Havok physics on ATI cards coming

Heh, figures I sold my 3870's.

Is it possible that it'll emulate Physx?
 
This may be bad news.
There will now be 2 different Physics acceleration standards that you need different cards for.
Our best hope was that some agreement could be made to use one standard.

If this doesnt lead to a cross licensing agreement, it makes gaming on a PC more complicated.
A backward step.
 
Nenu said:
This may be bad news.
There will now be 2 different Physics acceleration standards that you need different cards for.
Our best hope was that some agreement could be made to use one standard.

If this doesnt lead to a cross licensing agreement, it makes gaming on a PC more complicated.
A backward step.
Click to expand...

Yep. Both vendors have proprietary Physics systems will only cause the consumer grief.
 
Nenu said:
This may be bad news.
There will now be 2 different Physics acceleration standards that you need different cards for.
Our best hope was that some agreement could be made to use one standard.

If this doesnt lead to a cross licensing agreement, its makes gaming on a PC more complicated.
A backward step.
Click to expand...

I consider it a step forward. :)

Now you have only 1 type of Physics GPU acceleration, which only Nvidia cards support.

With Havok GPU physics, you have one more that ATI cards support.

Havok is owned by Intel and supported also by ATI/AMD. Larrabee is rumored to get its own instructions for Havok acceleration, giving it to all Intel CPU owners. If you read the link above, this will most likely happen to all AMD owners as well in their new gen of CPU.

This means: Acceleration on perhaps AMD CPU's and ATI GPU's. Acceleration on Intel CPU's and perhaps Intel GPU's.

Havok is the largest and widest adopted physics company by developers.

They want an open standard (again read link), hopefully meaning that Nvidia can join as well.

That would mean death to PhysX.

One standard left with acceleration for everyone: Havok.

In my opinion, this would be the best for all.
 
Is it just me or did anyone else also notice that AMD and Intel are disputing over their CPU cross license agreement?
 
alg7_munif said:
Is it just me or did anyone else also notice that AMD and Intel are disputing over their CPU cross license agreement?
Click to expand...

Yeah.
Intel gave advanced notice that spinning off the fabs would invalidate the agreement.
AMD went ahead regardless so Intel seem to be taking the letter of the law to hand.
Intel have to really, otherwise it sets a precedent.

I'm sure it will end sort of amicably, slightly favouring Intel.
 
alg7_munif said:
Is it just me or did anyone else also notice that AMD and Intel are disputing over their CPU cross license agreement?
Click to expand...

Are you suprised? :)

They are companies, in it for the money. Competitiors as well. Same goes with Nvidia.

Everyone are in it for the money, exept us, which are in it for the gaming. With one standard that everyone can use, we win. :cool:
 
Tamlin_WSGF said:
...Havok is owned by Intel and supported also by ATI/AMD. Larrabee is rumored to get its own instructions for Havok acceleration, giving it to all Intel CPU owners. If you read the link above, this will most likely happen to all AMD owners as well in their new gen of CPU...
Click to expand...

That will be great if it is fully realised.
I'm a sceptical optimist :)
 
Nenu said:
That will be great if it is fully realised.
I'm a sceptical optimist :)
Click to expand...

So am I. :)

But since Havok is bigger then PhysX, Intel/AMD/ATI are bigger then Nvidia, I think Havok will be dominant. The moment Nvidia supports Havok as well, game developers would have no reason to choose PhysX anymore that only Nvidia cards support. With Havok, they would reach everyone.

Even if Nvidia wouldn't choose to support PhysX, then Larrabee and AMD would make Acceleration available to everyone, and game developers wouldn't use PhysX.

I think PhysX will loose in any case.

Note from the link:

With over 100 developers and 300 leading titles already using Havok’s physics engine -- Havok Physics -- the company has clearly defined its position as the leading developer of game physics. By working together, both companies are demonstrating their commitment to open standards and continued support for the needs of the game community."
Click to expand...
http://hothardware.com/News/Strange-Bedfellows-AMD-and-Havok-Cooperating/
 
What irks me about this is that GPU-accelerated Havok support (Havok FX) seemed to be pretty much killed off after Havok was bought by Intel and no signs were given that Havok FX was going to be released any time soon.

Meanwhile game companies like mine went with the only solution which supported GPU-accelerated physics: PhysX. I doubt we'll invest months of our precious time and money into converting our custom game engine to Havok FX unless there's some huge incentive.

Too little too late, is what comes to mind...
 
Elledan said:
What irks me about this is that GPU-accelerated Havok support (Havok FX) seemed to be pretty much killed off after Havok was bought by Intel and no signs were given that Havok FX was going to be released any time soon.

Meanwhile game companies like mine went with the only solution which supported GPU-accelerated physics: PhysX. I doubt we'll invest months of our precious time and money into converting our custom game engine to Havok FX unless there's some huge incentive.

Too little too late, is what comes to mind...
Click to expand...

Havok is still most used by game developers. There are many huge upcoming titles with Havok support. If Havok will be supported on most hardware, both current and upcoming, it would be easier to sell your game engine or at least version 2 of it. I can understand your need to defend physX though, since you have invested already in it. :)

Intel is the biggest GPU maker of them all (counting laptops as well, since there are a lot of laptop gamers). They are also the biggest CPU maker.
ATI is the third largest GPU maker after Intel and Nvidia.
AMD is the second largest CPU maker.
Havok is the largest physics developer.

Late, but with guns blasting, comes to my mind. :D

By using PhysX in your custom game engine, you exclude a lot of users. With Havok, you might reach more...
 
I wonder if all Havok games can be GPU accelerated.
Many games use PhysX but only in software mode and cannot be GPU accelerated.
So is that list of Havoc compatible games an accurate reflection of what can be accelerated?
 
htphm42 said:
Woot! I'm actually excited for this. Let the Havok vs. Physx war begin lol :p.
Click to expand...

I doubt there will be much of a war. Havok is going for an open standard for everyone, while PhysX is a propritary one. The moment Nvidia starts supporting Havok, I believe PhysX dies. If Nvidia doesn't support Havok (which is the biggest), Nvidia looses market shares for their GFX cards.
 
Tamlin_WSGF said:
By using PhysX in your custom game engine, you exclude a lot of users. With Havok, you might reach more...
Click to expand...

All our games will run whether a PhysX-capable GPU is available or not. That isn't the point. So far our games do not require hardware acceleration of physics, but I have some ideas for games which would certainly require hardware-accelerated physics. Having two different physics APIs is even more annoying than having to write different rendering paths for particular GPU architectures.

AMD got offered PhysX by nVidia ages ago, they refused, and now it seems that we get to deal with both sides refusing to support a single, or even both APIs. Heck, Direct3D and OpenGL have co-existed for over a decade now without any issues. It'd be great if GPU manufacturers would stop caring more about their patents/licenses/whatever and work on providing standards instead.

Most likely my company will just keep using PhysX and see how things change. At this point there isn't even any clarity on whether Havok games will even be compatible with Havok FX, and thus no clarity on whether it'll be a popular API.
 
Tamlin_WSGF said:
I doubt there will be much of a war. Havok is going for an open standard for everyone, while PhysX is a propritary one. The moment Nvidia starts supporting Havok, I believe PhysX dies. If Nvidia doesn't support Havok (which is the biggest), Nvidia looses market shares for their GFX cards.
Click to expand...

Havok is proprietary, as is PhysX. The fact that Intel licenses Havok for $$ might have tipped you off. So far I see no reason why nVidia would support Havok FX.
 
PhysX sucks. I've have been consistently underwhelmed by the accuracy and feel of that API.
 
Hasn't ATI been talking about Havok since the X1900 series? What makes this announcement any different?
 
Obi_Kwiet said:
PhysX sucks. I've have been consistently underwhelmed by the accuracy and feel of that API.
Click to expand...

Based on what? What makes you say that Havok is a better physics API?

From what I have seen and been told by our lead developer, both APIs are quite comparable, with mostly some differences in the implementations of particular functions.
 
As an Indie developer myself, I just came.
This cleans the programming end up a shitload which means faster development time with less bugs.

Pure awesome.
 
Elledan said:
Havok is proprietary, as is PhysX. The fact that Intel licenses Havok for $$ might have tipped you off. So far I see no reason why nVidia would support Havok FX.
Click to expand...

I think you think of propritary another way. I don't mean that non-propritary is GNU licensed. Take a look at this to clearify:
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38392/118/

Elledan said:
snip.
Click to expand...

Having two different API's can be a problem. Wanting to do more ingame physics while using less resources must be a challange for you. This is understandable. You want an optimised game engine.

As a gamer, I feel the same. Buying hardware to run my games satisfactory is easier when there is one standard. Havok is biggest (I've said that enough now I think :p ).
CUDA based PhysX is not a good alternative. From what I have read, its indicated that Havok will support OpenCL, which both ATI and Nvidia supports. Non-propritary.

As a gamer, I also want options. Having an option to use Larrabee or similar to accelerate physics, while leaving shaders to SSAO and similar for added photorealism, gives me more choices. PhysX can't do that. They can give me either accelerated GPU physics if I buy an Nvidia card (which will limit my choices, though I might buy one next time if they have a better offer then AMD), or software physx, which seems crappy optimized on Mirrors edge. Havok has a better future for me.

If Havok comes on Larrabee and AMD CPU's, game developers like yourself will have more options to optimize the game engine for us. Instead of crappy PhysX cpu software support and hardware GPU support, you get hardware support in the new CPU's as well as option to use GPU with Havok. As mentioned above, I might turn off the GPU support and use only hardware (Larrabee) CPU support to use more SSAO.

I don't even know if my next card is ATI or Nvidia, but with Havok, my chances are better to get BOTH CPU and GPU acceleration. With Physx, there is no chance of that.
 
Being fair, its not going to be difficult for Nvidia to use the new streaming CPUs for hardware PhysX as well.
I hope they do find some common ground.
 
Nenu said:
Being fair, its not going to be difficult for Nvidia to use the new streaming CPUs for hardware PhysX as well.
I hope they do find some common ground.
Click to expand...

I hope so too. :)

Intel isn't going to close the doors on Havok and claim support for PhysX. AMD/ATI isn't going to close the door on ATI stream and start supporting CUDA.

For us, Havok might give us a more "complete" solution, compared to PhysX:

Our strategy is to optimize our CPUs to run Havok’s API and libraries and then to investigate how we can improve gameplay with offloading certain forms of physics simulation to the GPU. We have our theories and models, but we will not announce our product plans until we are ready to roll them out.
Click to expand...

http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38392/118/

Us gamers, would benfit if the "common ground" would be Havok. :)
 
Tamlin_WSGF said:
I think you think of propritary another way. I don't mean that non-propritary is GNU licensed. Take a look at this to clearify:
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38392/118/
Click to expand...
That article sounds like AMD was trying to sabotage the project and has apparently succeeded in doing so, as I haven't heard anything about that project in a while.
From what I have read, its indicated that Havok will support OpenCL, which both ATI and Nvidia supports. Non-propritary.
Click to expand...
PhysX will run just as easily on top of OpenCL as Havok FX. I can definitely see nVidia support his.

If Havok comes on Larrabee and AMD CPU's, game developers like yourself will have more options to optimize the game engine for us. Instead of crappy PhysX cpu software support and hardware GPU support, you get hardware support in the new CPU's as well as option to use GPU with Havok.
Click to expand...
Hardware support in CPUs? You realize that for physics-acceleration you _need_ SIMD hardware and that SSE and similar is woefully inadequate to deliver even a fraction of the vector processing power of a GPU? Now if you were talking about the Cell CPU...

I don't even know if my next card is ATI or Nvidia, but with Havok, my chances are better to get BOTH CPU and GPU acceleration. With Physx, there is no chance of that.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't be so sure. People seem to be thinking really black/white on this issue.
 
Elledan said:
That article sounds like AMD was trying to sabotage the project and has apparently succeeded in doing so, as I haven't heard anything about that project in a while.
Click to expand...

I have no doubt that AMD didn't want to have any PhysX support at all. Especially since they are going with Havok, which is a competing solution and they were negotiating with them.

PhysX will run just as easily on top of OpenCL as Havok FX. I can definitely see nVidia support his.
Click to expand...

Nvidia chose not to.

Hardware support in CPUs? You realize that for physics-acceleration you _need_ SIMD hardware and that SSE and similar is woefully inadequate to deliver even a fraction of the vector processing power of a GPU? Now if you were talking about the Cell CPU...
Click to expand...

Larrabee is already planned to have some GPU capabilities. AMD owns ATI, which makes GPU's. I don't think they were just venting hot air here. :)



I wouldn't be so sure. People seem to be thinking really black/white on this issue.
Click to expand...

Whats black and white? People are less loyal to hardware compared to before. Whatever gives us value for our money. We are also tired of different standards. I think Havok physics for all would be a better choice, if to have one standard. And, I want it to be that standard for BOTH Ati and Nvidia.

If Nvidia wishes to have one standard, they might soon have a chance to support Havok. This way, game developers as yourself, can choose to have one solution that gives GPU acceleration for all cards, and one solution that only supports Nvidia cards. :)

Lets hope Nvidia "doesn't sabotage that" and starts supporting Havok from the beginning ;)

You might remember from 2006 that Havok FX worked on both ATI and Nvidia cards. It might be the plan now too, if by platforms, they mean hardware platforms:

Cheng: We will happily work with and support all middleware tool providers. We announced collaboration with Havok since they are willing to operate as a middleware vendor and enable support for all platforms. If Nvidia wishes to place resources into enabling PhysX on AMD platforms, we would have no argument, provided they don’t artificially disadvantage our platforms in relation to theirs. We have attempted to initiate discussions with Nvidia on this matter, but so far they have been less than forthcoming.
Click to expand...

http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38392/118/

This will give you game developers a better tool, then PhysX that only works on Nvidia platforms (providing that Havok plans to support both Ati and Nvidia).
 
The black & white thing was mostly aimed at all the hatred I feel against PhysX, with many unsubstantiated claims being made, such as that PhysX would be inferior to Havok in some way (it's not, they're very comparable physics libraries), or that PhysX will rapidly die now (predictions are just that, even if you can support them with evidence).

Larrabee isn't a CPU, BTW, but a GPU. It may be a bit x86-ish, but Intel has never said it'd be used as a CPU. The lack of any kind of CPU-ish hardware (other than the stripped down cores) in Larrabee might have been a hint.

So far I remain sceptical about Havok FX, or whatever AMD comes up with. OpenCL is something I'm still waiting for as well, as AMD won't have an implementation for it (non-beta) until late this, early next year. In comparison nVidia will have non-beta OCL support in a few months time.

GLSL is more portable than CUDA/OCL anyway :p
 
Elledan said:
The black & white thing was mostly aimed at all the hatred I feel against PhysX, with many unsubstantiated claims being made, such as that PhysX would be inferior to Havok in some way (it's not, they're very comparable physics libraries), or that PhysX will rapidly die now (predictions are just that, even if you can support them with evidence).
Click to expand...

There is no hatred against Physx. I'm actually happy about PhysX. :)

For many years, it has been talked about getting GPU acceleration for ATI and Nvidia cards with Havok. Even demo's of Havok FX was displayed for both cards. Intel took over Havok and nothing happened.

Aegia has always had PPU cards for PhysX, but I never was interested in that. Not long ago, after Nvidia took over PhysX, hardware accelerated physics was introduced on GPU again. There is still an option to buy PPU cards for PhysX, but it still doesn't give anything worthwhile buying one even now.

What PhysX have done however, is to push Intel into making Havok FX happen. All press releases indicates that they wish to offer it for ATI AND Nvidia cards. In addition, they talks about making CPU's having extra instructions for hardware physics and offloading physics to BOTH CPU and GPU at the same time for optimal use of resources and multicores. Next week this will be introduced on GDC.

I'm grateful to PhysX pushing Havok to step up. :cool:

PS.
OpenCL will happen sooner then you think (non-beta) on ATI cards:
http://news.softpedia.com/news/AMD-...uts-More-Effort-on-ATI-Stream-SDK-99578.shtml

Larrabee is a hybrid. Only Intel knows how it will be when final, but its talked that it might come both as a card, and as a CPU through QuickPath.
 
CHAoS_NiNJA said:
Hasn't ATI been talking about Havok since the X1900 series? What makes this announcement any different?
Click to expand...

It was supposed to come on both ATI and Nvidia cards. Intel bought it and put it on ICE.

Whats different, is that they have unfrozen it now. :p
 
Tamlin_WSGF said:
It was supposed to come on both ATI and Nvidia cards. Intel bought it and put it on ICE.

Whats different, is that they have unfrozen it now. :p
Click to expand...

Ditto, this time it's for real, And in a world where vapos are the norm this is BIG.
 
Tamlin_WSGF said:
OpenCL will happen sooner then you think (non-beta) on ATI cards:
http://news.softpedia.com/news/AMD-...uts-More-Effort-on-ATI-Stream-SDK-99578.shtml
Click to expand...
That's of course just from a press-release :) I'll believe it when I see it.

Larrabee is a hybrid. Only Intel knows how it will be when final, but its talked that it might come both as a card, and as a CPU through QuickPath.
Click to expand...

Theoretically Larrabee's x86 processor cores can run existing PC software; even operating systems. However, Larrabee's video card will not include all the features of a PC-compatible motherboard, so PC operating systems and applications will not run without modifications.
Click to expand...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larrabee_(GPU)

Larrabee is a GPU which is half stuck in CPU-land :p
 
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