Havok FX

Accelerated physics using your graphics card:

http://www.penstarsys.com/#sli_phys

Isn't that just accelerating the eye candy ? Like making particles' movement more realistic... Kinda pointless for SL, besides maybe some client-side framerate improvement.

I saw nVidia has released a new card with an SLi physics engine on the chip. I wonder if for certain physical simulation, LL could offload the physics calculations to the client like they do with particles, llSetTextureAnim, and other client-side effects. It could be used for cool effects, like water splashing and such that wouldn't impact the sim itself.

Regards,

-Flip

Actually no, common misconception is that a GPU is a processor only capable of graphics. In reality its an extra CPU that is basicly having just graphics processing sent to it. What Havok & nVidia are doing is simply putting unused processing power to good use. GPUs pretty much never use their full potential because few programmers take advantage of it.

Though now I'm interested in getting a 7600 or 7800GS instead of the 6600GT or 6800GS (only because nVidia recomends a 7600 or better to take full advantage of it).

I'm still waiting for someone to start the "OMG HAVOK 4 zomg!" thread. Who's its gonna be?!



Regards,

-Flip

Well, Gamespot had a nice article on what to expect from DirectX 10 and how it'll offload the graphics from the CPU to the GPU for realistic physics and if it ran out of memory it'd use system ram. BUT the catch is, Windows Vista Only, DirectX10 Cards only (not 'compatible with....' ones). If you had the $$$ it wouldn't be an issue, but you're looking at a system with a $400-600 video card (or more). Plus I still don't trust Vista! Another downside- SL uses OpenGL, not DirectX, so Mac users would be left out.

DirectX is evil.

It could only really be used for physics on particles, anything else would have to be done server side. It would make sense to fit out servers for hardware accelerated physics but that would be Ageia rather than Havok FX (A server doesn't need a graphics card afterall).

Havok FX could make particle effects much cooler than they are now. Anyone found any screenshots of any game being developed with support for it?

Yes! And this is why:

Microsoft's DirectX APIs are a collection of interfaces that standardize how game developers talk to PC system hardware. It's a lot easier for programmers to write for a single DirectSound or Direct3D API, instead of writing for every single video card and sound card in existence.

I want the thrill of hunting down drivers for any video/sound card on the market!!! Imagine the fun of endlessly Googling the manufacturer, searching through all the sites written in Taiwanese/chinese/japanese!!! Now THATS fun!!

More tidbits from Gamespot's DX10 article:

Here's a list of several new Direct3D 10 performance improvements GameSpot was able to wrestle out of the DirectX 10 team:

* New constant buffers maximize efficiency of sending shader constant data (light positions, material information, etc.) to the GPU by eliminating redundancy and massively reducing the number of calls to the runtime and driver. New state objects significantly reduce the amount of API calls and bandwidth, tracking, mapping, and validation overhead needed in the runtime and driver to change GPU device state.

* Texture arrays enable the GPU to swap materials on-the-fly without having to swap those textures from the CPU.

* Resource views enable super-fast binding of resources to the pipeline by informing the system early-on about its intended use. This also vastly reduces the cost of hazard-tracking and validation.

* Predicated rendering allows draw calls to be automatically deactivated based on the results of previous rendering - without any CPU interaction. This enables rapid occlusion culling to avoid rendering objects that aren’t visible.

* Shader Model 4.0 provides a more robust instruction set with capabilities like integer and bitwise instructions, enabling more work to be transferred to the GPU.

* The D3D runtime itself has been completely refactored to maximize performance and configurability by the application.

And if none of this sounds impressive then why are you using a computer in the first place? Technically it's impressive. Will it happen? Maybe. Just gonna have to wait & see!
If this is whats coming down the road I think I'll start saving money now. But I'm still waiting a year or two before even considering Vista. Depends how much they force it on you, much like needing Windows XP to play some of the newer games that won't support Windows 2000 or less.

There are good cross-platform alternatives to DirectX. OpenGL, OpenAL, SDL...

Exactly. 'Cause if you offload physics to individual clients, one client would run faster than another. One client would see the ball at the 50yd. line, while the other is dancing in the endzone.

Now what could be nifty... determine who has the best connection vs. the best physics processor at any point in time within a region. Offload the physics to that person, transmit the results back to the rest of the region, and free the region server for whatever else. If the best solution is the server's own physics processing, then keep it on the server until a capable client comes along. I'm just thinking out load here, I realize this would also take away resources from a paying client, to use for the betterment of others.

Ok, it's a slow news night... what if SL could create a new way to earn L$. Suppose you have super-duper bandwidth and lightning fast hardware. You could allow SL to offload some background processes (texture/audio conversions, outfit baking, etc.) for a price. Something like the Seti Screensaver thing... Maybe you could earn L$60/minute. It sure beats camping chairs, and could benefit others as well.

The good thing about Havok FX is that it could be to used for things, that because of prohibitive bandwith requirements, can't be done on the servers.