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Who/why buys physics cards?

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Soldato
Joined
2 Dec 2006
Posts
8,204
Hey. I keep reading about games making effects which only work if you have these. But who achualy has them? And what sort of effects are we talking about. And why cant i run these effects with the latest graphics cards at £400/500 a time?
 
Nobody's buying discrete physics cards except for Pottsey. It was a short-lived fad that had little game support and limited consequences. The future of dedicated physics processing is with PPUs integrated onto the graphics card.

/IHMO
 
Dunno, im considering buying one to check out UT3 with it. Cant go wrong with 80 quid for some extra goodies :)
Ive wasted more on games in the past month or 2 that ive played for 5 mins and shelfed :P
 
“And what sort of effects are we talking about. And why cant i run these effects with the latest graphics cards at £400/500 a time?“
There are two types of physics effect. Gameplay physics and effect physics. Now in theory you can run effect physics on your GPU via Havok FX. I say theory as no games make use of this. Hellgate London is the first game due out that I am aware off, it should use Havok FX and the GPU.

You get things like wind, cloth, liquids, soft metal, extra objects and a performance boost. But only if the game supports it which is the big problem. The idea behind PPU’s are good the problem is lack of game support only about 20 games and about 20 demos/tech demos support the PPU.

So unless you have a bunch of PPU enabled games it’s a waste of time buying one. Unless you just want to download the free stuff and play about.







“The future of dedicated physics processing is with PPUs integrated onto the graphics card.”
I always find this odd. The idea is fine but current GPU’s do effects physics only not gameplay and GPU physics have been out longer and are doing far worse then Ageia’s PPU. Right now it seems like the future of dedicated physics processing is not GPU's doing the work as no one seems to care about it.
 
8igdave said:
So what benefits do you see in game?
Click to expand...

None, which is why hardly anyone in their right minds would waste money on them. Would be ok if they were cheaper.

I'll shell out £600 on my PC343B case + dual water cooling loops, but 100+ pound for a piece of useless PCB, caps and Silicon that does nothing but waste a PCI slot. No thanks.
 
So why do you have one ? lol.


Also out of curioucity how does a duel loop work for water cooling? Dont you need 2 pumps? Or do you just split the single pipe out of the pump into two?
 
I will make a promise in this tread. All I will do are answer questions not defend PPU’s. But please no personal attack’s or stupid comments about PPU’s are useless for everyone. Post facts and let people make there own minds up if its useless or not.
 
Pottsey said:
I will make a promise in this tread. All I will do are answer questions not defend PPU’s. But please no personal attack’s or stupid comments about PPU’s are useless for everyone. Post facts and let people make there own minds up if its useless or not.
Click to expand...


thats a nice policy. unlike some that defend something else ;) like thier life depends on it ;)
 
8igdave said:
So why do you have one ? lol.


Also out of curioucity how does a duel loop work for water cooling? Dont you need 2 pumps? Or do you just split the single pipe out of the pump into two?
Click to expand...

I don't have one :/

Yes dual loops means two pumps :)
 
You said you did have one :O lol.

And i just found a spliter where you can make 2 loops off one tube. But i gues this would split the pumping power of your pump. Though the pump i have in mind does do 1200lph compared to the others which do 600lph
 
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