Send your 8800's back! GOD has spoken!

[aaronjb]

At this particular moment, I think multi-core processors are the only solution to having more muscles for processing graphics. Single-core I guess isn't cutting it... and if that's what he wants, he's asking WAY TOO MUCH...

I can sorta understand how single-core would be much easier to code for, though...

It's not that single-core isn't cutting it - it's that we've really reached the apex that chip designers are willing to reach in terms of sheer processing power on a single core. The move to multiple cores has been dictated by the hardware designers, not the software developers. The transition period won't be simple, particularly for developers entrenched in years of single-core development.

 

[aaronjb]

I just re-read my posts, and I want to say that I'm not a Carmack fanboy. He can drive his F50 Ferrari off a cliff and my day would go on. But he's pushing against the hardware developers and resellers tendency to market the hell out of uber-expensive new technology when the need really isn't there and the improvements may be dubious.

The flip side of that coin, of course, is that we need a large group of frenzied consumers - the early adopters - who will purchase all the latest hardware. This gives hardware folks an incentive to push the limit and innovate. But there needs to be some balance.

 

[mblue]

Well, I can't say much about his comments but, I think he's right on the mark about Vista.

 

[fabulouscoops]

Doom3 with D3D9? No, try OpenGL. Your analysis of this isn't based in fact.

Another quote from the article

"Carmack said that Quake Wars, which is based on an upgraded Doom 3 engine, will not be a DX10 game.
On the topic of DX10, Carmack said that there’s nothing at the moment motivating him to move to the new API just yet for Quake Wars, citing that he’s quite satisfied with DX9 and the Xbox 360.

I was talking about Quake Wars using DX9 and the DOOM3 engine, not Doom3 itself. Of course this is on the Xbox360. If this is not the case then the article is confusing as to what is really being talked about.

As far as DX10 not being widely available until 2008, thats fine, but it does take years to develop a new PC game and if you are not starting right now, you will not have a product to sell in two years. Likewise, if you do not take advantage of new hardware technology, then you will be left behind very quickly. Intel is talking about 80 core processors in 5 years. If we can't code for 2 right now, today, then where will software development be in 5 years?

My opinion remains, Carmack is locked into a project which he must defend and he will be passed over by new hotshots who are eager to test the limits of hardware and operating systems. I don't think he is opposed to new technology, but his head is somewhere else at the moment (ie. the past)

 

[g0dM@n]

by the way, i LOVE the thread name... lol

 

[Hardin]

But the need is here for dx10. This is like when people said you wouldn't need pixel shader 3.0 and look at where we are now.

 

[aaronjb]

"Carmack said that Quake Wars, which is based on an upgraded Doom 3 engine, will not be a DX10 game.
On the topic of DX10, Carmack said that there’s nothing at the moment motivating him to move to the new API just yet for Quake Wars, citing that he’s quite satisfied with DX9 and the Xbox 360.

I was talking about Quake Wars using DX9 and the DOOM3 engine, not Doom3 itself. Of course this is on the Xbox360. If this is not the case then the article is confusing as to what is really being talked about.

I think it is confusing. They start talking about PCs, then move over to consoles. From what I've read, Quake Wars will follow the same path as Doom - OpenGL for rendering, with DirectX for input handling (SDL on Linux). But on the 360, Direct3D for rendering is the only option. I think what he's referring to is the tools and support provided by Microsoft versus the tools and support provided by Sony on the PS3. Many developers think that DX9 - specifically the D3D API - is far less evil than D3D8 and prior incarnations of D3D.

My opinion remains, Carmack is locked into a project which he must defend and he will be passed over by new hotshots who are eager to test the limits of hardware and operating systems. I don't think he is opposed to new technology, but his head is somewhere else at the moment (ie. the past)

I'll respectfully disagree. I think he's being more realistic than publishers and developers who think that a DX10-only game is feasible in 2007, or even 2008. And I seriously doubt that the Carmacks and Sweeneys of the world are worried about the new "hotshots" - using a new API hardly makes one a hotshot. Again, it's about being pragmatic - Crysis may be simply over-the-top amazing, but is the average game consumer going to purchase a new, expensive graphics card to play one game? Nope. It's all about selling more copies.

Carmack's beef, it seems, is one that many of us share: That the move to Vista is pushing a new graphics API which may not really be necessary, and that Vista itself really offers no benefits for game developers.

 

[aaronjb]

But the need is here for dx10. This is like when people said you wouldn't need pixel shader 3.0 and look at where we are now.

I'm not hearing Carmack say that there isn't a "need" for DX10. He's simply saying that the benefits may not be as great as they hype machine would have you believe.

 

[Hardin]

I'm sure people still say the same thing about 3.0

 

[Immortal_Hero]

okay what the heck is an asymmetric CPU??

AMD is kicking it around. It is a CPU with multiple cores that run at different speeds based on load. I know they are comming out with dual cores soon with this technology. For example when playing a game that only uses one core the other core would be down clocked saving heat output and power usage. Think of it as Cool N Quiet on a core basis instead of a CPU basis.

*Logs into Newegg.com* *cancels order for 2 8800gtx's* all b/c "god" has spoken (j/k btw haven't made the jump to 8800's, yet anyway). Sounds to me like this guy is afraid of moving forward in technology b/c it costs the game developers money to come up with ways to support new hardware. He gripes about everything new, DX10, Vista, multiple cores, and the list goes on. It also makes it harder to make a DX10 game for PC then port it to console or vice versa using different shaders. He likes XBOX so well b/c it uses DX and they can make minimual changes to port games between XBOX and PC. Pff... like he is going to influence me.

 

[largon]

Immortal_Hero,
That's not what the asymmetric CPU Carmack is talking about.
He referred to PS3 CPU: IBM Cell

 

[g0dM@n]

Immortal_Hero,
That's not what the asymmetric CPU Carmack is talking about.
He referred to PS3 CPU: IBM Cell

that did NOT make it ANY clearer to me...

is it a CPU and GPU processor in one?

 

[Hardin]

The Cell processor is one main processor called the Power Processor Element which controls the eight Synergistic Processing Elements. Each SPE runs a different program or task. It's a little difficult to understand at first, just keep rereading the article.

 

[g0dM@n]

The Cell processor is one main processor called the Power Processor Element which controls the eight Synergistic Processing Elements. Each SPE runs a different program or task. It's a little difficult to understand at first, just keep rereading the article.

so it's 8 cores... each core has its own job.

 

[aaronjb]

that did NOT make it ANY clearer to me...

is it a CPU and GPU processor in one?

Asymmetric processors have multiple specialized cores one the same die, whereas symmetric processors have multiple like cores on the same die. The cell processsor, from the little I've read, has a PPE (a general-purpose PowerPC-based processor) combined with several SPEs (Synergistic Processing Elements), which are RISC-based processors. Of course, there is
also a bus and a bus interface, and memory management. And, if I'm not mistaken (thanks wikipedia!) there are several PPE/multiple-SPE combinations on one Cell die.

In my experience - mainly with OS kernels - asymmetric processing makes is more difficult to predict execution time, and requires more up-front cost to achieve synchronization and to reduce waits and locks. With non-like cores (asymmetric processors), you have to dispatch threads to cores based on job type, i.e. integer operation, floating point op, matrix transform. I'd guess that in the case of the cell, the PPE would be the manager and dispatcher of these threads, and also perform other processing while waiting for the threads to finish. Balancing these tasks is not too easy, and I imagine that having multiple PPE/SPE(x) combinations would be a pain. Without adequate profiling tools, optimizing this code would be a pain as well.

Anyone with more knowledge, feel free to jump in here and correct or add to what I've said.

 

[Hardin]

Essentially yes but I heard that Sony disables one of the 8 to increase yields and then they use another one for os security so there are only 6 available.

 

[aaronjb]

so it's 8 cores... each core has its own job.

It's a little more complicated than that in practice, but that's the general idea.

 

[aaronjb]

Kind of an aside: All of this SMP and aSMP stuff seems great, until you pull back from the beauty of it all and realize that you're dealing with the very real-world problems of deadlocks and race conditions. OS kernels abstract these issues into software (with execution rings, spinlock prevention, etc.), so developers have to deal with these (and prevent them, for the most part) on these consoles, because I doubt the hardware is managing this stuff for them.

 

[grayg]

I think Sony first planned to have around 3 Cells in the PS3, 1 as a cpu and 2 as the gpu. Obviously they scrapped the idea if it was true, but atleast this explains its capablities of proccessing graphics.
It is 9 cores in a Cell cpu, the main PowerPC core and 8 SPE's, though for the PS3 1 SPE is disabled to help yeilds and another SPE is used to run the operating system. So effectively developers have the PowerPC core + 6 SPE's to play with.
I think more than anything Cell will probably allow more special effects e.g. F.E.A.R particle effects x10

The article on Wiki sure does make the Cells SPEs sound like a gefroce 8 nvidia type stream proccessor.

 

[Hardin]

It'll be very interesting to look back 5 years from now and see which console had the better processor.