Gone have the day's of 3dfx  :'(

But where do we go from here?  ???

Who do we look to next? It has come to my attention that many users in this forum are turning their modern (and keeping up to date with things) attentions to the ATI Radeon series.  Not have I heard from any user that they now are moving onto the nVidia GeForceFX series.

Is this because people hate nVidia? I get the impression from a few forums like this one, that 3dfx fans hate nVidia for buying out 3dfx.  Is this because people regiously hated the fact that 3dfx's enemy gobbled them up in one mouthful, by buying them out?
Or is it because of the fact that nVidia bought all rights to 3dfx's technology, but never thought of implementing it in their own work, and not using 3dfx's future potential (VSA-200 Rampage) and just boxed it all up and put it in some dusty archive to rot.

Or have I got this wrong and the fact is that people move onto ATI Radeon technology because it's better (or is it, I don't know  ???)?

Why haven't we looked at new and old upcoming rivals?
The XGI Volari, I have heard mixed reviews about.  Do we not see these as a worth adversary due to their rookie insight into the graphics market?

What about the old but never gone, Matrox?  Their new Parhelia card looks pretty impressive! I've heard good reviews about this one, but some people may hold out on this one because once it's realeased in May/June, ATI and nVidia will be bringing their next generation of cards out a couple of months later down the line.

What are your views, and who would you make your alliance with?

hehe, concerning the nvidia/ati struggle:
i would prefer nvidia 'cause there are still 3dfx engineers working on the geforcefx and upcoming cards. but as you see, directx9 runs just better with ati and they're more innovative. not that nvidia's dx9 technology is worse, it's just that microsoft gave ati better cards than nvidia when they worked out the dx9 internal graphics chip architecture specifications. that's why nvidia's gforcefx series can't really perform to their full power! (that's internal graphics architecture, write if you want to know more about that) anyway, yes i like ati more than nvidia, they've just a better image + their cards deliver more power @ lower clock rates than nvidia (at the moment).
concerning the matrox parhelia: toooooo expensive, no dx9 support, bad game/driver support.
concerning xgi: it's all about the drivers, let's wait until they're good enough to release the card's full power (that's why most review are so different --> different driver versions).
concerning s3 chrome: that'll gonna be an opportunity! let's see!
anyway, most people here will have a new machine and an older one to run their voodoo cards and older games. i personally do not, but i should  :-[
enough for today, more discussion tomorrow!  ;)

Personally, I've aquired only 2 ATI Cards that replaced a Voodoo5 5500 AGP and a Voodoo4 4500 AGP.
(being a Radeon 9700pro and a Radeon 7500)

Since NVidia showed a rather rigid policy of no support (nor any real help either), I myself followed a rigid policy of buying no Nvidia Products in turn.

Currently, I (personally) see the GeForce series as inferior to ATI's Radeon series, although there are some up&downs (mainly Driver-wise) for ATI as well.

That leaves me with an NVidia-free Collection of Video Cards (currently about 35 3dfx- , and some ~25 non-3dfx Cards) so far ;)

Of course that's only personal policy born from pure principles.
Seen from the Hardware alone, Nvidia is still a viable alternative for many, with quite competitive products on the market.

In the Future, XGI may one day become a serious player, together with S3's Deltachrome series. That may take a while, however...

I don't believe that any of 3dfx's old engineers are still employed by nvidia, or if there are, they're probably brainwashed into being average nvidiots by now anyways :P

Nvidia has shown in many cases that the only reason their cards can produce better benchmarks than ATI cards is due to drivers, which obviously points to driver "cheating". XGI has also become entangled in this practice, which is why I personally won't think much about getting a Volari until these issues are resolved. ATI on the other hand gets more power out of their cards. They also offer better low and middle-end cards, like my amazing Radeon 9500, which might not be the absolute top of the line, but still produces usable framerates with decent quality and AA/AF on, sometimes even all the way, depending on the game. On the other hand, GF4 MX can't even do half the crap necessary to play some games (Deus EX 2 comes to mind, although I'm not entirely sure), whereas a 9000/9200 are entirely capable.

Another point: when Nvidia tried to make Omega quit producing his third-party detonators, ATI commended him for his fine work with the cats (such a shame he's dropping 9x support  :().

But to counter all of this, I will throw in one good thing for nvidia: linux support. My GF2 GTS (a whole $10 investment) is now in my red hat 9 box, and nvidia's Linux forceware drivers are the only reason I can get decent gameplay out of TuxRacer  ;D

3dfx engineers still work for nvidia! and they put forward the geforcefx project a lot!
concerning drivers, what is cheating????? isn't everybody free to give the best performance avaible to their hardware? is mesafx cheating??

wrote on 21.02.04 at 14:39:17:

3dfx engineers still work for nvidia! and they put forward the geforcefx project a lot! concerning drivers, what is cheating????? isn't everybody free to give the best performance avaible to their hardware?

Driver cheating is the practice of lowering detail settings, adding extra optimizations, etc. for specific games/programs, normally 3D Mark, Aquamark, Quake 3, etc., programs that are normally used to benchmark the card. If you ever look at tom's hardware review, you will notice that almost all nvidia products accel at certain benchmarks, whereas ATIs are normally about equal in all benchmarks. ATI, IMOHO, focuses more on creating good products than lowering detail and making minor optimizations to make them look like they're good.


Quote:

is mesafx cheating??

What brings this up? Okay, YES. But in an entirely different way. MesaFX implements features via software that are not available on the card itself, which I suppose is cheating in a way.

wrote on 20.02.04 at 19:25:02:

Or is it because of the fact that nVidia bought all rights to 3dfx's technology, but never thought of implementing it in their own work, and not using 3dfx's future potential (VSA-200 Rampage) and just boxed it all up and put it in some dusty archive to rot.

I'm gonna have to correct you there...VSA200 != Rampage; VSA = Voodoo Scalable Architecture and Rampage had nothing to do with Voodoo. It was a new core, totally designed out of simulation. 3dfx wanted to get rid of the Voodoo name for good; Rampage was actually meant to be called Spectre...

Part #1
Thanks for your great definition amp_man, now I'm fully advised! Sorry, but it doesn't look like you know enough about today's graphics processor internal architecture to understand why nVidia "cheats" and why ATI is believed to do not. For your better comprehension - and inviting everybody else interested - here's a short summary of the problem you're all worried about:


We know ATI and nVidia to be the main developers for Microsoft when speaking of Pixel & Vertex Shading. Microsoft's task is to implement their work in the actual DirectX version, that's recently DirectX 9.0b. Due to decisions made by ATI and nVidia years ago, they gap between both firms' way of realizing new technologies became bigger. Along with DirectX9 a special topic became highly interesting, that one is, as you should know, internal arithmetic precision.
As the Radeon 8500-9200 (R2XX) works with a unique format (16bit precision), this is - simply said - not enough for complicated material shaders like the ones in DirectX9. So ATI gave the R300 and following models 24bit internal precision.
Meanwhile nVidia went another way: even the NV2X (GeForce 3/4) made use of 2 different formats: texture coordinats were calculated with 32bit precision, colour data got a mixture of 9bit and 10bit precision. To realize material shaders and the whole other implementations nVidia extended the colour precision to 12bit, and even a new 16bit format was introduced.
(Remember, it's also a matter if a GPU makes use of integer or floating point precision!
Integers: have a defined field of numbers and a fixed depth precision
Floating points: cover a wider range of numbers with the same quantity of bits but pay this achievment with a mostly lower, variable precision -> the higher the number, the lower the precision)
Anyway, Microsoft had to decide which format should be used by Pixel Shaders 2.0, and they grabbed 24bit precision. You see, if they would have set a higher standard, ATI wouldn't even be able to deliver DirectX9 hardware! But Microsoft also legalized a 16bit floating point precision.
See what that means? nVidia can't make use of their 12bit colour precision format combined with Pixel Shaders 2.0! Here's why this fact hits the GeForceFX series so hard: the NV30 has 2 arithmetic units: the first handles Pixel instructions with 32bit. This high precision hits performance -> means that most operations could only be done 4 times per clock. That'S a bit too poor, so nVidia decided to create a second unit. The second unit handles frequently used instructions with 12bit precision very fast, but therefore (-> 12bit!) it can't be used by Pixel Shaders 2.0. Got it? That's why the GeForceFX series (precisely GeForceFX 5200, 5600, 5800) is so slow when we speak about DirectX9 performance! Only the 5700 & 5900 got a 32bit second arithmetic unit, therefore they were able to shorten the performance gap towards ATI.
Moreover, HLSL (High Level Shading Language) has been developed by Microsoft to give game programmers a relativly easy program language for Shaders 2.0. In its first version, the compiler shipping with SDK for DirectX programmers produced code in that order preferred by the Radeon's arithmetic units. Thus, the GeForceFX series got another performance impact, as it prefers another order. There's a new compiler for the SDK now which also can produce GeForceFX preferred code.
I don't want to refer here to ATI's R3XX architecture, let's just say it was more compatible than nVidia's way. Please post here if you want to know more about it, though.
It is now nVidia's job to work closer with game developers, Microsoft & their customers. They optimize their drivers for specific games (e.g. Halo) & for performance. e.g. only the main texture is filtered anisotropic when enabled in some detonator versions. As for ATI, they did the same! And they still do! But nobody cares. Something about "cheating", i was surprised you state that optimizing hardware for games etc. is faint..! That's a stupid opinion man, I want my hardware fast and I don't care if only 3 or 4 of 6 or 8 textures (in multitexturing) are filtered anisotropic 'cause nobody would see any difference!
Listen, I still prefer ATI because the GeForceFX series has some more bugs than the R3XX & their mid-range and budget cards are a lot faster than nVidia's. Not to forget the customer support which is more personal (3dfx-like) than the one of nVidia. And, of course, i hate nVidia for bying 3dfx, like everyone here. But I also know that the GeForceFX series has a great potencial when adressed in the right way, and that's what you just didn't get!

Part #2
@ Lecram: I couldn't even see why you quoted James, as there's nothing wrong in what he said. So I'm worried about the fact that you want to "correct" something there..?! Anyway, yours isn't the truth, either. In fact, there were 3 Spectre types planned:
1. 1 Rampage chip (rasterization only)
2. 1 Rampage chip + 1 Sage chipg (geometry assist/ Hardware T&L unit)
3. 2 Rampage chips + 1 Sage chip

VSA-200 is the right codename. It isn't Voodoo anymore, right, but it's still Scalable Architecture (as you can see). Well, I didn't create this name, neither did you. Who knows which person thought it has to be called so.

Not to forget the following projects:
1. Fear (scalable like the Spectre, with Fusion chip (=Rampage2) for rasterization & Sage2 unit)
= faster Spectre-variation with more pipelines & higher clockrates
2. Mojo (tile-based/deferred rendering etc.)
= fully new architecture consisting partly of Gigapixel's technologies


This time I'll end with the words of Gary Tarolli, former CTO of 3DFX, now working as 3d engineer for nVidia:


Quote:

We were so close! But not all the hard work will be flushed down the drain. nVidia bought the technology developments and hopefully some ideas and technologies will find their way into future chips.

I read in an recent interview with a German nVidia press speaker this is not going to happen. Sad but true! Let's hope this Guy's a liar!  ;)

PS: Whoever read up to here, you're crazy!  ;D

wrote on 24.02.04 at 16:09:36:

Part #2 @ Lecram: I couldn't even see why you quoted James, as there's nothing wrong in what he said. So I'm worried about the fact that you want to "correct" something there..?! Anyway, yours isn't the truth, either. In fact, there were 3 Spectre types planned: 1. 1 Rampage chip (rasterization only) 2. 1 Rampage chip + 1 Sage chipg (geometry assist/ Hardware T&L unit) 3. 2 Rampage chips + 1 Sage chip VSA-200 is the right codename. It isn't Voodoo anymore, right, but it's still Scalable Architecture (as you can see). Well, I didn't create this name, neither did you. Who knows which person thought it has to be called so. Not to forget the following projects: 1. Fear (scalable like the Spectre, with Fusion chip (=Rampage2) for rasterization & Sage2 unit) = faster Spectre-variation with more pipelines & higher clockrates 2. Mojo (tile-based/deferred rendering etc.) = fully new architecture consisting partly of Gigapixel's technologies This time I'll end with the words of Gary Tarolli, former CTO of 3DFX, now working as 3d engineer for nVidia: I read in an recent interview with a German nVidia press speaker this is not going to happen. Sad but true! Let's hope this Guy's a liar!  ;) PS: Whoever read up to here, you're crazy!  ;D

Actually, "mines" is the truth...

*sigh*

Of course I know there were meant to be three different products, in fact four were rumored, though a dual Rampage dual SAGE would not have been needed at the time.
And they go like this:

Spectre 1000
Spectre 2000
Spectre 3000

And I know all about the different configs and I know for a fact it wasn't VSA 200...

I'll let you in on a little secret...there is no VSA 200 or even VSA 101 for that fact. It was never called that. But people started calling it so in turn it stuck. VSA100 was a marketing name but Daytona and Rampage had no marketing names yet...

Word of advice, please do not argue with me on this, as this is true...

thanks sharing this great secret...actually vsa-101 was a marketing name -> as i know, you would see the chip's name (if you have one) under 3dfx info of the 3dfx tools. well. i suggest you are right concerning vsa-200, but then please give us the right name (if there was any). if you can not, nobody will be concerned about the invented name vsa-200..okay, maybe the v for voodoo worries
what about rsa-200?  ;D r like rampage..

I think I have an explanation that might clear this whole VSA 200 crap up:

engineering name is not marketing name

the rampage/vsa-200/spectre was still highly in develpment. The enigineers working on the project could have easily called it the VSA-200, and whoever owns the one working card might still call it that. It would be a marketing division of 3dfx that would rename it to something new and killing the voodoo name, but while it was still in development, nobody really cared about that type of stuff, that would be decided later. Anyways, this is just one theory. I have heard all these different...theories, the Spectre series comprised of the rampage/spectre chips, but I've also always heard the rampage also referred to as a VSA-200, even though it would have been a spectre.

*sigh*

No amp_man...

VSA 100 : Voodoo  as  Rampage : Spectre

There's no such thing as the "Spectre" chip. It's the Rampage chip. Spectre was going to be the actual name of the product, like Radeon and Geforce...

wrote on 24.02.04 at 23:30:17:

*sigh* No amp_man... VSA 100 : Voodoo  as  Rampage : Spectre There's no such thing as the "Spectre" chip. It's the Rampage chip. Spectre was going to be the actual name of the product, like Radeon and Geforce...

Must I clarify everything for you?


Quote:

the rampage/vsa-200/spectre was still highly in develpment

in other words, the rampage chip, aka the VSA 200, which would have been the essential part of the spectre series!


Quote:

I have heard all these different...theories, the Spectre series comprised of the rampage/spectre chips

sorry, typo on my behalf, I meant Sage!


Quote:

but I've also always heard the rampage also referred to as a VSA-200, even though it would have been a spectre

referrring to the fact that the V in VSA stands for Voodoo, but the card would have been a Spectre, not a Voodoo.

wrote on 24.02.04 at 16:40:11:

Word of advice, please do not argue with me on this, as this is true...

And patience, I don't understand your post...

I've seen that link before, there was nothing ever really wrong with it.  :)

i've this link before, it doesn't provide much informations wether there was a vsa-200 or not.
well, i think we agree there was a vsa-101, anyway.

anybody read my 1^st post.......?  :P

Someone mentioned the Linux tux racer game. I have seen it running on a Banshee and it looked horrible, and very slowly. I don't know why, as when comparing this small game with Quake3 or NFS5 it is clear that the last two stress much more the graphic card. Anyway I am inclined to be against the person that said that the only videocard that run Tux Racer at decent framerates was a Geforce. I've seen it running very well on a Radeon 9000.

One way or another Linux drivers and support are very scarce now. If the situation will change in the future, it's unknown. However, more important is the lack of a unified and singular accelerated graphics instruction set in Linux. You don't have something like DirectX, that every card should acheve a certain compatibility. Without that we can't compare Windows an Linux in a normal way. That is their major problem, as games is the biggest and most profitable industry out there, which is mainly supporting and demanding faster CPU and GPU.

An alternative to 3dfx. I don't know. These days drivers are the least well and carefully designed pieces. I now that a good or a bad set of drivers can make quite a difference.

wrote on 25.02.04 at 09:25:19:

One way or another Linux drivers and support are very scarce now. If the situation will change in the future, it's unknown. However, more important is the lack of a unified and singular accelerated graphics instruction set in Linux. You don't have something like DirectX, that every card should acheve a certain compatibility. Without that we can't compare Windows an Linux in a normal way. That is their major problem, as games is the biggest and most profitable industry out there, which is mainly supporting and demanding faster CPU and GPU.

Well, the future is unknown for you, lad!  ;D "something like DirectX" exists for Linux, and it is called DRI! :o Direct Rendering Infrastructure... and is OpenGL-based. Okay, so it's not like DirectX, but it _IS_ an infrastructure. DRI drivers are developed inside Mesa...  :P But I am sure you knew that (you seem to know everything) and you were just testing us...  ;D

Perhaps...
Look at Tux racer. Is there any reason why it shows so strange looking textures and an appaling framerate on a Banshee? On Windows you see NFS5 or Quake running much faster and those are more complex. Can it have a connection with drivers optimisations? Perhaps, or maybe more than that...

OR you've loaded X11 in 24bit mode which prevented DRI from launching (much like all pre-vsa100 voodoos can't render 32bit D3D/OGL) thus your game runs in pure software mode :)

Can be easily fixed by changing to 16bit.
for more info type glxinfo in the console.

wrote on 25.02.04 at 10:02:47:

Perhaps... Perhaps, or maybe more than that...

Ye, perhaps! Or perhaps you know why, mr knows-everything!

Geez, I'm tired of people like you: you really like adding sheeps and cows together, don't ya? You always compare one game on a system/platform with another game on a different system/platform!

The answer is: I dunno why TuxRacer doesn't perform well, cos I haven't tested it!

I will augment your common-knowledge a bit and tell ya that the TDFX DRI driver has been surpassed (in both features and performance) by the original Glide driver -- the one found in MesaFX. That is, if you can make the difference... As for other HW, I cannot make any assertion... perhaps lack of cooperation from IHVs. nVidia and/or ATI haven't disclosed sourcecode yet!

Your point was:

Quote:

However, more important is the lack of a unified and singular accelerated graphics instruction set in Linux

And I replied to it. I never mentioned Tux! And if you're not tired lerning for today, I shall augment your common-knowledge even further: DRI is opensource and maintained on a volunteer basis. When BeyondDreams makes it to the top and smash down Microsoft with some secret plans, keep TungstenGraphics & co. in mind! Maybe fund them to develop their wonderful tools in such a manner to satisfy your needs.

Example: John Carmack of idSoftware donated 10000$ for Mesa. Brian Paul thought the best person to deserve them was Keith Whithwell and redirected them to him.

PS: DenisF is right! DRI switches to pure SW if it can't initialize something. The best way to test is glxinfo, glxgears. Some important environment variables: LIBGL_DEBUG (if memory serves). Useful utilities: ldd (to check the ELF chain).

Whoa!  :o  Quite a popular topic I raised!  ;D

Regarding the VSA-200, I used this terminology merely on it's popularity as it is well-known and widely used in regard to the Rampage series.  I didn't mean to wrong anyone by giving it the wrong title. It was just the label that nearly everyone uses for it.

I did read your topic, Micha.  Thanks for your insights.  I agree with your opinions.  ;DI don't feel crazy for reading your ENTIRE views, but my eyes feel a little dizzy!  ::)

I see that many of your views are balanced towards the side of ATI.  

I must admit, that I have only had one graphics card since my 3dfx days.  That is a nVidia GeForce2 Pro DDR. Yes, you can slag me off all you want, but the fact is, was that I bought it as part of a new machine I was having built up in 2001.   :)
Back then, none of you would have had the bad feeling you have towards nVidia, that you have now, as 3dfx had only just gone bust, and nVidia had not told us then that they were not supporting 3dfx cards (if they had have announced it before I bought it, I would have had the same principles as FalconFly would have).
The other fact was that ATI weren't much of a real competitor back then and I wanted a good mid-range card.
The thing is, I still use the card now! I've never updated since!  :)
Reason why?: I ran Hidden & Dangerous 2 Demo yesterday on the GF2PRO @ 1280x960, Full Texture details, Trilinear filtering, 4x AA.  Ran at 30 FPS!  :o ;)
Still a brilliant card! If I had to upgrade today though, I wouldn't know which way to turn! :-/

Quote:

Someone mentioned the Linux tux racer game. I have seen it running on a Banshee and it looked horrible, and very slowly. I don't know why, as when comparing this small game with Quake3 or NFS5 it is clear that the last two stress much more the graphic card. Anyway I am inclined to be against the person that said that the only videocard that run Tux Racer at decent framerates was a Geforce. I've seen it running very well on a Radeon 9000.

hey, how about actually reading my post before you go off on some lame rampage about it? My card, a GF2 GTS, is running in a P2 333 w/128mb SDRAM on Red Hat 9, and I mainly use Gnome, if it matters. When I tried running the game the first time, on the driver included with RH9, it ran like shit, even the menus were like .5fps. So I installed the Nvidia Forceware Linux drivers, and the game was playable, even better than my V5/P2 350, when that was running the same OS.

Also, you can't argue with the fact that Nvidia''s support of linux users is better. Check out their forums here, and you will note an entire section dedicated to Linux and Linux drivers. Where are ATI's support forums? I'll answer that for you: they don't exist.  And besides, I never even mentioned ATI in my original post, I was referring to the fact that better, updated drivers existed than those that came with the OS, because when I was using the Voodoo 5, MesaFX wasn't out yet, and I didn't know about Mesa itself.

wrote on 25.02.04 at 21:30:17:

...that came with the OS, because when I was using the Voodoo 5, MesaFX wasn't out yet, and I didn't know about Mesa itself.

Don't worry, amp! There are many people who never heard of Mesa before. And some of them already started emanating highly "professional" opinions about it!

"Maybe if Mesa and Amigamerlin, along with Koolsmokey will work together, this thing could become reality" - Boiu_Andrei

hey ya, thanks for reading James, and i agree w/ the Geforce2 thingy: mine also still runs games like Halo @ 40fps /Thunderbird 1.4GHz & 1GB RAM. bet that's because this ol' directx7 card can't perform all the shaders (since it has no pixel shaders & only vertex shaders 1.1) -> no acceleration, no performance hit in this respect (i mean e.g. shadows done by pixel shaders can't be activated in Halo on this card, so there's more space for other rendering etc.)
@ Daniel: i'm amazed about the john carmack story you mentioned! anyway, great work!

wrote on 26.02.04 at 07:43:46:

Don't worry, amp! There are many people who never heard of Mesa before. And some of them already started emanating highly "professional" opinions about it! "Maybe if Mesa and Amigamerlin, along with Koolsmokey will work together, this thing could become reality" - Boiu_Andrei

:)

*g*

Yes, that was a true Classic ;D

wrote on 26.02.04 at 07:43:46:

Don't worry, amp! There are many people who never heard of Mesa before. And some of them already started emanating highly "professional" opinions about it! "Maybe if Mesa and Amigamerlin, along with Koolsmokey will work together, this thing could become reality" - Boiu_Andrei

LMAO! But I hate to be put in the same category as "some" people  ;)

/Off-Topic: I just went to the Beyond Dreams website (which, FYI, is not beyonddreams.com, although that site was somewhat more interesting) and thought this would be an interesting little snippet for some of you out there:
"having a good image is more than necessary"

What a luck we have people to say: "Oh, good image is more than necessary"... News, right? By the way, this is pretty useless talking and very off topic, so we shall rather stick to the point.

sorry guys, even that I'm of the same opinion as you, i have to agree with Andrei: stick to the topic or create another one!

I think that the most important question we can put these days is not what is the most powerfull graphics card, but if there is trully one to have good drivers. All the videocards, no matter how good they are, they are rushed onto the market, bought by hundreds of users, only to later realise that the advertised performance and compatibility is very, very far from real life.

In fact with every new game you wonder if your card or your system can run that game. We are far from the 1980's era were a single component upgrade would have meaned a big difference, and you almost never loosed compatibility. Yes the games were not too complex, but then again...

Today I have to fully agree with the people that say: if you want no compatibilty, drivers nightmares, disk space problems, windows crashes and errors, just something simple that just does what it's build for, we look smiling at the games consoles. I'm not talking about fakes such as Xbox (Geforce + Pentium, needs a media player software to play movies), but real ones as PS2 (and PS3, which is currently under development).

Coin on coin, the console is much cheaper and you spend less money with it, but you can't do everything with it. That's the only downside. And after a while you have to buy a new one...

different times, man..reflect about this simple point:
there were just a few games in the 80's compared to nowadays. just every day we got more of them! do you think you can deliver a driver which can fully support all games without getting any problems? see, that's not possible nowadays. you would need 100 people working around the clock or something like that..

concerning game consoles:
dude, do you know why nearly everbody who wants to play games owns a M$ PC system?? because it's (despite to consoles) a scalable system! since 3dfx introduced the voodoo1 the pc raised to become the gaming console..and that's the fact why I'm still posting here! we've now even more quality w/ faster performance on pc games compared the a crappity smackin' gaystation. that's why we buy computers, isn't it?
the only console really useful is - in my opinion - the nintendo gamecube which can deliver full tv resolution unlike most other consoles.

* lol *

Modern Consoles can quickly become significantly more expensive than any decent PC.

Count all the basic add-on equipment you need (Controllers, Memory Cards etc.), and the hefty prices for Games, and you're almost at a normal PC's cost after a while.

And when it comes to your hatred (can't explain it otherwise) to modern Hardware...
Well, my Card worked on everything I threw onto it.

With the only difference being :
- heaps better visual Quality
- much more performance (actually far beyond what I or others expected)

And as you said, the Options left with a Game-cube/box or alike are extremely limited.
I've seen a number of Games for the latest Boxes, and I was very disappointed. What I saw and heard from those things was far below what I expected. Graphics was "okay" at best, but already far behind what PC's can do.

To me, these things are built for kids (or people in general, who can't handle a PC)

After 2 years, you're stuck with alot of expensive equipment, that is becoming obsolete at race tempo (unless you choose to play the same Games over and over).

At the same time, PC owners will have upgraded their Boxes over time, giving them a smooth transition to whatever new technology turns up (at their own choice and pacing)

PS.
Nothing personal Boui, but from someone hardly understanding 2nd/3rd line Hardware, Software or Technologies , I do not expect a useful opintion about state of the art Hardware, and you prove me correct over and over ::)

To counter-point this: consoles are offering acceptable results for their price, want more, state of the art, you pay a hefty price for it. If you have the money, you could receive something that is 10 times better, more reliable than any PC, and offers the greatest quality, but the price is 100 times bigger, and the programes designed for it are 100.000 times more rare, at least.

You have to admit that this "compatibility no matter what, and on everything" gives a nice and steady boost for things that cost on an average 50$ but just adds and adds up to the prices, without receiving what is on papers.

Still not enough? Ok. You buy a 3 Ghz CPU today. Soon you discover that you need 1 Ghz of Ram because games are demanding. You buy a newer soundcard because the on-board one fails to sound correctly and stutters in some games. You then install Directx, tons of pathces, to find out that the game still don't runs. Then you have a feeling, and you try each and every setting on D3d. Yes, you make the game to start. You play the game, but you are going from 100fps downto 30 when lots and lots of things appear. You see the sky but it has some strange "dithering" effect even when you can only run in 32 bit color. Frustration all over the place, as the photos from the game looked way different in that game magazine, and on TV.

So, unless you like the pain of only a part that has been presented above (as in reality you could have way more problems), you either lack the money to buy now something else (hard to find one), or you find yourself in a vicious circle, investing over and over again in newer equipment to escape problems for a while. This has sense if you are using the PC at many more than just games, but a very large share of people use PC for games, then it is rather a constant loss of money.

wrote on 27.02.04 at 02:30:17:

LMAO! But I hate to be put in the same category as "some" people  ;)

'k  ;)


Quote:

/Off-Topic: I just went to the Beyond Dreams website (which, FYI, is not beyonddreams.com, although that site was somewhat more interesting) and thought this would be an interesting little snippet for some of you out there: "having a good image is more than necessary"

@everybody:
That _WAS_ an off-topic remark!!! Now everyone rushed to smack amp for "off-topic"-ing. *g* I wish I had a coin for each off-topic remark on each thread in this forum.  :-/

And I think "beyonddreams.com" is a matter of taste.  :P I believe amp stated: "more interesting", not "an interesting". So I have to agree with him.  ;D

I believe (although I might be wrong) that the author of the thread intended to probe opinions about today IHVs. I mean VideoCard manufacturers. So I sense a lot of people off-topic here (that includes me, too).  ::)

To the Problems that can ship with PC Games/Software :

Well, technically, there shouldn't be cases where something doesn't run at all.

And nobody today needs a 3GHz CPU or 1GHz *g* (1GB?) of RAM (except a handful of special Applications).

Most Problems (if existing) are caused by the guy sitting in front of the Monitor, due to lack of knowledge or experience.
Sounds harsh, but it's an old wisdom, and still holds true.

The remaining bits and pieces are indeed buggy Code, in which I fully agree.
But considering (as an example) that the Network Code of UT2004 is worth some 5 Million lines of code alone *ugh*, Bugs have been with PC users (and that includes to a lesser extend Mac or Linux/Unix) for quite some time now.

Since nothing man creates is perfect, this is unfortunately normal.

The same is valid for alot of products (even much more expensive ones like cars, for example). If they're new, they always contain some number of bugs or annoyances.
(remember the old saying : never buy a "point Zero" Version ;) )

All one has to do, is to inform himself, before making decisions. Once that (often omitted) most important step is done, things usually run as they should.
Sometimes, that requires nothing more than simply wait a month for the Game to mature with a Patch or two readily supplied.

If what I wrote wasn't true, nobody would be using PC's today ;)
(and those that do, would make frequent sessions with a psychatrist *g*)
------------------------
But one has also to consider, that PC's still remain what they always were :
Cutting edge technology, and by nature of their their complexity never meant to be used by everyone.

Often enough, Companies or people preach different, but if you look into the past, and compare it to today, one thing has never changed :
- as soon as Problems occur, the basic User quickly reaches his limits, despite colorific Multimedia WinXP Help Pages ;)
- at that point, help from other more experienced Users (formerly we'd call them "Admins" ) is needed, in the Past doing their Command Line magic, now using their knowledge of the key Controls of the OS (which often remains invisible to basic Users).

I guess that will never change, it's just that people forgot about it, or were/are in error to believe those times were over.

Anyway, new Hardware or Software isn't evil by nature.
It just takes skill to use it.
In times where every 'Joe Smack' thinks he can assemble and setup a PC on his own, this continues to hold true, that's it  ::)

wrote on 27.02.04 at 11:50:39:

Most Problems (if existing) are caused by the guy sitting in front of the Monitor, due to lack of knowledge or experience. Sounds harsh, but it's an old wisdom, and still holds true.

harr, i agree: the pc can't be smarter than the person sitting in front of it ;D


wrote on 27.02.04 at 11:50:39:

But one has also to consider, that PC's still remain what they always were : Cutting edge technology, and by nature of their their complexity never meant to be used by everyone.

not fully true...i remember times the pc was far beyond likeable systems. i considered the rush to have started in the late 80's/ early 90's, but I'm not your grandfather, so you might know better  ;)

hehe, by "PC" I was extending beyond what we nowadays normally call "PC".

Long before the IBM compatible (x86) PC was widely accepted, there were numerous other Personal Computers (which at their time were often much cheaper, and more powerful/feasible in specific areas).

Good old times, Commodore VIC-20, C16/C116 and Plus/4 , Sinclair Z80, Schneider CPC series...
...later followed by the successful Commodore C64/128 and eventually AMIGA vs. ATARI ST series (and the rare but innovative Acorn Archimedes).

Those were only few of the past "Personal Computers", the list of the historical PC's is actually gigantic.
----------
What I meant in my previous Text :

The first PC's were in the hands of people who actually knew what they were doing (or adopting/learning quick).
Same applied to the earlier Systems (although for some it was sufficient if they were able to load & execute their Games ;) )

Today we have heaps more powerful and complex machines, not rarely in the hands of complete Tech n00bs (which in itself isn't bad, but some refuse to invest the time needed to understand the technology; they just want to use it, which ultimately leads to problems)

'Every computer which is sold in the electronic-store around the corner and fit's on a simple student-desk is a "Personal Computer"'. I can't remember where i've read it but i think that line describes a PC perfectly! What's very interesting for me is that the PC wasn't really capable of running action games in the 80's. There were lots of games of course (look at www.the-underdogs.org) but when you look at SSI games from 81-85 or other games from that tim you'll see that they are mostly in 40x25 CGA textmode with userdefined characters. There were some some games using EGA in the late 80's but scrolling was bad. Some of them already supported music but no one could really afford the Adlib or CMS Gameblaster. Look at the scrolling of Duke Nukem 2 and compare it to the C64 or Amiga Version of Turrican and you know what i mean. I think the beginnig of the GAME-PC was Wing Commander - a 3D game. After that game 8bit was lost and it was Amiga against the PC. A clone of WC called EPIC (1992) looks similar on the Amiga and the PC. Until 95 the PC was better at 3D and the Amiga was better at 2D. Settlers, Dune 2 and other games were developed for both systems. Then in 1995 the Amiga was 'Doom'ed. I think you think you know wich game i mean ;-) This was the end of non X86 PC's with the exception of the Apple Mac in the US.

Regards,
Andreas

sure, Falcon, i was thinking of the AT system...
i still own a commodore64 and masses of games for it..this thing rocks  8)

Wow, this is amazingly far from the original topic, I can't even tell how it got there.

First off, I apologize to all you kiddies out there who have never seen p0rn before...are there any? At least I doubt on any board dedicated to 3dfx. c'mon, we're mature ppl here, a 6-year-old isn't going to be looking up info on video cards built while he/she was still sucking his/her thumb. I'm not saying that I personally watch/enjoy it, I'm simply stating that it is out there, it is something that people will stumble accross from time to time, as I did, and although not of much interest, there are less interesting things. Also, dborca, thnx for clarifying, there's a difference between "interesting" and "more interesting" (I pray that makes sense). And also, normally a "/Off-Topic:" would state that an off topic remark is about to come  ;)

Second, how on earth did we get from ATI vs. Nvidia and all the other players to 80s video games? Somehow, I think that it might have actually been my fault, with that stupid crap about linux drivers :-[  But this is the point where I keep my mouth shut, most of what you're talkng about is from before I was born  :P

http://my.fit.edu/~mmichael/BanHim.jpg

If that is the will of the people, then it shall be so

On the other hand...


Quote:

This is against the rules of this board (and others boards also), is it clear ?

Very clear. However, I never posted the actual material on the site (hell, I haven't even seen anything but the front page), and the front page makes it very clear the content of the site. This was not intended to advertise the site, but more or less advertise that it wasn't what you might believe it was. BeyondDream's website is available by click the profile link under Andrei Boiu's posts, then clicking the home page link, or something like that, if anyone should happen to care.


Quote:

ps : You agree, through your use of this YaBB forum, that you will not post any material which is false, defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or otherwise in violation of ANY law

Again, nothing was actually posted, I didn't even make it a link!!

So, if you feel it necessary, go ahead, ban me, you've already gotten me demodded on vf >:(. Hell, ban me on there too, it's life or death for which I visit these forums, and there are many more out there. I'm sure cz would be more than willing to take me back  ;D I just happen to like these forums because they are (or at least used to be) very inviting, and like myself, somewhat nostalgic, not to mention that the people here are bright as anything (save for a couple). Heck, any forum with geniuses who can get 3+ year old cards compatible with the latest standards must be damn smart. Anyways, I've got to leave, I hope this post is not my last.

EDIT: If you're going to ban me, you might as well take out the guy who calls himself nudegoonies, or the one on VF called fukker while you're at it  ;)

They're not gonna ban you, lol...patience was just makng a remark about the picture...

N U D G E :
That guy from the late 80's aussie sitcom called 'Hey Dad'. Now i know why they renamed 'Puckman' to 'Pacman' in the US:
http://www.arcade-history.com/detail.php?id=1901 ;-)

By the way, we had so many subject changes in this thread: From ATI vs NVIDIA to 3DFX engineers to Rampage to Linux to Beyonddreams to Consoles to Computerhistory to Gamehistory to Boardrules. Thats life ämp_man  ;-)

@micha
Nice to see another 'Brotkasten' fan here! I always say everything that makes fun 'rocks'. There are so many people out there who always buy the latest hard'n'soft and say that everything that is more than two years old (c64's and voodoo's for example) sux. The really don't know what they miss...

Regards,
Andreas

wrote on 29.02.04 at 23:24:18:

N U D G E : That guy from the late 80's aussie sitcom called 'Hey Dad'. Now i know why they renamed 'Puckman' to 'Pacman' in the US: http://www.arcade-history.com/detail.php?id=1901 ;-)

sorry m8, my bad. I still don't like the whole idea of using "fukker" for a username though.


Quote:

By the way, we had so many subject changes in this thread: From ATI vs NVIDIA to 3DFX engineers to Rampage to Linux to Beyonddreams to Consoles to Computerhistory to Gamehistory to Boardrules. Thats life ämp_man  ;-)

Now, just how exactly did it get from, say, Beyonddreams to consoles...

wrote on 27.02.04 at 10:49:32:

To counter-point this: consoles are offering acceptable results for their price, want more, state of the art, you pay a hefty price for it. If you have the money, you could receive something that is 10 times better, more reliable than any PC, and offers the greatest quality, but the price is 100 times bigger, and the programes designed for it are 100.000 times more rare, at least.

Yes, but as FalconFly & Micha said, it proves to be more expensive.  You said it yourself: "If you have the money"  ;)
The PC provides a much smoother transition with upgrading to today's modern technology.

wrote on 27.02.04 at 10:28:45:

different times, man..reflect about this simple point: there were just a few games in the 80's compared to nowadays. just every day we got more of them! do you think you can deliver a driver which can fully support all games without getting any problems? see, that's not possible nowadays. you would need 100 people working around the clock or something like that..

I totally agree with this fact. That idea of having drivers that support every graphical functionality incorporated into today's games is impossible.
Different graphics engines, newer 3D technologies, it is very difficult for a manufacturer to anticipate what will need to be covered by the drivers. Have you ever wondered why drivers for graphics cards have got so large in file size over the years? The scale of compatibility they try to cater for is immense.


Quote:

concerning game consoles: dude, do you know why nearly everbody who wants to play games owns a M$ PC system?? because it's (despite to consoles) a scalable system! since 3dfx introduced the voodoo1 the pc raised to become the gaming console..

The Voodoo1 did change the way we look at computers for games today! This is correct! Trying to fuse an arcade feel to the PC system was a success made by 3dfx. You can argue this point quite openly, but my opinion is that ATI and nVidia would not have been in the same frame of mind today if it wasn't for 3dfx! The only vendor that may have been still thinking this way today without the existence of 3dfx, would have been Matrox!




Quote:

and that's the fact why I'm still posting here! we've now even more quality w/ faster performance on pc games compared the a crappity smackin' gaystation. that's why we buy computers, isn't it? the only console really useful is - in my opinion - the nintendo gamecube which can deliver full tv resolution unlike most other consoles.

GayStation!  :D I like that one!  Classic  ;D Never liked the b*st**d playstation series! Just never caught on with me!

Now the GameCube, I definetely agree with, as it produces such a brilliant quality of images on the big screen! More so than the PS1/PS2. What's more, all that power from such a little box! It's a great console to have for taking on your holidays or when moving around! :)  If we could just get hold of some of the Mini-DVDR's! I feel a Piracy spree in the air!  ;D  Only for backing up your original games in case they get damaged, of course.  ;)

wrote on 27.02.04 at 10:49:32:

Ok. You buy a 3 Ghz CPU today. Soon you discover that you need 1 Ghz of Ram because games are demanding. You buy a newer soundcard because the on-board one fails to sound correctly and stutters in some games. You then install Directx, tons of pathces, to find out that the game still don't runs. Then you have a feeling, and you try each and every setting on D3d. Yes, you make the game to start.

Ahhh, the joys of PC's.  :) However, I have never come across situations as bad as this all at once, and as FalconFly most famously said, it's mostly the user sat in front of the monitor!
Also, do you think this really bothers anyone who owns a PC? as I don't see PC users on the decrease, more like on the increase! ::)

Micha is also right! A computer is the most un-intelligent thing in the world......without man (or woman, in the presence of our Lady, Patience), without a user!


Quote:

You play the game, but you are going from 100fps downto 30 when lots and lots of things appear. You see the sky but it has some strange "dithering" effect even when you can only run in 32 bit color. Frustration all over the place, as the photos from the game looked way different in that game magazine, and on TV.

You show me any game that runs @ or anywhere close to 100fps on a PS1 or PS2, and I will eat all my collection of hats and burn my house down in recognition of my ignorance! Trust me, it won't come to that though! ;)

And just for my own personal rant, no offence to anyone intended but I would rather stick with the PC's than buy a console only for it to be out of date a year down the line and have to spend another £350 every year for the latest brand new model!

in fact, most game consoles are designed for average 30fps, not more. anyway, thanks for "agreeing" so much, james!

@ nudgegoonies: hehe, they just don't know what's good  ;D

>>adding<<
this here becomes my favourite thread so far  ;D ;D

wrote on 01.03.04 at 13:11:30:

Ahhh, the joys of PC's.  :) However, I have never come across situations as bad as this all at once, and as FalconFly most famously said, it's mostly the user sat in front of the monitor! Also, do you think this really bothers anyone who owns a PC? as I don't see PC users on the decrease, more like on the increase! ::) Micha is also right! A computer is the most un-intelligent thing in the world......without man (or woman, in the presence of our Lady, Patience), without a user! You show me any game that runs @ or anywhere close to 100fps on a PS1 or PS2, and I will eat all my collection of hats and burn my house down in recognition of my ignorance! Trust me, it won't come to that though! ;) And just for my own personal rant, no offence to anyone intended but I would rather stick with the PC's than buy a console only for it to be out of date a year down the line and have to spend another £350 every year for the latest brand new model!

You still don't come to agree with the fact that you link things made in China with things made in Europe, with very different standards, and you expect to kick the bucket? Any of these works even a tiny different, and you can't expect paper-to-reality performance values. As things become more complex, greater the chances of a thing going "out of sync". Even 1 Celsius degree increase in heat can create a 2% non-linear response in electronic circuitry, not including the inherent problems of the actual chip and board design, flaws in components, tensions that vary even at 0,01 volts. Tons of situations to help a thing go wrong...

To your surprise, games can get as high as 100fps. They usually don't. In fact most of the time they don't get past 30fps in high res/tex/geom values. But, there is a but, you get to 100fps in an instant when you reach a low complexity area, this is very exhausting for the eye, and this happens in fact more than you think, not at 100fps, but at 60fps and it still matters. What I always say is that it is useless to make a game to run at 100fps or 60fps on a platform, when you don't make the fps performance more constant. Even when going slightly constant, sometimes you are still uncomfortable while playing a game. Vsync and Frame rate limiters can help, but the downside is that still you can go from 15 to 30 or 60fps in an instant.

I wonder if going deeper into tech stuff and electronics would help someone understand more what are the inherent problems of the PC's and how the old problems can't be solved so easily. And still some people even on calculations and on paper, would not recognise the true facts and figures that define that situation. As I doubt that, I will not go further in complexity.

oh, please, have a try! i don't understand you, make it clear to me! i want to know something about pc complexity for real!  :D
i suppose you don't do so as you don't know most facts. anyway, read again and try to figure out what james was speaking about!
e.g. to the fps: we were only refering to consoles here, no pc crap!
etc...

I know very well what I am talking about, Micha, I was reffering to fps on PC's, and more than that, definitevly has no sense getting into tech stuff. It would have one if you've commented elseway the last post, reffering to specific items, when you say you disagree. Doing in the manner you did, gets a clear answer to whom lacks the knowledge of some deep tech problems (avoiding to clearly proving with numbers, on what you don't know clearly) ...

wrote on 02.03.04 at 11:49:05:

I know very well what I am talking about, Micha, I was reffering to fps on PC's, and more than that, definitevly has no sense getting into tech stuff. It would have one if you've commented elseway the last post, reffering to specific items, when you say you disagree. Doing in the manner you did, gets a clear answer to whom lacks the knowledge of some deep tech problems (avoiding to clearly proving with numbers, on what you don't know clearly) ...

Well, I guess you're very accustomed with this type of posting, anyway!  :P
And, btw, it's voltages, not tensions. Please avoid translating Politechnic Institute's papers "mot a mot".

Now we're on topic, awwright! ;D

http://my.fit.edu/~mmichael/Smileys/laugh.gif

wrote on 02.03.04 at 09:58:48:

You still don't come to agree with the fact that you link things made in China with things made in Europe, with very different standards, and you expect to kick the bucket? Any of these works even a tiny different, and you can't expect paper-to-reality performance values. As things become more complex, greater the chances of a thing going "out of sync". Even 1 Celsius degree increase in heat can create a 2% non-linear response in electronic circuitry, not including the inherent problems of the actual chip and board design, flaws in components, tensions that vary even at 0,01 volts. Tons of situations to help a thing go wrong... To your surprise, games can get as high as 100fps. They usually don't. In fact most of the time they don't get past 30fps in high res/tex/geom values. But, there is a but, you get to 100fps in an instant when you reach a low complexity area, this is very exhausting for the eye, and this happens in fact more than you think, not at 100fps, but at 60fps and it still matters. What I always say is that it is useless to make a game to run at 100fps or 60fps on a platform, when you don't make the fps performance more constant. Even when going slightly constant, sometimes you are still uncomfortable while playing a game. Vsync and Frame rate limiters can help, but the downside is that still you can go from 15 to 30 or 60fps in an instant.

I'm sorry, what on earth are you tring to say? Man Andei, your posts get more and more fun to respond to! WTF is this crap about stuff made in chine versus europe? Everything is made in china/taiwan/japan these days! Jesus, I'll bet if you opened up that PS2 or XBOX, it would have 1/2 the same stuff as computers get! That's because they are little computers, and use a lot of the same or very similar equipment. And when you really think about that, doesn't it make sense that you would have the same variations in FPS that you do on an x86 PC? But with a console, you can't do anything about it! As for you're stuff about heat and overclocking, duh, when stuff runs hotter, it becomes somewhat less efficient. That's why serious overclockers spend big bucks on water cooling, CO₂ cooling, and even liquid nitrogen cooling to keep their equipment running at those speeds. By the way, anyone seen those PCs with the refridgeration unit built into the bottom? Or perhaps it was here that I saw it, can't remember.


Quote:

I wonder if going deeper into tech stuff and electronics would help someone understand more what are the inherent problems of the PC's and how the old problems can't be solved so easily. And still some people even on calculations and on paper, would not recognise the true facts and figures that define that situation. As I doubt that, I will not go further in complexity.

Yes andrei, don't bother going into any further details. As one of america's greatest leader's once said:
"It's better to keep one's mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and resolve all doubt."
-Abraham Lincoln

That is a very good motto by Abraham Lincoln.

I do apologise Andre if this causes any offence, but your English does leave something to be desired and I struggled to see the point you were making.

About the framerate debate, Scientifically, the human eye only sees a limit of 24 fps (this can be made debatable give or take a frame depending on the refresh rate in 'Hz'.  This would have to be a drastic difference e.g. 60Hz compared to 120Hz). Anything above 30fps, the eye fails to keep up and notice the difference in the change of the frame.  The game may seem faster at 100fps than 30fps, although the eye does not seem the frame change, it just sees an increase in speed of the game (the game moves faster).

My opinion is, is that PC's will ALWAYS be ahead of consoles, performance and quality wise, due to the high demand in newer technology and the frequent ever-changing architecture of modern systems.

Ahhhh... those demons... won't let me alone... There is a question that haunts me continuously... Well, sorry, I can't help myself, so I have to ask: this subforum has "off-topic" description. Does this mean _ALL_ threads must be off-topic? http://my.fit.edu/~mmichael/Smileys/lmao.gif

look andrei, as most people here, i'm just too tired refering your posts. it's amazing how pigheaded and conceited one can be. sorry for that. but how come you promote game consoles in a 3dfx forum (as you should know, 3dfx made game consoles unnecessary for most of us)??
i recommend you reading some books and come back later.

wrote on 03.03.04 at 13:49:29:

Ahhhh... those demons... won't let me alone... There is a question that haunts me continuously... Well, sorry, I can't help myself, so I have to ask: this subforum has "off-topic" description. Does this mean _ALL_ threads must be off-topic? http://my.fit.edu/~mmichael/Smileys/lmao.gif

LMAO! I think it's a competition, whoever can't go more off topic (from the already "off-topic" topic) loses, and so far, Andrei's in the lead!

wrote on 03.03.04 at 10:17:20:

That is a very good motto by Abraham Lincoln. I do apologise Andre if this causes any offence, but your English does leave something to be desired and I struggled to see the point you were making. About the framerate debate, Scientifically, the human eye only sees a limit of 24 fps (this can be made debatable give or take a frame depending on the refresh rate in 'Hz'.  This would have to be a drastic difference e.g. 60Hz compared to 120Hz). Anything above 30fps, the eye fails to keep up and notice the difference in the change of the frame.  The game may seem faster at 100fps than 30fps, although the eye does not seem the frame change, it just sees an increase in speed of the game (the game moves faster). My opinion is, is that PC's will ALWAYS be ahead of consoles, performance and quality wise, due to the high demand in newer technology and the frequent ever-changing architecture of modern systems.

..
When will the 24-30fps myth end?  :D
just see the 60/30/15 Hz demo from 3DFX
http://falconfly.de/artwork.htm

wrote on 04.03.04 at 20:52:13:

.. When will the 24-30fps myth end?  :D just see the 60/30/15 Hz demo from 3DFX http://falconfly.de/artwork.htm

It's not a myth, lol. It's actually the max the human eye can see. The only reason more FPS are needed is to compensate for massive explosions and world details in games. I would love to have my games locked at 30fps. The 24-29.9 fps thingy is from movies; ever notice how hollywood/professional movies always tend to look different from home movies and the like? It's all about FPS. Hollywood movies are usually filmed at 24fps, which gives it that "effect".

*ugh*

While the untrained eye alone might only process something around that figure passively viewing something, the process of  human recognition  and interaction can (depending on training) by far exceed this figure.

I can tell 25 from 40 fps just by looking at it, and depending on Interaction level, anything sub 80fps can feel sluggish and very disturbing.

Hardcore Quake 3 Arena players literally puke on their machine, it if drops below 120fps ever.

The 25fps is a myth, and basically defines the absolute minimum fps for basic Cinematic experience (barely sufficient to fool the eye into seeing a 'Motion Picture' , based on zero Interaction)

I totally agree with Falconfly on the fps choice.
I have to add only one thing to that: if the above discussion was true, then above 25fps we would see no difference. But then comes to the fair problem: why is it that there can be subliminal messages in a frame (or split-frame one) above 25 fps, to affect your psychic. So, above 25 fps it is more than clear you can see the difference.

Making a bit of a comparison, human hearing is also said to be limited to 16 (or 17 kHz) frequency. Yet the human can hear beyond this frequency or below, depending on audio system, ear characteristics, training and not last but least, attention. This definitively proves that limits are quite variable, and the same applies to Video. And thanks Daniel. It was voltages (not tension), I maked a little mistake were it shouldn't be...

In fact, 3dfx representatives once said (I don't remember exactly were), that a constant frame-rate around 60fps is the main goal when talking about PC games performance.

wrote on 04.03.04 at 23:07:30:

*ugh* While the untrained eye alone might only process something around that figure passively viewing something, the process of  human recognition  and interaction can (depending on training) by far exceed this figure. I can tell 25 from 40 fps just by looking at it, and depending on Interaction level, anything sub 80fps can feel sluggish and very disturbing. Hardcore Quake 3 Arena players literally puke on their machine, it if drops below 120fps ever. The 25fps is a myth, and basically defines the absolute minimum fps for basic Cinematic experience (barely sufficient to fool the eye into seeing a 'Motion Picture' , based on zero Interaction)

Lecram25 has a point here.  Games that do run at 80 or 120 fps do so for the reason to compensate the frames in computer slowdown when complex things happen on screen.

Out of the 24fps you see every second, the 56 or 96 left over are used as a buffer or conditioner to keep the framerate above the 24 frames that the eye sees in that second.

wrote on 05.03.04 at 09:31:24:

I totally agree with Falconfly on the fps choice. I have to add only one thing to that: if the above discussion was true, then above 25fps we would see no difference. But then comes to the fair problem: why is it that there can be subliminal messages in a frame (or split-frame one) above 25 fps, to affect your psychic. So, above 25 fps it is more than clear you can see the difference.

Depends how many frames long a subliminal image is!  :P    This is no comparison or evidence to back up your claim on the topic I am talking about


Quote:

Making a bit of a comparison, human hearing is also said to be limited to 16 (or 17 kHz) frequency. Yet the human can hear beyond this frequency or below, depending on audio system, ear characteristics, training and not last but least, attention. This definitively proves that limits are quite variable, and the same applies to Video. And thanks Daniel. It was voltages (not tension), I maked a little mistake were it shouldn't be...

You clearly have won the title for the most Off-topic conversation!  ;)


Quote:

In fact, 3dfx representatives once said (I don't remember exactly were), that a constant frame-rate around 60fps is the main goal when talking about PC games performance.

If you read my topic on framerate conditioning and buffering, the reason was because 60fps could guarantee that 24 frames a second will be read by the eye, depending on the complexity of graphics on screen.

guys, has anybody of you ever had biology in school??
in fact, what human can see varies between 20-25fps - not more. the thing you think you can see more on desktop, falcon, is because of the technology of tube monitors, or have you ever seen a flickering on a modern flat panel? see: the screen may flicker @50Hz, but if the game runs @30fps it runs smooth. but depending on the the tube technology, you see a flickering which has nothing to do with the fps of your games.
well, i agree a shooter is nicer @50fps than below, and nfs underground should run smooth @25fps. and this is the case where monitor refresh rate and game refresh rate combined cause problems. try games with activated vertical screen sync and your problems will all disappear *amazes me* hehe, at least, if your gfx and cpu is fast enough  ;D

>>adding<<
i'm trying to figure out what's the use of 120fps in qIIIarena when your monitor is locked to 85Hz or something...as in this case Hertz = frames per second (--> the use of vsync  ;) )

When talking about the fps thing i remember the 2d scrolling problem on the C64. When scrolling a 2D level to the left with 1 pixel per frame (the c64 always runs 25fps on a pal machine and displays them in 50hz tv-mode) it is absolutely smooth. If you want to scroll faster with 2 pixels per frame it is also absolutely smooth. But what if you want to scroll only a bit faster  then you had to do 1 pixel per frame, then two pixel per frame, then one again etc. And this looks bad. In a 3D scenario there are so many 3D objects moving at different changing speeds. If you have a 3d object rendered to a 2D framebuffer with accelerating speed moving from the left to the right (for example) from 0.1 pixel per frame to 30 pixels per frame then all ppf rates that are not divideable by the refreshrate and are under 24fps are jerky. The higher the resolution and the higher the refresh and framerate the less visible are those effects.

Another thing is that PC monitors are optimized for a clear stable picture rather than TV's that are optimized for moving pictures.

Regards,
Andreas

P.S.
I really know what i'm writing about but i don't know if my thoughts are readable after they went to through my language processor (6 years english in school) so i really hope you understand what i am writing about ;-)

wrote on 05.03.04 at 16:01:36:

guys, has anybody of you ever had biology in school?? in fact, what human can see varies between 20-25fps - not more. the thing you think you can see more on desktop, falcon, is because of the technology of tube monitors, or have you ever seen a flickering on a modern flat panel? see: the screen may flicker @50Hz, but if the game runs @30fps it runs smooth. but depending on the the tube technology, you see a flickering which has nothing to do with the fps of your games. well, i agree a shooter is nicer @50fps than below, and nfs underground should run smooth @25fps. and this is the case where monitor refresh rate and game refresh rate combined cause problems. try games with activated vertical screen sync and your problems will all disappear *amazes me* hehe, at least, if your gfx and cpu is fast enough  ;D >>adding<< i'm trying to figure out what's the use of 120fps in qIIIarena when your monitor is locked to 85Hz or something...as in this case Hertz = frames per second (--> the use of vsync  ;) )

Trust me, I have seen military Prototype Simulators in demonstration at exactly 24fps, and the effect was horrible  (visible, sluggish motion on a widescreen Projection).

So the naked eye can clearly see more than 25fps ;)
The biologists might argue with an "average" human's capability, but well I'm not "average".

Also, the "Motion Picture" already has quite alot of "Motion compensation", in order to camouflage exactly this Problem :
Having the Scene on the screen "jumping" around during camera slews due to the way too low fps. If 25fps was all we could see, then no Motion Compensation would ever be needed. On small screens the effect is minimal, but in large Cinemas, it can be extreme (despite Motion compensation or special postprocessing and/or recording FX).

And I have played with VSync on (left on accidentally), rendering a Game almost unplayable at ~80-85fps, because all my timing was constantly off.

And a last example :
I played on my Notebook at something like 30-40fps, which was "viewable" to the bystander, but far not enough for competitive play. (and that's on a TFT)

To me (and many others), 30fps are not smooth, not on a CRT, nor on a TFT. (actually doesn't matter)

The use of fps > refreshrate is, that the game feels free, uninterrupted and undisturbed. The faster the Action, and the required Interaction, the higher the fps needed for silk smooth gameplay. And depending on Training, this can exceed some 150fps for the absolute Pro Gamers.

I actually saw a bit of 60fps cinema at the Futuroscope (french theme park). Images were MUCH more lifelike than crappy standard 24fps cinema, which gets really sluggish if the camera moves too fast..

please: ask your former biology teacher. you can't see more than average 25fps. you shouldn't orientate on screens, that's about true nature.
example: ever tried to catch a fly? you must have noticed the fly is very quickly moving away. why? the fly is able to see about 50fps or more, don't know exactly. if you could see @ the same rate, you would be able to kill the damn fly! but you aren't, you can't even see every move of the fly, but the fly instead is able to see more of your movements than you do. many animals can do movements  human can only see under special cameras catching all "frames" & showing it at lower frame rates because the human eye isn't able to see the whole movement by nature.
the screen thingy is different. it's a matter of the matrix if you believe to see more than average 25fps. so, ever seen a flickering in nature (without being drunken)  ;D i don't know the technical details why man sees a flickering @ less than 75Hz, but i truly know: you aren't able to see more than 20-30fps in nature.
convinced?

Nope, since I know I can "see" more ;)
(explanation below)

Why ?

Take a very big Screen (Plasma, TFT, CRT, whatever) @ 140Hz if you like (or more).
Then color the top half bright, and the lower half dark.

Now rotate the contained image, with the Image being displayed at 25-30fps.

The Result :
The Motion especially at the Borders will jump some distance every frame, and everyone will see it (including you).
(as a simple result of physical laws)

This is the worst case Result.

Why don't we see anything like that in nature ?
Because Nature doesn't "run" @ 25-30fps, it runs basically at unlimited fps. If it did, we'd see the same disturbing effects we see on anything physically limited to such low fps.

Even an Oscilloscope, drawing onto a phosphorous Layer (which fades only slow in brightness) will show the effect of flickering, if it draws the Curve at only 25fps (despite the after-glowing Screen helping alot to fool the eye).

I agree, the human eye cannot deliver a full, high resolution Image at unlimited rates. BUT, it is the human brain, that takes only the Information off that image, that it is focussing on.
This (I must assume) is naturally only a certain percentage of the total field of view (e.g. a limited area of a Monitor).
With the brain focussing on it (or even only specific parts of it), I reckon this remaining, small percentage of the Total Image can be scanned for Information of Interest much more often than 25-30fps.
============
I think the reason we disagree on the Topic, is that there is a tremendous difference between "seeing" and "sensing".

Seeing is defined as the raw, naked and unprocessed Image that the eyes can deliver to the brain.

Sensing is what is left, after the brain performed one of its most powerful functions critical to our survival and effectiveness : Filter irrelevant details

So I should have written, that I meant the sensing process actually. I hope that makes things a bit more clear.
I would agree that no human would be able to actually detect/sense all detail changes within an Image at more than 25fps (it's simply beyond the brain's capacity).
A full detail Image-by-Image comparison can become impossible (provided enough details are taken into consideration) at even 1fps, it's just a matter of overtasking the brain's capacity to process all the Information, at which it naturally must begin to filter what it deems less relevant.

wrote on 06.03.04 at 16:08:52:

Then color the top half bright, and the lower half dark. Now rotate the contained image, with the Image being displayed at 25-30fps.

I'd like to mention another aspect to this matter. I dunno whether I'm right or not, but maybe it's worth mentioning: the eye doesn't work in an "analogous" mode, but a "sampled" mode instead...
Take this example. Place yourself 2, 3 meters away from a long wall, then "move" your sight back and forth (from the nearest point you can see, to the furthest point. You will notice how the eye "jumps" from one point on the wall to the next. This is sampling. Perhaps this applies to motion, too... I dunno. But if _IS_ true, then take a look at the Nyquist theorem and you'll have the maximum observable framerate.

This is definitively a very interesting discussion, and a bit unseen in normal situations.

What I am wondering is how many people actually believe in the strong-steel approach of the biologists that sustain the 25fps. Definitively, no matter how much time has passed since then (not including the name of who stated this vision), people still believe in this, fairly strong. However, movies have been done and advertised to be close to real (hence the name moving-images), but accordingly to the technology and vision of that period of time.  

As technology evolved, some have proved that the 25fps approach can be looked as a compromise, and proved why. Immediately the people that have money from movies industry fighted back this, and with force, compared to their opponents. This is why many people are still too keen on 25fps "so-called reality" and "optimum result". However, with the aid of scientist and advertisers this vision of "25fps perfection" is starting to fade out slowly.

alright falcon, i have to agree: so the human eye might be limited to av. 25fps, but needs more (like in nature) to constantly deliver smooth info to the brain  ;D  -in simple words, of course..but i think we can compromise this way.  ;)
hehe, never seen guys in a forum trying to "translate" anatomic topics into "hardware language" before  :D

oh i have to add something concerning the focusing eye:
somebody made a test some months ago & the result was that people playing shooters get more details of their natural environment than people who don't play or beat up with tetris ( ::) )
so if you play shooters, i.e. you won't get more details in somebody's face, but you'll notice more objects & forms when you e.g. enter a room you've never seen before (that would also mean you notice more colors, and by this, your world is more colourful and so also more interesting & happier than your mates' world not playing ut200x  ;D ;D )