Larian Studios Forums General Chat Chat (Anything) You nerds! Update me on computers!

Cleglaw, I've heard of speciial physics processors to be built in into hardware for games ... I also heard that the makers of Gothic 3 intend to support such a thing.

you are talking about the AGEIA PhysX Physics Processing Unit (ppu).

It is an extra card (pci pci-e) specialises in Physics calculations. But I like it more when it goes to the CPU since that way you don't have to buy an extra card :s

What is Crossfire? Can't seem to find it anywhere (I know it's an ATI feature, but that's about it).

Übereil

crossfire

Crosfire is ATI's version of SLI... instead of having an internal cable (bridge) you need to connect, they have an external cable... a crosfire cable... No settings needed, its mostly "plug 'n pray"

they just tried to make it more hassle-free than the SLI, where you have to, connect the bridge, enable SLI in windows, then restart to make it all work.... (but then again, how often will you change the SLI settings??? is it really that much more effort to do it once and leave it? )

I just tested the difference between 2 cards.... fairly similar cards...

The first a Leadtek nVidia A6800 LE TDH 128 bit, 256 MB card (a GeForce 6800 card)
The second a Leadtek nVidia A6800 A400 TDH 256 bit, 256 MB Card (also a GeForce 6800 card)

now not to bore anyone with detailed specs of a benchmark program... i decided to rather use something simpler, and more to the point of basic evidence Larian's very own "Config tool" that tests the Frames per second...

The first card got on 1600 x 1200 FSAA 0, Fog ON a FSP of 65 - 68 (i ran a few tests to make sure)
The second card got on the same settings 93 - 98 FPS (i also ran a few tests to make sure)

now the differrence between the 2 cards:

card 2 is 256 bit (double the processing bandwidth -speed that data can get gathered and sent), faster ramdac (450 MHZ), UMFB memory (runs at the same speed as the GPU, instead of having its own speed that can be slower than the GPU)...

card 1 is 128 bit (like MOST cards still) normal ramdac 350 MHZ, DDR 3 memory (400 MHZ - in this case faster than the GPU, so no bottleneck)

I cant even identify the 2 cards from each other... they look EXACTLY the same.

That must have been some kind of "core test" (ie it only tested the core), since twice the size of graphic memory (and twice the bandwidth) ought to make a difference <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/suspicion.gif" alt="" />.

Übereil

memory is the same size.... both are 256 Mb... just the ramdac, GPU bit-rate and memory-type differs.

on bench marking utilities there are also a vast difference.... i just wanted to keep it simple...

and the Frames per second rate, is sort of the FINAL result (everything combined)

GO L_R <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/up.gif" alt="" />
Darn how is it possible that a Lady with your looks has brains too *ducks for cover into unused Nuclear shelter* <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/delight.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

Ah, thanks, Morbo. I just cannot remember such names. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/winkwink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Was about to type that it probablly was her husband typeing when I realized I need her help too much.

Übereil

<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/silly.gif" alt="" />

he is more into fixing anything... not finding everything out....

but yea.... he knows MORE about fixing puters than most people....

Great, can he help me fix my poor exuse of a homesite? <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/biggrin.gif" alt="" />

It doesn't look very good for the moment <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" />... (Was planning to start working on it this weekend.)

Übereil

My current graphic card cant handle oblivion too well...can any1 tell me a good AGP card wich should run oblivion about maxed out with a price less then 150 Euros? (Or maybe even under 100?)

thnx <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/biggrin.gif" alt="" />

I only checked out a Swedish site, but I found some GeForce 6800 that fit your description. Some Radeon X1300 would probablly work too. Don't bother looking for the economyclass GeForces, they're acually whorse than 6800...
What card do you have for the moment by the way?

Übereil

S3 Virge DX with 2MB VRAM upgradeable to 4MB! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/biggrin.gif" alt="" />

[geek mode]

I change the tittle to You geeks! instead of your nerds since it is more appropiated according to definitionens of nerd vs geek. [/offtopic]

[/geek mode]

I am afraid to by oblivion for pc since seems some people have trouble with random crashes.

6600GT (I remember when that card was top of the line :s)

I found an official online shop wich is located near me has an 7800GS (best AGP there is i think) for 90 Euros <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/eek.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/eek.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/eek.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/eek.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/up.gif" alt="" /> (other sites have it for about 350 Euros...) think its a typo tough <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/disagree.gif" alt="" /> but i asked em <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

OK, now that the writeing part is (allmost, I have to read through it all and correct all the faults) done, I have to design a page. The pagedesign itself is comeing to something I'm acually satisfied with (if some pro has some nice tips, I wouldn't mind though <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/winkwink.gif" alt="" />. I am going to turn the links into pictures btw), but I have one problem. Down in the left corner (where the text "Här ska jag ha en kul bild" is) I'm going to have a picture of a computer. The thing is, I don't have pic of a computer. And that's where (I hope) you come into the picture. Not into the picture of the computer, but into this simile of a picture... Anyway, if someone has a nice picture of a computer (preferrablly drawn), and wouldn't mind me haveing it on my homesite, I would appreshiate if you gave it to me <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> (for free <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/winkwink.gif" alt="" />).

Übereil

Iframes are evil <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/puppyeyes.gif" alt="" />

Why not try normal frames ? But that's just my thought. IFrames are notoriously known to be exploited by some Trojans/Viruses / whatever.

With DHTML everything could look much better ... but that's a bit more difficult to program, I think (never used it so far, but must admit that I didn't program HTML pages in the last few years).

The problem with ordinary frames is that they're not as mobile. I have to have the links to the far left/right/top, and the text to the far right/left/bottom, which IMO doesn't look as good. I've never got an ordinary framesite to look decent imo.

And I wonder how a virus can exploit something like that without rewriteing the code on my page <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/think.gif" alt="" />...

Übereil