What's ATI's answer to Physx on Nvidia?

[finbarqs]

So there are a handful of games that support PhysX in which Nvidia does in hardware. I know ATI does Havok, but From the demo's and games I've seen, PhysX seems to be the superior technology. Besides going out there and Purchasing a genuine PhysX card, what's AMD's solution to this? Do they have any? I know they have the Performance crown, but I would like to see more realistic physics on an AMD card!

 

[BenSkywalker]

They are working with several other companies, including nVidia, to get Bullet physics running on their GPUs. Not sure when we are going to see the fruits of this labor, but hopefully before too long.

 

[GaiaHunter]

Which games did u see/played that run GPU accelerated physX?

AMD/ATI stance on physX is not support it because it is controlled by competition = NVIDIA.

They are interested on using OpenCL combined with physics library like Bullet.

I wouldn't be too much concerned - ATI cards are able to accelerate physics. It is a software question, not hardware.

 

[nitromullet]

Besides going out there and Purchasing a genuine PhysX card, what's AMD's solution to this?

FWIW, you can't do this with an ATI graphics card. NVIDIA disabled PhysX period for any system running an ATI card, whether that PhysX card is an NVIDIA video card or an old AEGIA PhysX card.

 

[davidrees]

That is such a jerk move. I was considering buying an nvidia card for physx. I heard there is a work around, but whatever.

Almost seems like people with a Radeon and a discrete Physx card might have some kind of cause of action.

 

[T2k]

What's even more of a truly @sshole move from Nvidia that they disabled even my original PhysX PPU because I have an ATI card.
Of course, you can hack it back but it clrealy shows how much Nvidia does not give a sh!t about anyone including its own customers. You don't count, period.

Bunch of fuckin arrogant, PoS Nvidia managers - time to screw them very hard.

 

[Genx87]

What's even more of a truly @sshole move from Nvidia that they disabled even my original PhysX PPU because I have an ATI card.
Of course, you can hack it back but it clrealy shows how much Nvidia does not give a sh!t about anyone including its own customers. You don't count, period.

Bunch of fuckin arrogant, PoS Nvidia managers - time to screw them very hard.

Seek help

 

[T2k]

Seek help

Coming from someone who's got ""Capitalism is the unequal distribution of wealth. Socialism is the equal distribution of poverty" in his sigline?
Truly priceless, I guess...

Aside of educational deficiencies, seriously: don't you agree that it's way beyond to shut down my PPU?

It's an AGEIA card, not an Nvidia card - they should have kept this onboard until I get rid of it (likely next year) but no, they couldn't do it...

 

[dguy6789]

Seeing all of the Nvidia apologists reminds me of the P&N section. To some, Nvidia can do no wrong.

 

[Cookie Monster]

Not much news about havok GPU accerelated physics as of late. Might be a while before we see anything.

 

[akugami]

@T2K

PhysX disabled on an ATI+nVidia combo is crappy but it was an nVidia business decision. Just like ATI not supporting PhysX on ATI cards (not combination of cards) was a business decision. Live with it. Granted disabling an Ageia PhysX card was a screw job on their own customers.

nVidia is not a non-profit corporation just like ATI is not a non-profit corporation. They are for profit corporations. Their sole purpose is to make money. The product/services they offer may differ, business philosophies may differ, but the goal is the same for all for profit companies. To make money.

ATI is no different from nVidia. Just like Apple is not the champion of freedom against the big bad Microsoft juggernaut. Apple and MS have screwed over customers on their way to gain more of the almighty dollar. Heck, people championing Apple (and I am an Apple fan) are somewhat surprised to see how controlling and manipulative they are. They have done things that are worse than MS. I am not. As a business, you do everything that you legally can to gain advantages over your competitors and rake in as much cash as possible. If you do any less, then you are not doing your job.

nVidia obviously feels that disabling ATI+nVidia PhysX is the right move for them. I'm not on their board. I am not a top level manager. I don't have the information they do. I can give my opinion and speculation on whether it is a good or bad decision but who am I to say they are wrong? While as a consumer I may feel differently and as someone who is interested in business I may feel it is the wrong decision, it's kind of hard to argue from the outside that what they are doing is unequivocally wrong.

Years from now it might prove to be a crucial decision in helping them stay on top of ATI. On the flip side, there's also an equal chance of this being part of a series of decisions by nVidia that allows ATI to climb back to equal status or even surpass nVidia. We can speculate all we want but no one really knows. If someone did, I'd love to know so I can put some investment dollars in and become a rich person.

And lastly, ATI dropping support or reducing support for many of their cards on Vista and Win7 (some of them produced in the last 3-4 years) somewhat of a screw job. It's just business. Don't take things so personally. ATI and nVidia are faceless corporations. Treat them as such.

 

[Genx87]

Coming from someone who's got ""Capitalism is the unequal distribution of wealth. Socialism is the equal distribution of poverty" in his sigline?
Truly priceless, I guess...

Aside of educational deficiencies, seriously: don't you agree that it's way beyond to shut down my PPU?

It's an AGEIA card, not an Nvidia card - they should have kept this onboard until I get rid of it (likely next year) but no, they couldn't do it...

If you want to discuss my sig send me a PM.

As for the rest. I will agree it is probably a bit much however I can see from their perspective not wanting to field support calls from people using their competitors cards with rendering or other issues.

Either way you get way too frothy at the mouth over a companies business decisions.

 

[Schmide]

If you want to discuss my sig send me a PM.

Bullshit. If you don't want comments on your sig, delete it. If you parade it in public expect comments.

 

[Genx87]

Bullshit. If you don't want comments on your sig, delete it. If you parade it in public expect comments.

Uh talk to the mods. We went through this about 2 months ago. No discussing sigs.

I have no problem discussing my sig within a PM.

Not sure what it is with the people outside of the P&N forum. But they simply cant handle not talking about my sig within PMs.

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

Coming from someone who's got ""Capitalism is the unequal distribution of wealth. Socialism is the equal distribution of poverty" in his sigline?
Truly priceless, I guess...

Aside of educational deficiencies, seriously: don't you agree that it's way beyond to shut down my PPU?

It's an AGEIA card, not an Nvidia card - they should have kept this onboard until I get rid of it (likely next year) but no, they couldn't do it...

So use AGEIA's drivers and don't bother with nvidias?

 

[Schmide]

Uh talk to the mods. We went through this about 2 months ago. No discussing sigs.

I have no problem discussing my sig within a PM.

Not sure what it is with the people outside of the P&N forum. But they simply cant handle not talking about my sig within PMs.

If you get to display controversial ideals in every post (via sig), we should be able to quantify them as part of your argument. Most people keep P&N in P&N.

As far as I see it, correct me please Mods, your sig is fair game to deduce motivation/bias.

You can "deduce" what you will from his sig, but pls don't derail threads with OT comment about it.

TIA

Fern
Supr Moderator

 

[SlowSpyder]

akugami, I agree with what you are saying, AMD is not some knight coming to save gamers from the nasty Nvidia. But the problem many people have is Nvidia's decisions lately. This Physx disabling thing and the whole Batman AA thing have made them look bad in some peoples eyes.

But getting back to Physx in particular, the problem is that many people bought an Nvidia card (or an Aegia card) to run Physx. On the box nowhere did it say that Physx was limited to PC's that use only Nvidia cards to do the rendering. Then Nvidia changed that after many people already bought and used Nvidia cards for Physx. That was a decision that should have been decided on before they sold cards that could be used as stand-alone Physx cards... not after people bought the parts and were able to use them for months in that role. So I can see why some people feel slighted by Nvidia about that move.

How would people feel if AMD took away HD/BluRay acceleration and audio through their graphics card/HDMI if their driver detected an Intel chipset, even though it's worked flawlessly for a long time? Because of these types of decisions on Nvidia's part, I can see how some people may feel like Nvidia is making some very unfriendly moves towards customers and look to other options...

 

[MStele]

I wouldn't worry about it. I wouldn't surprised if Microsoft supplied a new physics module for Directx which allowed physics processing using none proprietary methods, much the same way Direct3D offered an alternative to 3dfx. It won't be here tomorrow, but if this ATI problem goes critical among gamers MS will step in.

Lets make note that no developers are required to use Physx, so its not right to accuse Nvidia of being unfair. Nvidia offers a feature that developers like, so they develop for it. Nvidia was smart enough to see potential in the technology. Instead of hating on Nvidia, we should be saying well done and then look toward ATI to see if they can come up with an alternative, and if they can't, then so be it. Thats how competition works. Basically, at this point ATI needs to put up or shut up.

I'm not pro Nvidia or ATI. I've bought various cards from both companies over the years, and will continue to buy whatever is best at the time. I would have never thought that a physics engine would have been a dividing factor, but thats where the line is, like it or not. In the mean time, if your pro ATI and don't like the situation, your only recourse is to not buy games that use Physx in the hope that developers will choose not to include it, or to make it optional. At the moment, developers prefer to support Physx. Well done Nvidia