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Valve Speaks on HalfLife 2, Benchmarking, and Driver Issues
(Click here to view the original thread with full colors/images)
Posted by: TotalRecall
Gabe Newell of Valve recently gave a presentation at ATI's Shaders Day on benchmarking issues in the gaming industry and problems that Valve has run into with using DX9 code and nVidia's NV3X line of cards as compared to ATI's Radeons:
NVIDIA's NV3x-derived chips are way off the pace set by the ATI DirectX 9-class cards. The low-end GeForce FX 5200 Ultra and mid-range GeForce FX 5600 Ultra are wholly unplayable. The high-end GeForce FX 5900 Ultra ekes out just over 30 fps, well behind ATI's mid-range Radeon 9600 Pro. The Radeon 9800 Pro is twice the speed of the GeForce FX 5900 Ultra.
Newell also expressed skepticism about the payoffs for NV3x-specific optimizations, noting that the optimization process was arduous, expensive, and less likely to produce performance gains as shader techniques advance. What more, he said, smaller developers are not likely to have the resources Valve was able to bring to bear on the problem.
He suggested one way of dealing with the issue would be to treat all NV3x hardware as DirectX 8-class hardware, which would cut down significantly on eye candy and new graphics features, but which could yield more acceptable performance on NV3x chips.
The Tech Report has put together an article of slides and data accumlated from the presentation. AnandTech, Beyond3D, Extreme Tech and HardOCP also are covering the story.
Brian Burke from nVidia has responded to the points Newell brought up:
We're confused as to why Valve chose to use Release. 45 (Rel. 45) - because up to two weeks prior to the Shader Day we had been working closely with Valve to ensure that Release 50 (Rel. 50) provides the best experience possible on NVIDIA hardware.
nVidia also says they expect improved numbers and better pixel shader performance from the newer drivers, which should fix some of the snags Newell mentioned. Expect more to surface soon.
Posted by: Steveo
Sorry if I'm being boring here - but why can't these people just stick to what they do best??? ie Nvidia/Ati making GFX cards etc and Valve/ID etc etc just stick to making games.. All this lark about how a certain game has been optimised for use on a particular card etc is all a load of crud. How much money do these people think that us poor souls have so we can keep upgrading our PC's? Does this mean for eg that I'm gonna have to buy an Ati card just so (after spending the £40 on the actual game) I can actually play it? It stinks if you ask me.. I've just spent a good bit of last weeks wages upgrading from a GF2 to a Gf4ti4600 
Posted by: Null Actor
You misunderstood. They claim that there is no optimization.
Posted by: Steveo
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