- Oct 3, 2009
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The slide in this thread from the CPU forum got me wondering... What the [expletive] does " - Dual Graphics support with 'Crystal' series" entail?
Now, a short search informed me that this very likely means crossfire between the Kaveri IGP and AMD's upcoming dedicated mobile gfx chips.
What I am now wondering is whether the recent improvements in both Crossfire technology and the use of GDDR with the APU in the PS4 should lead me to being optimistic that this new iteration of hybrid crossfire could be much better than previous ones? Perhaps as good as I naively hoped it would be, years ago when we first heard of the concept?
*
Graphics benchmarks demonstated that previous APUs have an obvious memory bandwidth bottleneck when using common DDR3 main memory. So even in the best of cases (when paring these bandwidth starved APUs with dedicated cards sporting identical or nearly-so amounts of processing resources) scaling from doubling the GFX processors would be disappointing or downright pathetic (e.g. when hybrid-crossfiring actually decreased performance when compared to only using the dedicated card).
So now that AMD has built and shipped a GDDR5-utilizing APU, which by all accounts is performing well at the heart of the new Playstation, it could be hoped that they can, if they choose to, deliver an APU which will perform like a card built around an equivalent GPU outfitted with dedicated memory. Although from what I remember reading, I don't believe that there's any reason to think that Kaveri has the capability to use GDDR5 memory. But then again, I seem to remember that a common objection to this is both the cost of the memory and the need to solder it directly to the motherboard (no dimms), both of which arguments need not apply to a higher-end mobile system.
Add to that the fact that AMD has steadily improved CFX (scaling in general and frametimes in particular) to the point that benchmarks done on the latest GCN desktop cards are setting the mark to beat -- An important part of which is apparently the PCIe-centric XDMA. And with one of Kaveri's selling points being AMD's first PCIe3 controller, that also seems to bode well...
*
That being said, I expect that somebody out there can set me straight -- because I'm on the verge of being perilously enthusiastic that my long-past hopes of hybrid CFX being as awesome as it sounds should come to pass.
Now, a short search informed me that this very likely means crossfire between the Kaveri IGP and AMD's upcoming dedicated mobile gfx chips.
What I am now wondering is whether the recent improvements in both Crossfire technology and the use of GDDR with the APU in the PS4 should lead me to being optimistic that this new iteration of hybrid crossfire could be much better than previous ones? Perhaps as good as I naively hoped it would be, years ago when we first heard of the concept?
*
Graphics benchmarks demonstated that previous APUs have an obvious memory bandwidth bottleneck when using common DDR3 main memory. So even in the best of cases (when paring these bandwidth starved APUs with dedicated cards sporting identical or nearly-so amounts of processing resources) scaling from doubling the GFX processors would be disappointing or downright pathetic (e.g. when hybrid-crossfiring actually decreased performance when compared to only using the dedicated card).
So now that AMD has built and shipped a GDDR5-utilizing APU, which by all accounts is performing well at the heart of the new Playstation, it could be hoped that they can, if they choose to, deliver an APU which will perform like a card built around an equivalent GPU outfitted with dedicated memory. Although from what I remember reading, I don't believe that there's any reason to think that Kaveri has the capability to use GDDR5 memory. But then again, I seem to remember that a common objection to this is both the cost of the memory and the need to solder it directly to the motherboard (no dimms), both of which arguments need not apply to a higher-end mobile system.
Add to that the fact that AMD has steadily improved CFX (scaling in general and frametimes in particular) to the point that benchmarks done on the latest GCN desktop cards are setting the mark to beat -- An important part of which is apparently the PCIe-centric XDMA. And with one of Kaveri's selling points being AMD's first PCIe3 controller, that also seems to bode well...
*
That being said, I expect that somebody out there can set me straight -- because I'm on the verge of being perilously enthusiastic that my long-past hopes of hybrid CFX being as awesome as it sounds should come to pass.
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