll lose some nice effects that make the surrounds looking really nice.
 

Keysplayr

Elite Member
Jan 16, 2003
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Originally posted by: VIAN
reaaaaaaaaaally doubt it
I reaaaaaaaaaally don't. There is a significant difference. And the performance will be better so.

The other thing I think the Tech was talking about was that HL2 will feature the "Get In The Game" ATI logo, meaning it runs better on ATI cards. Although, when Nvidia did this with the FX, the logo didn't mean crap most of the time.

Your GT will be able to run it at 1600x1200 4aa 8as at 45+ fps; there is nothing to worry about.
Maybe true, but if 3Dc is enabled, ATI cards will look better. However, I would wait and see if this feature is actually applied and also see if ATI's presentation of 3Dc is actually the real performance of the card.

I might only be worried if I got a FX card, but even then you will still be able to play it in DX8, just not as the developer intended it in DX9 which kinda sucks. You'll lose some nice effects that make the surrounds looking really nice.

VIAN, the game is not out yet. Wait and see before we say anything. Will HL2 run faster on ATI? Very possible. Will it look better on ATI? Not likely unless valve coded the game out of DX9 spec plus explicitly writes it to take advantage of ATI's hardware. Even then, I'm not so sure. Nobody knows until we see retail version benches.
And yes, FX cards should be in for a world of hurt.
 

HelliKoid

Member
Sep 3, 2004
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woah ,cool then, thanks for the input! :)
hope they don´t make that 3Dc feature. imagine ati could pay a looot to valve to make that,then we´r fucke d(gf) knda possible. 3dc is so cool?makes better graphix, and nvidia hasnot 3dc?

what is BS?

 

Marsumane

Golden Member
Mar 9, 2004
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Yea i think he was just thinking of the difference between older, lastgen hardware. FX series vs 9xxx series.
 

Drayvn

Golden Member
Jun 23, 2004
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Serious Sam is using 3Dc, ATi wanted to make 3Dc to take over from the current generation of compression technology, which is getting pretty old, and thats why its open source.

Both 6800 and X800 series of cards will run it fine.
 

kylebisme

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2000
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Originally posted by: HelliKoid
woah ,cool then, thanks for the input! :)
hope they don´t make that 3Dc feature. imagine ati could pay a looot to valve to make that,then we´r fucke d(gf) knda possible.

No we aren't, we just don't get quite as high as image quality as on an ati card; nothing really new there though.
 

clicknext

Banned
Mar 27, 2002
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I am willing to bet that if you just play the game (and not do any specific analysis of the performance and image quality), it will look exactly the same on these two top of the line cards.
 

HelliKoid

Member
Sep 3, 2004
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both run fine ok , but image quality?
or is it hard to see

wd ya mean, high image qual as an ati.
with an gf 6800 gt the same image quality-textures...than a x800 pro right?
i bet when tha HL2 comes out, u take screenshots of with 6800 and x800.and not talkin about fps(care less), but about image quality,textures,fx,world, ....
and HARD to see a diference right u have to have a clinic eye, or am i wrong?
 

nikon133

Junior Member
Sep 24, 2003
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Originally posted by: HelliKoid
woah ,cool then, thanks for the input! :)
hope they don´t make that 3Dc feature. imagine ati could pay a looot to valve to make that,then we´r fucke d(gf) knda possible. 3dc is so cool?makes better graphix, and nvidia hasnot 3dc?

what is BS?

Err... what is the point, dude? Having 3Dc or not, game will look the same (and more than good enough) on your card. If it can look even better on some other hardware, that is a bonus.

The way you're saying, it is like "if I can't have it, noone else can". That is kinda selfish, you know :)

Anyway, Doom3 is running better on nVidia. You can't have it all.
 

Creig

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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It's possible that Valve might have an "enhanced textures" install feature for ATI cards. It would use 3Dc compression to utilize more detailed textures than the regular non-compressed ones. But we won't know for sure until HL2 is actually released.
 

gururu

Platinum Member
Jul 16, 2002
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well no offense but you arent head reviewer for a large website. we talk to valve quite often about many things, and have interviewed a few of their staff. I already have info about 3DC and HL2 but im under NDA about it. if stu gets any info from valve then we can post it ...
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