The Power PC Thread [f*ck off consoles]

[Wilkeh]

Got a few PC bits for sale if anyone's interested -

i7 4790k - £200
Asus Maximus VII Ranger - £60
Samsung 840 250GB SSD - £50
Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2x4GB) - £30
Corsair 540 air case - £50

Or everything for £350 delivered all in!

Throw a PSU & GPU in her and she's a sweet machine! :smile:

 

[Silent_Scone]

So who's looking to buy one of those unpredictable Asrock GPUs? (Clearly something lost in Chinglish there).

 

[Silent_Scone]

@SharkyUK

 

[SharkyUK]

Cheers dude. I watched the GDC presentation from nVidia and Microsoft about the technology. Having seen the demos... we are still a LONG way from full raytraced graphics in games! I also noticed that, having watched the available demos a few times, there's not much in the way of glass-like (refractive and transmissive) objects on display. Maybe those materials slow the renderer down too much? :tongueout: Trying to get the ridiculously fast GPU poly rasterisation running at full efficiency alongside [what is effectively] per pixel raytracing is an interesting one. It's not exactly trivial or conducive to optimal performance. I also see they are cheating a bit with their global lighting implementation but, issues aside, it's a step in the right direction towards higher-fidelity visuals and realising more realistic PBR imagery. I approve.

But I still don't expect true raytraced graphics to be along in the next decade. Considering Disney / Pixar et al invest millions in render farms - and still have to wait hours for quality results - I can't see my PC running at that performance level for quite some time...

 

[SharkyUK]

Regarding the DirectX Raytracing stuff in the previous posts... I took a closer look at the specs and what DXRT can offer. As suspected, there is no support for refractive materials such as glass. It's actually quite limited in what it can do. Until GPUs become several orders of magnitude more powerful, and their architecture is changed to move away from polygonal rasterisation, we are never going to see movie-like CGI quality in games. The amount of noise, aliasing and temporal artifacts introduced by raytracing is really disappointing in the demos presented. Again, this is purely down to not having the computational grunt to resolve the images to sufficient levels of quality at interactive frame rates.

EDIT: Oh yeah, you need Volta as a minimum as well...

 

[Cookie]

So you're saying it's probably a couple of generations away from mainstream GPUs then?

 

[Silent_Scone]

Without question, probably more. When you think just how much strain some rendering techniques like Soft Shadows put on the GPU in comparison, something like this is going to offer negligible improvements at best if we see it anytime soon. Like Andy says it's really quite difficult to even tell what Remedy are trying to show in that demo.

 

[adamlstr]

Anyone played with a Corsair One System?

I’ve got a couple to play with at work, they seem decently built but so expensive when you compare to building your own.

8700K, 1080ti, 32GB @ 3200.

 

[N0ddie]

It is expensive, but small form factor builds seem to be expensive (regardless of brand).

 

[Daz...]

Expensive, but they look good and I can see the appeal for people who want a pre built system.

 

[Daz...]

.

 

[Silent_Scone]

Regarding the DirectX Raytracing stuff in the previous posts... I took a closer look at the specs and what DXRT can offer. As suspected, there is no support for refractive materials such as glass. It's actually quite limited in what it can do. Until GPUs become several orders of magnitude more powerful, and their architecture is changed to move away from polygonal rasterisation, we are never going to see movie-like CGI quality in games. The amount of noise, aliasing and temporal artifacts introduced by raytracing is really disappointing in the demos presented. Again, this is purely down to not having the computational grunt to resolve the images to sufficient levels of quality at interactive frame rates.

EDIT: Oh yeah, you need Volta as a minimum as well... :tongueout:

That Seed Demo ran on three Titan V lol.

 

[adamlstr]

Expensive, but they look good and I can see the appeal for people who want a pre built system.

Yeah there’s a niche there for sure. We’re thinking traders desks tbh, downgrade the 1080 to a k620 or something and the cost becomes more reasonable.

 

[SharkyUK]

So you're saying it's probably a couple of generations away from mainstream GPUs then?

I'm saying it's probably a couple of decades away mate, maybe more. The computational costs are astronomical. I do expect this new API to evolve and find its way into games to some degree (certainly as GPUs continue to grow faster and more capable) but the whole, "bringing moving CGI-like FX to your games" is just b****cks. We're a long, long, long, long, loooooooong way from that. I'd like to see the same demos running with global illumination being calculated along with a few complex refractive objects in the scene...

Fair enough, play with new ideas and integrate these new techniques (although ray tracing has been around for decades) but rasterisation will remain king for quite some time. Besides, some of the stuff being produced now looks phenomenal.

Without question, probably more. When you think just how much strain some rendering techniques like Soft Shadows put on the GPU in comparison, something like this is going to offer negligible improvements at best if we see it anytime soon. Like Andy says it's really quite difficult to even tell what Remedy are trying to show in that demo.

It is kinda cool but it's such a limited demo in terms of scope and content. And it requires a heap of compute performance, too. All I see is noise, temporal flicker / artifacts, aliasing... but I am still impressed with what it's actually doing! I'm not convinced many folks 'outside' of computer graphics really know what is being presented (nor would I expect them to).

That Seed Demo ran on three Titan V lol.

Absolutely crazy. I would recommend at least 4.

 

[SharkyUK]

FLOL! 1080p at 24fps... running on 4x watercooled Tesla V100 cards with a 4-way NVLINK GPU interconnect... Interestingly, seeing as there is no multi-GPU support in DX12 on Unreal Engine 4, a collaboration with Disney engineers resulted in a multi-GPU architecture being realised so that they could put this sort of stuff together.

So - you fancy buying the system that ran this demo? It's a beauty. 20 core Xeon CPU, 256GB RAM, 4x Tesla V100's giving 20,480 CUDA cores and 2,560 Tensor cores for 480 teraflops of parallel compute performance. Oh yeah, it will also cost just shy of £90,000. Welcome to the future of gaming.

 

[Ex-User (19928)]

I don't get where you're coming from Sharky?

I assume you have more experience than the rest of us with this stuff but progress is progress is it not?

 

[SharkyUK]

I don't get where you're coming from Sharky?

I assume you have more experience than the rest of us with this stuff but progress is progress is it not?

Oops - sorry mate. I meant to actually post this in the "Realtime Graphics Engines" thread!

My point is that the current Game Developer Conference has seen the release of some cool new technology (although it's tech that has been around for decades) allowing a limited amount of raytracing to be used in generation of graphics for gaming. It's being touted as bringing games up to the level of CGI movies with real shadows, reflections, etc. The hype is massive. A few demos have been released showing off the tech and, true, it is impressive. However, folks are generally expecting a huge leap in fidelity in graphics using these techniques but, due to the sheer compute performance needed, it ain't going to happen any time soon. I won't go into detail here as I'll be here all night. It is indeed something I'm passionate about and have been working in for 25+ years (3D graphics and rendering technology for games and movies, realtime and offline).

Don't get me wrong, everyone thinks I'm taking the piss and that I'm against the technology. I'm not. I absolutely LOVE this stuff. It just pisses me off that it gets so hyped, punters get excited and then developers get moaned at for not adopting the tech. I just think it's too early as expectations will far outweigh what current hardware can deliver.

 

[Cookie]

FLOL! 1080p at 24fps... running on 4x watercooled Tesla V100 cards with a 4-way NVLINK GPU interconnect... Interestingly, seeing as there is no multi-GPU support in DX12 on Unreal Engine 4, a collaboration with Disney engineers resulted in a multi-GPU architecture being realised so that they could put this sort of stuff together.

So - you fancy buying the system that ran this demo? It's a beauty. 20 core Xeon CPU, 256GB RAM, 4x Tesla V100's giving 20,480 CUDA cores and 2,560 Tensor cores for 480 teraflops of parallel compute performance. Oh yeah, it will also cost just shy of £90,000. Welcome to the future of gaming.

So what you're saying is that it's a dick measuring contest at this point

 

[SharkyUK]

So what you're saying is that it's a dick measuring contest at this point

Hahaha, no - not really mate. it is genuinely a 'good thing'. As @Jeff simply says, progress IS progress. Raytracing can be traced back (fnar fnar) to the 1960's but the real turning point came in 1979 when a guy (Turner Whitted) produced a paper detailing his algorithm for generating graphics using this technique. He rendered a couple of glass spheres showing shadows, reflections and refraction. It took hours and hours to render a simple, low-res scene but that planted the seed. Ever since, folks have been using the same basic techniques to render realistic graphics. The techniques are more readily adopted by the movie industry as they can produce more realistic visuals, albeit at the expense of compute cost. That's why Pixar have render farms with thousands of CPUs and their movies still take months to render. It's only now that gaming tech is getting to the point where it can use a very limited subset of what raytracing can offer. And that is demonstrated in the video I posted. For a technique that has been around for decades, the fact it's only starting to become viable now indicates how expensive it is to implement for real time stuff, like games. There's an awful lot of clever smoke and mirrors going on in the demo to make it run at the targeted 1080p @ 24fps and yet it still requires a 90 grand PC with non-mainstream tech to make it happen. As said, I won't go into detail as it really is boring unless you're into this sort of thing I'll spare you that.

To answer your question - is it dick measuring? No. It's just something that's come a bit early. Pun intended.

 

[Silent_Scone]

FLOL! 1080p at 24fps... running on 4x watercooled Tesla V100 cards with a 4-way NVLINK GPU interconnect... Interestingly, seeing as there is no multi-GPU support in DX12 on Unreal Engine 4, a collaboration with Disney engineers resulted in a multi-GPU architecture being realised so that they could put this sort of stuff together.

So - you fancy buying the system that ran this demo? It's a beauty. 20 core Xeon CPU, 256GB RAM, 4x Tesla V100's giving 20,480 CUDA cores and 2,560 Tensor cores for 480 teraflops of parallel compute performance. Oh yeah, it will also cost just shy of £90,000. Welcome to the future of gaming.

LOL, I'm sure they found a way for the sake of the demo (regarding UE4 scaling)

 

[SharkyUK]

Got a few PC bits for sale if anyone's interested -

i7 4790k - £200
Asus Maximus VII Ranger - £60
Samsung 840 250GB SSD - £50
Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2x4GB) - £30
Corsair 540 air case - £50

Or everything for £350 delivered all in!

Throw a PSU & GPU in her and she's a sweet machine! :smile:

Still for sale mate?
A guy I know needs a CPU, mobo and RAM (possibly interested in the case, too).

 

[GiT]

Got a few PC bits for sale if anyone's interested -

i7 4790k - £200
Asus Maximus VII Ranger - £60
Samsung 840 250GB SSD - £50
Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2x4GB) - £30
Corsair 540 air case - £50

Or everything for £350 delivered all in!

Throw a PSU & GPU in her and she's a sweet machine! :smile:

Still got this little lot?

 

[Cookie]

FIGHT

 

[Wilkeh]

Still got this little lot?

I'll give Sharkey's colleague first refusal mate. He should know by tomorrow/Friday if he wants it.

Sharkey's had the SSD already though

 

[GiT]

That cool fella, only spotted it last night lol.

 

[Silent_Scone]

FIGHT

LOL

 

[adamlstr]

If anyone is interested, I’ve got a few Corsair Dominator DDR4 2666MHz 8GB dimms available, will sell in 16/32/64 GB kits.

[emoji106]

They’ve only seen about an hour of light use.

 

[donnylad]

this was my set up, but just packed half of it away around 10 minutes ago!

I play a game called Everquest progression server is a true box server and you can only load 1 account per PC. 6 PC's and 7 screens total. Yes im a Geek!

Just trying to turn 1 pc into a driving sim with Assetto Corsa.

 

[GiT]

I thought my 3 x 24" Acers was being greedy! lol

 

[botfch]

My NEC ex NHS screen has broken, going to be an expensive month unless they decide to sell off some more.😢

 

[Daz...]

Just been having a play after fitting a Kraken G12 with a Corsair H75 to my 1070 Armor yesterday. This is all inside a Corsair 250D, with a H100i v2 squeezed in for good measure.

Temperatures were hitting 75c on the stock cooler whilst gaming. You can see below the temperatures have now dropped dramatically.

This was at stock speeds.

This is with 100MHz on the Core Clock and 500MHz on the memory.

Then I tried 140MHz on the Core Clock and stuck with 500MHz on the memory.

This was the best overclock I had with the stock cooler.

 

[Daz...]

Need to tidy the cabling up but will do that when the 6700k turns up.

 

[Cookie]

f**king Windows cumulative updates have bricked my OS drive. Sat for 30 minutes doing absolutely f**k all and won't even boot into safe mode. Time for another reinstall. f**king Microsoft

 

[Silent_Scone]

Last update really fucked with performance for me. Native multicore enhancement totally bollocked, was getting terrible performance.

Switched back to Driver override in BIOS and back to using ITB 3.0

 

[Ex-User (19928)]

Anyone heard anything bad about those LianLi height adjustable desks with the computer chassis built in?

I'm thinking of buying one this afternoon as I'm sick and tired of this piece of s**t Corsair 540, need a smaller desk to fit some new furniture in our room so it seems like the idea solution.

This one https://www.overclockers.co.uk/lian...ght-adjustable-desk-case-black-ca-747-ll.html

 

[Darren S]

Anyone heard anything bad about those LianLi height adjustable desks with the computer chassis built in?

I'm thinking of buying one this afternoon as I'm sick and tired of this piece of s**t Corsair 540, need a smaller desk to fit some new furniture in our room so it seems like the idea solution.

This one https://www.overclockers.co.uk/lian...ght-adjustable-desk-case-black-ca-747-ll.html

Monies!

 

[Wilkeh]

I've got another PC for sale if anyone's interested. Perfect for a media PC or a 1080p gaming one as it's a mini ITX one.

Corsair 250D
i5 4670k
Asus Z97I-plus
120gb Kingston SSD
500w PSU
8GB RAM
Windows 10

All it needs for gaming is a GPU, and probably a better cooler as it's only got the standard intel one on it.

£300 posted.

 

[Wilkeh]

Actually I think it's a 4690k

 

[Geddes]

I need some help please. I've recently installed steam fair few months ago and installed Punkbuster so i could play Battlefield, I lost intrest in playing the games so i un installed everything inc steam and for some reason the last thing i can't un install is the Punkbuster Services on Apps and Features Settings. It come up Windows cannot find it ...... and make sure you typred it in correctly and try again.

 

[Geddes]

Here’s what I’ve got,What do I have to do to get rid of it? Thanks