[maximumPC] Nvidia Tom and Rev interview on Contracts, Gsync + more

[Leadbox]

For bonus points it works on AMD, Nvidia and Intel hardware because its calling into DirectX using the standards set there by the 3 vendors. It has the potential to be bad for everyone but Nvidia, but so far they haven't appeared to cheat using it, there is no smoking gun showing Nvidia hurting their competitor using this API. If it happens they will ruin what they are building, its not in their best interests for game devs to not use gameworks, they get paid for it.

Hardly a bonus if intel and AMD can only run said effects as fast as nvidia allows because the aforementioned parties cant optimize them. So sure the Batmans, Assassins Creeds and Witchers will have the full works for your enjoyment if you have a nvidia card but everywhere else it will just be the token effects. I just hope developers don't completely substitute their own neutral effects with blackbox Gameworks effects.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Try looking at the date-stamp at the bottom-left of the slides. AMD didn't even have a graphics division at the time they were made.

And I never said DX12 started then, I said the process of removing overhead did with the introduction of the new driver model, coupled with DX10.

So you are saying that Microsoft taking 9 years to actually make any progress on the driver overhead issue is inspiring confidence in you? They will have beta dx12 releases fall/holiday 2015, and you said they started this process in 2006. AMD started mantle around 2011 and will likely have 10 or more mantle games available by the time dx12 has one.

Oh yes, an API that ties you to GCN/AMD with zero backwards compatibility with hardware and 10,000s existing games. Where do I sign up for this "amazing" API?

I keep asking why backwards compatibility is even an argument against mantle. GPUs need to be backwards compatible not APIs. If a GPU supports previous APIs then your automatically covered in terms of backwards compatibility. What you are implying is that AMD will drop all support for any version of direct x and only support mantle. This is not the case. You are also making it sound like Microsoft releases patches that update every old game ever made to run on the latest version of direct x. This has never happened. By making this statement you are either intentionally making false statements about mantle to create fud or are just unaware of how GPUs and APIs work. Mantle is identical to direct x in terms of backwards compatibility if you own an gcn GPU. That is the truth of the matter.

There's absolutely no evidence of MS being pushed by Mantle. Again, steps were being taken to lower overhead back in 2006. Why do you think Vista completely overhauled the graphics driver stack? If anything, you could say Mantle was pushed by DirectX.

I do not understand how you fail to see the push mantle provided Microsoft. Mantle was such a huge slap in the face to Microsoft that for the first time in my memory as a pc gamer they released a press statement about their new version of direct x 2 years before it comes out. Direct x has been about trickling improvements out across more than a decade. Mantle is about exponential gains in short periods of time.

As for the stranglehold, MS is in a neutral position to develop an API given they have no competing hardware division and are just trying to sell Windows. This is in stark contrast with AMD making Mantle, which gives them an inherent bias and conflict of interest with locking out competition.

This is why DirectX (and OpenGL for that matter) will always be fundamentally different to any IHV-produced API.

There's nothing lame about a vendor-neutral API that reduces overhead and allows any IHV to target it without restriction or licensing, while providing full backwards compatibility.

Xbox isn't competing hardware? Microsoft has every incentive to make PC gaming miserable in order to push people towards Xbox and their Xbox live cash cow. They are even integrating Xbox live into windows. They don't want something better available that offers choice because they would lose money.

To date Microsoft's attempts at reducing driver overhead are either intentionally lack luster to stifle the PC vs. Xbox, or the result of incompetence and laziness.

 

[bystander36]

I honestly think that Gameworks is Nvidia trying to differentiate PC from console. They are bolt on effects that are really only being applied in cross platform ports. PC gaming is very important to Nvidia (and very much rightly so) and gameworks makes implementing advanced features a whole lot easier from one game to the next. If there was no gameworks, these games would come out pretty much exactly as their console counterparts. But i guess people really think otherwise.

Basically it has been villainized to death, just like pretty much anything Nvidia does. I do not really get all the widespread aggressiveness towards the company but apparently its a smaller group making a lot of noise. Reading forums, review post, blogs, you tube comments, etc it would appear that every one absolutely hates Nvidia and all that they do. Release a tablet, and it is the worse tablet ever-pointless and a waste of everyone's time. They make game works and they are trying to sabotage PC gaming (when actually they are trying for the opposite, to take it up a notch). Gsynsc, Physx, you name it. Terrible terrible nvidia, plaster it all over the net.

The most astounding thing is that as the nvidia hate has been spreading and increasing everywhere on the net, Nvidia themselves are as popular as ever with gamers. As much as there are claims that everything nvidia does is a failure, they somehow continue to make decent profits. Surely something isnt adding up here.

Perhaps it is because the real gamers who buy their cards are out enjoying them playing games. They dont care or feel like they have nothing to prove or defend. I mean, no matter how loud these nvidia nay sayers get, Nvidia keeps trucking along, doing what they do. So the people that make the most noise, well they just want to be heard...... I guess

It seems the internet loves AMD because they "usually" give the best bang for the buck, even if it comes with problems (thinking more so of the past).

It's the same way that anything on Piracy is filled with tons of people defending it.

Anything free, or perceived as a bargain or underdog is defended at all costs, and anything the successful company does is horrible in principle.

Then, of course, and this is more the case on this site I think, you have people who have backed one company, and is unwilling to accept anything the other company does. You see people on both sides doing this. You see more on AMD's side, only because of their best bang for the buck status. (Though there are plenty of Nvidia fanatics too. The loud ones seem rather even for both sides).

 

[3DVagabond]

It seems the internet loves AMD because they "usually" give the best bang for the buck, even if it comes with problems (thinking more so of the past).

It's the same way that anything on Piracy is filled with tons of people defending it.

Anything free, or perceived as a bargain or underdog is defended at all costs, and anything the successful company does is horrible in principle.

Then, of course, and this is more the case on this site I think, you have people who have backed one company, and is unwilling to accept anything the other company does. You see people on both sides doing this. You see more on AMD's side, only because of their best bang for the buck status. (Though there are plenty of Nvidia fanatics too. The loud ones seem rather even for both sides).

WUT? :\

Perf/$ = Piracy? I think you are trying a little too hard to discredit AMD here by equating support for them as being the same as people supporting internet piracy. I don't even know where you dredged that comparison out from.

 

[bystander36]

WUT? :\

Perf/$ = Piracy? I think you are trying a little too hard to discredit AMD here by equating support for them as being the same as people supporting internet piracy. I don't even know where you dredged that comparison out from.

I think you are reading too hard here. I'm saying that it is all about bargain hunting for many or most those I see around the forums. Piracy is easily viewed as a bargain hunting practice. Just as the mass forum users go off on how overpriced Apple is, and even the Linux users do with Windows.

I'm also not discrediting AMD here. I'm discrediting the fanatics.