[TECH Report] As the second turns: the web digests our game testing methods

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HurleyBird

Platinum Member
Apr 22, 2003
2,812
1,550
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It is my opinion that what Baumann said was nothing more than a reactive PR response to the negative publicity. Very convenient to have a memory subsystem re-write already in progress to replace the Awesome Never Settle drivers and the Never Settle campaign.

Sorry Keys, but that's almost as bad as the people calling out Scott Wasson. Almost, because unlike Wasson Baumann might have some cause to lie, but the act of believing that he is lying without proof or precedent betrays a mind boggling confirmation bias.

You've just given the AMD crowd some great ammunition. Maybe you aren't as smart as I thought.
 

SirPauly

Diamond Member
Apr 28, 2009
5,187
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I don't think that the awareness from constructive forum discussions or investigation aspects of improving latency is a major AMD negative over-all or, the AMD responses are not reactionary but simply trying to explain and improve their products for prospective and current customers.

I do believe that both nVidia and AMD desire constructive criticism so they can improve their products.
 
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Keysplayr

Elite Member
Jan 16, 2003
21,219
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Sorry Keys, but that's almost as bad as the people calling out Scott Wasson. Almost, because unlike Wasson Baumann might have some cause to lie, but the act of believing that he is lying without proof or precedent betrays a mind boggling confirmation bias.

You've just given the AMD crowd some great ammunition. Maybe you aren't as smart as I thought.

I was just thinking about the convenience and timing of his mention of the rewrite.
Your definition of "almost" now means "no where near" to me.
You yourself JUST SAID Baumann might have cause to lie. I agree. With that in mind, my opinion makes even more sense. And dont worry about my IQ. Not really here to impress you. You do have my respect though. ;)
 

SirPauly

Diamond Member
Apr 28, 2009
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I came up with Dave in the 3dfx forums and remember his first views with the alias Wavey!

Found him to be very credible over the many years!
 

Cadarin

Member
Jan 14, 2013
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I'm hoping they come out with a fix. But I can't say that I've experienced any issues. I've played Skyrim plenty and the only problem I have is the unbearable input lag with my mouse. Feels like the engine is about 20 frames behind my movements.

I blame the game for that, not the video card.

Even with the fix, I will still have that problem. But I will take anything they want to give me.

I agree that the input lag in Skyrim (and every other recent Bethesda game) is unbearable. Thankfully, its also fixable, here's a link to a video with all the steps laid out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2AJDJ8sOfQ

Aside from some slight differences with the .ini files, these changes will fix input lag in Fallout 3 and FO:NV as well.
 

3DVagabond

Lifer
Aug 10, 2009
11,951
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So now we are cherry picking what we are going to believe of what Baumann said? He said they are addressing the latency reports. Respose is, "AMD admits stuttering problem". He says that there's a lot of factors that could affect latency. The memory rewrite, which was already in progress is one thing, drivers are another, and game optimizations are another. Response to this, "Baumann is a liar".

First, saying they are looking into ways to address the latency issue is not admitting there is a stuttering problem. As has been pointed out, the last gen had way more latency than TR's report showed with the 7950. Fact, Fermi cards that were tested suffered from it even more than Cayman. Fermi owners weren't reporting that their cards were stuttering messes. Cayman wasn't "slower but smoother". Nobody who is currently oh so concerned with AMD's latency issues is trying to get nVidia to "fix Fermi's problem". Even though, not only do a lot of people own these cards, but they are still being sold. The bias exhibited removes any possibility of a majority of unbiased posters putting any credibility into this crusade. This is either a problem or it isn't. It's not just a problem when AMD cards measure worse than nVidia cards.
 

raghu78

Diamond Member
Aug 23, 2012
4,093
1,476
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Keys has made these forum nearly unbearable, a big reason I hardly post here anymore.

maybe everybody should see common sense and stop responding to his posts. post to thread topic if there is any valuable information . for example fraps frametimes charts in various games would help. ignore him and let him be.

also Nvidia drivers are not devoid of stuttering issues. 310.70 and 310.90 whql have major complaints on ocn nvidia forums of BF3 stuttering, significantly reduced max overclock speeds, CTDs etc.

also here is a user comparing GTX 660 Ti and HD 7870. complains of stuttering with GTX 660 Ti. its not all rosy in Nvidia land. the second thread is user complaints on BF3 stuttering in R310 drivers.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1339698/...is-better-hd-7870-vs-660-ti-benchmarks-inside

http://www.overclock.net/t/1346657/battlefield-3-unplayable-on-r310-drivers

i know i should not have mentioned nvidia drivers in this thread. but it was only to make a point that both sides have driver issues. Nvidia's robustness with SLI drivers though is much better than AMD CF. excuse me for bringing nvidia drivers into this thread.
 
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Lonbjerg

Diamond Member
Dec 6, 2009
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Funny how the fact that microstutter is a fact...make AMD fans mad at keys....upside-down world...
 

BrightCandle

Diamond Member
Mar 15, 2007
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I find the part about the SSD intriguing. Anyone else care to compare SSD to HDD in terms of frametime?

He determined that an ssd does not impact on gameplay, which we have known for quite a while.

There are games where it matters like arms 2 but in general the games that benefit are more like hl2 and shogun where you see reduced load times.
 

zebrax2

Senior member
Nov 18, 2007
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Didn't saw that that was a 3 part investigation and that HDD vs SSD has been discussed in part 2.
 

Homeles

Platinum Member
Dec 9, 2011
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Funny how the fact that microstutter is a fact...make AMD fans mad at keys....upside-down world...
Try reading the thread. It's a good idea; I promise.

You've completely missed why people are complaining about Keys.

So now we are cherry picking what we are going to believe of what Baumann said? He said they are addressing the latency reports. Respose is, "AMD admits stuttering problem". He says that there's a lot of factors that could affect latency. The memory rewrite, which was already in progress is one thing, drivers are another, and game optimizations are another. Response to this, "Baumann is a liar".

First, saying they are looking into ways to address the latency issue is not admitting there is a stuttering problem. As has been pointed out, the last gen had way more latency than TR's report showed with the 7950. Fact, Fermi cards that were tested suffered from it even more than Cayman. Fermi owners weren't reporting that their cards were stuttering messes. Cayman wasn't "slower but smoother". Nobody who is currently oh so concerned with AMD's latency issues is trying to get nVidia to "fix Fermi's problem". Even though, not only do a lot of people own these cards, but they are still being sold. The bias exhibited removes any possibility of a majority of unbiased posters putting any credibility into this crusade. This is either a problem or it isn't. It's not just a problem when AMD cards measure worse than nVidia cards.
I don't feel like that's a valid comparison. Just because the frame latency tests didn't spark outrage before does not mean that everybody is now a bunch of hypocrites. And there's a major difference between Fermi and Southern Islands — Fermi is not Nvidia's current architecture. It's pretty typical for both AMD and Nvidia to put their legacy architectures on the back burner, and expecting Nvidia to solve stuttering issues on deprecated hardware is nothing more than wishful thinking.

But do you know for a fact that Fermi's stuttering hasn't been fixed? Until you do, your argument has zero substance.
 
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SirPauly

Diamond Member
Apr 28, 2009
5,187
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Nobody who is currently oh so concerned with AMD's latency issues is trying to get nVidia to "fix Fermi's problem". Even though, not only do a lot of people own these cards, but they are still being sold.

That's not true to me: This awareness is not just about improving AMD sku's but for the awareness to help improve smoothness for nVidia and AMD sku's -- single and multi-GPU for current and prospective gamers. The bigger picture!

Some gamers have been very vocal about smoothness attributes for many, many years and for me, this awareness for smoothness and for reviews, investigations and discussions to go beyond just frame-rate is music to my ears.

You know what I tire of? More worried about agendas and personal aspects than the hardware and games -- trying to improve gaming experiences is so much more important to me.
 
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Homeles

Platinum Member
Dec 9, 2011
2,580
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Apoppin just posted up his frame time investigation results

http://alienbabeltech.com/abt/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=27397
Seems like where the 680 loses when it comes to smoothness, it's not by much (with the exception of RE5). A couple extra spikes here and there — no biggie. When the 7970 GE doesn't do well, it really doesn't do well.

It's hard to expect either company to be flawless, but the kind of stuttering found in Hitman has got to go. Far Cry 2 doesn't do well on either vendor.
 

KingFatty

Diamond Member
Dec 29, 2010
3,034
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How can it be that changing from one brand of SSD to another brand of SSD, with the same CPU/GPU, can affect jitter so much?
 

ICDP

Senior member
Nov 15, 2012
707
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Seems like where the 680 loses when it comes to smoothness, it's not by much (with the exception of RE5). A couple extra spikes here and there — no biggie. When the 7970 GE doesn't do well, it really doesn't do well.

It's hard to expect either company to be flawless, but the kind of stuttering found in Hitman has got to go. Far Cry 2 doesn't do well on either vendor.

I didn't find any stuttering on my HD 7970 in Hitman AB even when seriously underclocked.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=34376473&postcount=550
 

Homeles

Platinum Member
Dec 9, 2011
2,580
0
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How can it be that changing from one brand of SSD to another brand of SSD, with the same CPU/GPU, can affect jitter so much?
That I/O inconsistency that Anand is waging war against? That's likely what you're looking at right there.
I didn't find any stuttering on my HD 7970 in Hitman AB even when seriously underclocked.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=34376473&postcount=550

Two reviewers have... so I'd imagine that there has to be something going on.
 
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Rikard

Senior member
Apr 25, 2012
428
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I didn't find any stuttering on my HD 7970 in Hitman AB even when seriously underclocked.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost...&postcount=550
Two reviewers have... so I'd imagine that there has to be something going on.
ICDP's results are completely different from mine. I found Hitman to be CPU sensitive, and you have both faster CPU and RAM than me. And I am not sure if downclocking the 7970 to 7950 speeds is valid. This proves that it is not true that all AMD cards are causing microstuttering, always. From what I have seen in reviews and this forum, I really think that the entire system matters as well as game settings etc. It is a very complicated issue, and right now we have no way of predicting who will suffer from it under what circumstances.
 

3DVagabond

Lifer
Aug 10, 2009
11,951
204
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Try reading the thread. It's a good idea; I promise.

You've completely missed why people are complaining about Keys.


I don't feel like that's a valid comparison. Just because the frame latency tests didn't spark outrage before does not mean that everybody is now a bunch of hypocrites. And there's a major difference between Fermi and Southern Islands — Fermi is not Nvidia's current architecture. It's pretty typical for both AMD and Nvidia to put their legacy architectures on the back burner, and expecting Nvidia to solve stuttering issues on deprecated hardware is nothing more than wishful thinking.

But do you know for a fact that Fermi's stuttering hasn't been fixed? Until you do, your argument has zero substance.

You are missing the point. While there is measurable latency, and it's far worse with Fermi, nobody has ever complained about stuttering during gameplay. "Mountains out of mole hills".

Besides, if there was a problem, I would expect nVidia to fix it. There are still Fermi cards being sold today. They are still under warranty, and people have a right to expect them to do the task they were designed for.
 

ICDP

Senior member
Nov 15, 2012
707
0
0
ICDP's results are completely different from mine. I found Hitman to be CPU sensitive, and you have both faster CPU and RAM than me. And I am not sure if downclocking the 7970 to 7950 speeds is valid. This proves that it is not true that all AMD cards are causing microstuttering, always. From what I have seen in reviews and this forum, I really think that the entire system matters as well as game settings etc. It is a very complicated issue, and right now we have no way of predicting who will suffer from it under what circumstances.

The reason I underclocked the card was to attain a level close to the 7950 at 950/1250 in the TR review. When I run it at stock or overclocked the result was the same zero micro stutter but much higher FPS.
 

SirPauly

Diamond Member
Apr 28, 2009
5,187
1
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The GTX 570 had less ram and is even mentioned here:

The only card that struggles at all here is the GeForce GTX 570, and we suspect that it's bumping up against some VRAM size limitations; it has the smallest video memory capacity of the bunch.

http://techreport.com/review/23150/amd-radeon-hd-7970-ghz-edition/7

The HD 6970 had strengths and one of them was having more default ram and as time passes a potential gamer may enjoy the advantages of this.
 

railven

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2010
6,604
561
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You are missing the point. While there is measurable latency, and it's far worse with Fermi, nobody has ever complained about stuttering during gameplay. "Mountains out of mole hills".

Besides, if there was a problem, I would expect nVidia to fix it. There are still Fermi cards being sold today. They are still under warranty, and people have a right to expect them to do the task they were designed for.

Was the stuttering discussed by a reviewer? I've noticed around here, it takes a reviewer (or someone claiming to be one) to get any traction for discussion.

I personally don't recall any reviews addressing the stuttering of le Fermi. Perhaps nVidia paid some monies to keep it on the down low o_O

Tin foil hats aside, does it really matter? Are we back at defending the wrongs of one by pointing out the wrongs of another? Awesome.:rolleyes: