Kangal said:
WombleGoneBad --> thanks for your post
His post pretty much sums up what I said without asking the final question: Why is the marketing factor important anymore - Why on earth do we still depend on numeric values if we have videos of sample applications running, real world examples of useful software.
Mr B said:
The I7 is the most capable series of desktop CPU's available today... I'm assuming he was trying to get the point across, that todays most powerful folding rigs is indeed at he top of his list. Oh, sorry, folding, gaming...
Your rant on the issue seams mostly childlike, and unfit. You don't agree with the list, fine, ignore it.
B!
I do have an i7 myself. Yet it seldomly (read: never to my knowledge) contributed to the graphics on my PC. Anything I do graphics wise except for displaying the desktop (assumption time.. hooray) is done on the GPU.
Heck, even raytracers and physics are all done on the GPU now. Don't believe me? Just check out the demos "Agenda Cycling Forth" ([fact]Does rendering, physics and sorting on the GPU[/fact] - [assumption]the CPU is only used to control music which in turn feeds the GPU with timing and scene information[assumption]) or "Elevated" (Running entirely in a GLSL shader except for the terrain which is just a few draw-calls and again, music is on the CPU, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YWMGuh15nE)
Both of these demos work as far as sound processing is fast enough on the CPU and if the GL API calls can go through the driver fast enough. The GPU is the bottleneck - the CPU is almost idle. I do get the point that Kangal wanted to say that a "Gaming Computer" produces the best graphics (even though I think that this is not true - read on..) but he made it sound like the i7 (or CPU in general) is a major point. This is clearly not true, hence I question it because I don't want others to belive it. If you are expierenced enough to filter out that its not necessary: congratulations, however, some people are not.
(Note however, that the CPU COULD be used to raytrace or precalculate data which is an important part in cg. However, its not common to do much stuff on the CPU anymore in todays software except for logic, physics, ... [all sorts of things which don't necessarily contribute to graphics AND those things which have an impact on the logic])
Kangal said:
I just put the "core i7 gaming computer" because it is not difficult to find a computer today which outpaces the graphical performance of the PS3. If I had just put PS3 at the top, perhaps you would've still replied and told me off as a sony fanboy. It was just there to make a point, yes I already know its the GPU not the CPU its the combination of CPU and GPU that determine if it can play Crysis, I was just too lazy to type a kick-ass GPU up there (so many to choose from). BTW, thanks B! for getting it and I do think that rant was childlike and unfit.
No, the combination of CPU and GPU is important for the gameplay part of the game. However, the CPU shouldn't have much influence on the graphical quality (which your list was about). Todays software is heavily centered around the GPU. Even the folding mentioned above by Mr B. is actually done on GPUs as it seems (at least I remember seeing a whitepaper about it) .
Kangal said:
Again I used "i7" and "Gaming Computer" to save time. I mean a true geek would understand the meaning of the point instead of arguing its details like Dr Sheldon Cooper. That list is there as to also prove a point. We can compare the performance ... by our perception. It is a crude method, but one that relies on observation, and as a scientist I know physical observations are valid parameters to be able to make predictions and conclusions. And Fox one more thing, the claim is backed ... by my observations! So you can take it as a grain of salt if you please or reference it for a journal, it does not affect my stance. I dont know many things, infact easier to say nothing about how software in computers work. So their may be techniques to make some systems look better than others and I'm not arguing that.
A true "geek" sees that your post makes no sense because you use a CPU to "measure" "graphics capabilities". Actually all that i7 fanboy-ism at the moment makes me sick. People speak like only i7s can make current gen games possible. This is not true.
As a scientist you should also know that you should give REAL evidence for your claims (such as screenshots). If you don't have time to do that you shouldn't do it in first place. You should also set boundarys for your assumptions.
Kangal said:
To you this list may be useless (as you stated), then just ignore it or say I think this list is useless instead of a long long long Dr Cox rant.
This is a forum. It was made for discussions. If I wanted "yes / no" options I'd probably waste my time with something else. I don't answer your posts for myself but for you so you can improve your posts and contribute better information next time - spread the word and actually shape the community. So, that way I get something in return in the end by reading other users post which are far more wise and knowledgeable than my own posts. Yes, I'm looking at you exo, ari, laurent, pickle, adventus, ... *tons of others - don't complain if you are not on here - you know your names*
Kangal said:
But here's a kicker: Can you honestly say that an Xbox 360 has less graphical power (or however you state it) than a PS2, as to contradict the list?
Do you have any proof that disproves the list?
I don't have the patience to find hard proof for the list at this time, but I believe many people would be satisfied by the order.
Yes. Yes, I do have and no I'm not satisfired by the order
This is on amiga - did you see some of those effects on PS1? Probably not. Does this make the amiga more powerful in terms of graphics? Possibly - because we don't know if this can also be done with a PS1. Only because we didn't see it doesn't mean it's impossible.
Here is another one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNCqrylNY-0
Sooo.... my washing machine (actually I have seen these microcontrollers in nearly anything - my switch has one in it for example) is actually higher in the list than a NES? (Now that you have seen what it can do)
Similar things can be said about the X360 comparison to PS2.
Additionally, I'm sure there are cases where the X360 can perform slower than the PS2. Depending on the running software this can be a necessary effect and make the PS2 perform better than the X360 (even tho this might be very rare).
You should also think about the fact that good graphics are not always photorealistic or complex to process by the hardware.
Imagine a quiz game. Isn't it enough to have 4 buttons with the answers on them on the display? Most systems can do exactly this - it might be what you could consider the best graphics for a special case.
Another example would be camera mapping.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGI0ro5rXA8
(Randomly found on youtube)
All this takes is a high-res image and a few low poly objects without any additional shading. Nearly any system can do this. And for most games this is a great option to have high visual quality if the camera stays in some boundaries. The thing is: imagine doing this on the PS2 - works. Now do the same on the X360 - works. Does this make them equal graphics wise?
Probably not if we talk about processing power as the X360 will most likely be faster. Possibly not about output image quality because the X360 has a higher resolution output (thats another topic..). But you can say for sure that both achieve what the developer wanted to have and the user shouldn't be able to tell how the image was produced on any of the systems. If you wouldn't know which system was faster (because both should be able to do this at at least 60 FPS) before, you couldn't tell it afterwards. And if a PS2 game used this technique but a X360 game didn't, you would also say the PS2 produces higher quality graphics. You would have to assume the PS2 has a higher graphics processing capability
I'd put all systems on par when it comes to graphic capabilities. The only difference is how fast they can do it (because even your old gameboy COULD be used to raytrace a high quality HD image into memory if you swap it often enough and if you give it enough time). The speed is the limitation by the system, the other limitation would be the software developer himself who decides how the image is made AND who is responsible for implementing it in a fast way (implementation on CPU? GPU? some additional chip?) to work around the first limitation.
Kangal said:
Even with the best benchmarks in the world with the most comparable functions its impossible to have "2.8x" or "7.0x" rule. PERIOD.
Agreed :lol: but it is humiliating to see how literal you took a "hypothetical" scenario. I was just trying to say it isn't completely useless to have that extra piece of information, and was trying to back that up with an example. It's a shame if you didn't understand it.
Look around on the forums. All those who actually work on emulators or those who understand how they work are really PISSED OFF because this myth keeps coming up again and again. It's really frustrating to see the same thing turning up so many times even tho its completly false.
Kangal said:
We were talking about "childlike" before?
sebt3 said:
Exo... You should just stop doing this.
I mean, you're just just giving insight on how thing works. And this is real insight and I love to read them.
But your argument while to the point and fully valid, are too technical to be understand by common mortal.
In that case, those who don't understand it should read up on their own to understand the discussion or maybe even contribute to it OR they should just shut up and leave this stuff to others. Whats the use in knowning about numbers if you can't do anything with them? It's just turning into fanboy-ism and wrong claims.
---
However, now that we have the reason why this topic was started we should also see that we have gone really offtopic.
Ontopic: Emulation is extremly case specific and should be asked for every emulator on its own. Yes. I even mean differences between emulators emulating the same system.
//Edit: I mostly agree with Exo though. For most emulators the Pandora should be faster if we talk about LLE and a platform without hundreds of add-on chips which have very specific operations.
//Note: Had to strip out the media tags because only one vid seems to be allowed per entry.. Sorry, because this also messed up the structure of this post
