News AMD announces support for Havok Physics

[CardJoe]

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2008/06...avok-physics/1

AMD has announced support for Havok Physics, essentially sticking two fingers up at Nvidia and its recently-acquired PhysX API.

[p3n]

Source and havok already utilise multi threading?

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by p3n

Source and havok already utilise multi threading?

yep, and that's all done on the CPU AFAIK.

[kempez]

Haven't AMD/ATI also announced support for PhysX as well?

[Timmy_the_tortoise]

I thought Nvidia was soldering an entirely separate PPU onto their newest cards next to the GPU, meaning that valuable GPU power isn't taken up by physics processing.. That sounds more exciting than this ATI GPU acceleration.

Or, did I get that wrong?

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by kempez

Haven't AMD/ATI also announced support for PhysX as well?

not as yet, no.

[Jojii]

here is my guess,

intel is worried that if the install base is large for physx then developers will create titles for it, so maybe they brokered a deal to get ati into the havok game to act as a stop gap on the install base % so developers will continue to create new games that feature the havok engine.

then intel shafts ati later, without astroglide

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by Jojii

then intel shafts ati later, without astroglide

Ouch.

[johnmustrule]

physx is a superior simulation, I can't understand why AMD would support intel with this.

[TreeDude]

Originally Posted by johnmustrule

physx is a superior simulation, I can't understand why AMD would support intel with this.

PhysX is not superior. Ever play a game with support for PhysX? The whole idea was so that great physics don't cause a fps hit. But it does. A bad one at that. PhysX was a good idea with a terrible follow through. Not to mention that it hardly even added anything to the games. Most of the time it just gave you a bit more debris.

AMD is only doing this because they do not want to add a third option. There are already 2 clear physics solutions and they needed to pick one to back. PhysX is no longer an option, due to the Nvidia buyout, so their choice was already made. This comes at no surprise to me.

[byronrock]

There's no sense if AMD dont will use (right now) in his GPUs. AMD must to transport Havok to its poor "Close to Metal" (if still isnt dead) for emulate Havok at GPGPU.
I dont know but its kind of weird this decision, i though AMD was closer to choose Nvidia's PhisX (no matter if CUDA is needed) than Intel's Havok.

But its supposed that AMD decision isnt close. And with the time can change.

Can AMD take the 2 options HAVOK and PhisX?? Kind of hybrid decision.

For to have total compatibility with all future game titles

[Icy EyeG]

Originally Posted by Timmy_the_tortoise

I thought Nvidia was soldering an entirely separate PPU onto their newest cards next to the GPU, meaning that valuable GPU power isn't taken up by physics processing.. That sounds more exciting than this ATI GPU acceleration.

Or, did I get that wrong?

No, nVIDIA is porting PhysX to CUDA.

[BioSniper]

It reminds me of 3dfx vs OpenGL vs Direct3D all over again.

[Timmy_the_tortoise]

Originally Posted by Icy EyeG

No, nVIDIA is porting PhysX to CUDA.

Ahh... That makes sense.

Havok is the much better engine anyway. I've seen GRAW with and without PhysX.. and there is pretty much no difference, it's literally just a few extra black bits flying out from the centre of an explosion...

Sure, the tech demos were great... But I have yet to see a decent implementation. And Havok are reaching a point which pretty much matches PhysX in terms of physics objects on screen at once..

[Brett89]

I'd love to see the Havok engine go further, seeing as it's so good.

Up yours Nvidia

Priceless.

[Passarinhuu]

Originally Posted by TreeDude

PhysX is not superior. Ever play a game with support for PhysX? The whole idea was so that great physics don't cause a fps hit. But it does. A bad one at that. PhysX was a good idea with a terrible follow through. Not to mention that it hardly even added anything to the games. Most of the time it just gave you a bit more debris.

You can't add more debris and expect not to have a performance hit. You're rendering more objects at the same time, there has to be lower performance... Unless the PhysX is also unloading work from the GPU there is no way you can avoid it

[TreeDude]

Originally Posted by Passarinhuu

You can't add more debris and expect not to have a performance hit. You're rendering more objects at the same time, there has to be lower performance... Unless the PhysX is also unloading work from the GPU there is no way you can avoid it

Dude Physx was an actual addon card. Made by Ageia before Nvidia bought them out. It WAS offloading and it STILL had a performance hit.

[HourBeforeDawn]

hmm well i think this is a better way to go as Havok was the better physics engine over PhysX

[notatoad]

Originally Posted by TreeDude

Dude Physx was an actual addon card. Made by Ageia before Nvidia bought them out. It WAS offloading and it STILL had a performance hit.

yes, but it only offloaded the physics calculations, which i believe is relieving the CPU not the GPU. the system could calculate the trajectories for 50 peices of debris at once instead of 5, but that forces the graphics card to render 10x the polygons which is where the framerate hit comes from.

[Sebbo]

ATI was originally looking at running the havok engine on their GPU's back when they had a physics on crossfire solution coming, but that ground to a halt when intel bought havok. going from that, continuing to work with the havok engine seems an easy decision compared to forking out money to their main competitor in the GPU market or developing their own solution.