Ok so i see PhysX adds in Cloth and extra particals. But its Old and other games already have their own physics engine so i fail to see what PhysX does. PLUS only like 20 games support PhysX.
physx offers hardware GPU support for physics calculations which basically allows for faster rendering and more room for funkier physics shit
I like Physx.
I guess it serves its purpose if about 20 games use it.
I like how it hands off some of the physics to the GPU when you have a shit CPU. i have a gtx 570, set physx to my cpu, and couldn't run Mirror's edge on low. then i set to GPU, and i maxed it with no trouble. You see, i don't think it's pointless, just hardly noticeable.
a lot of the simple fabric movement shit you've seen is really not all that hard to render on the CPU, but you don't see this on games that don't use physx, simply because that GPU rendering will produce much faster results than on the CPU:
[img]http://ve3dmedia.ign.com/images/03/96/39630_normal.jpg[/img]
keep in mind that physx calculations can actually be run entirely on the CPU without the assistance of a card, but it's just too much for the CPU in most cases (some games do still allow this, however, such as MEdge)
Too much for the CPU?
You obviously haven't met my Phenom II.
i kind of over-exaggerated but CPU-driven physics is massively slow as opposed to GPU-driven
[img]http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/mirrors_edge_physx_performance/images/cpuphysx1600.gif[/img]
[QUOTE=nikomo;29900689]Too much for the CPU?
You obviously haven't met my Phenom II.[/QUOTE]Still, depends on your GPU. I have a Q6600 OC'ed to 3.0Ghz, and I can't have it for PhyX to severe bottlenecking. My GPU is a GTX 570. I can't run games as well as I would expect them to. I've seen gain in switching PhyX from my CPU to GPU. I'm just going to wait for Ivy.
[QUOTE=nikomo;29900689]Too much for the CPU?
You obviously haven't met my Phenom II.[/QUOTE]
An 8800 GTS will still eat the shit out of it. I'd almost bet it'd beat my Core i5-2500.
Now, I'm a total idiot when it comes to details like this, so someone feel free to correct me: the difference is in how the two processors deal with data. CPUs are fantastic for handling one thing at a time extremely quickly, but GPUs excell at handling tons of data all at once, making them far more suitable for mass processing (ala CUDA) and physics (ala PhsyX). But again, I'm an ass when it comes to this and it's been a while since I read up on all of this.
Honestly the only game I've played that has made PhysX apparent was Mirrors Edge, so as naive as OP is, I'd sort of have to agree. Though really it's not PhysX's fault, mainly just developers' for not using it in a way apparent enough to make it worthwhile.
the problem is some people have tried using the capability of physx as an actual gameplay element but it's problematic when half the market doesn't use NVidia, and even less NVidia cards support PhysX (not saying that a lot don't)
physx is neat when it's supported, but not worth paying extra for
[QUOTE=Jaehead;29900948]physx is neat when it's supported, but not worth paying extra for[/QUOTE]
Its supported since the GeForce 8000 series, no need to pay extra.
[QUOTE=Goz3rr;29901176]Its supported since the GeForce 8000 series, no need to pay extra.[/QUOTE]
Tell that to AMD.
[QUOTE=Bomimo;29903967]Tell that to AMD.[/QUOTE]
I have no idea about ATI cards supporting PhysX, i suppose you need to buy an extra card in that case.
sorry if I wasn't clear - what I was trying to say is for example
a 6970 costs $320, and a GTX 570 costs $350
in this case you can forgo PhysX since you'd have to fork out an extra $30
[QUOTE=Jaehead;29906164]sorry if I wasn't clear - what I was trying to say is for example
a 6970 costs $320, and a GTX 570 costs $350
in this case you can forgo PhysX since you'd have to fork out an extra $30[/QUOTE]
You are a complete moron, and you're not paying extra for PhysX, the 570 is just better.
I'm willing to accept nvTax for the general reliability of nVidia gpus, even if they aren't fastest all of the time.
[QUOTE=Goz3rr;29906215]You are a complete moron, and you're not paying extra for PhysX, the 570 is just better.[/QUOTE]
570 is more certainly expensive, whether it's better is debatable. Better drivers, 40% less vram. Also where is a 6970 $320?
PhysX is not something inherent in the GPU for nvidia, they just managed to run it on the Cuda Cores. So since your gpu has cuda cores it will run PhysX. There MIGHT be some licensing thing, but since nvidia owns physX as of a few years ago I don't see the point.
If I remember correctly, Nvidia (intentionally?) cripples Physx on the CPU by not enabling features such as SSE, which would allow it to perform significantly better.
Well, personally, the only game in which I noticed PhysX was Mafia 2 but I really don't mind not having as good cloth physics.
physx is blowing over, anyway. gpu-accelerated physics isn't exclusive to just nvidia.
there are physics engines out there that'll work with shit that isn't exclusive to NVIDIA's CUDA cards, using both DirectCompute, microsoft's GPGPU solution using the shader system, or OpenCL, either of which can work with both ATI and NVIDIA cards. the bullet physics engine recently got support for these alternative solutions, plus havok is getting this together.
what are you going to use, a physics API that'll work with only one card or one that'll work with two cards? expect physx to be phased out relatively soon because of this.
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