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The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

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Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#281
post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most data center GPUs don't have display outputs and some use exotic connectors (not PCIe x16 slots), making them worth next to nothing as conventional graphics cards.

It's probably possible to move the rendered frames via PCI Express to another card with video output or perhaps design a custom card that connects via NVLink/Infiniband and provides video out. Or maybe even mount the video out on the GPU motherboard if he graphics chip had support but it's not just not connected to a port.

LTT did something similar with a mining "GPU" several years ago.[0] It involved buying a mining card with modified firmware and installing a modified and unsigned driver which shoved the rendered frames into the integrated GPU to output.

It's possible these datacenter AI GPUs are built so different from conventional GPUs that they lack required hardware to draw polygons, like ROPs and texture units. Why waste chip engineering time and silicon die space to support applications that a product isn't designed for? Let me remind you that gaming is a small slice of NVidia's balance sheet[1], so it makes sense to not have to use one chip design for everything.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY4s35uULg4

[1] $4.3 billion out of $57 billion https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-announces-financia...

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#282
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The GP was talking about Unreal Engine 5 as if that engine doesn't optimize for low end. That's a wild take, I've been playing Arc Raiders with a group of friends in the past month, and one of them hadn't upgraded their PC in 10 years, and it still ran fine (20+ fps) on their machine. When we grew up it would be absolutely unbelievable that a game would run on a 10 year old machine, let alone at bearable FPS. And the…

> it still ran fine (20+ fps) 20 fps is not fine. I would consider that unplayable. I expect at least 60, ideally 120 or more, as that's where the diminishing returns really start to kick in. I could tolerate as low as 30 fps on a game that did not require precise aiming or reaction times, which basically eliminates all shooters.

On 10 years old hardware?

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am pretty sure that the current demand of gpu's can pretty much eat the left idle time issue at major datacenters because of the AI craze. Not that its good or bad tho but we could probably have something more akin to spot instances of gpu being given for gaming purposes. I do see a lot of company are having GPU access costs per second/instant shutdown/restart I suppose but overall I agree My brother recently came…

Wait what? Mac and ps5 can ‘crossplay’ video games? Or is ps5 a game?

ps5 as in playstation 5

and I meant that I think that the ps5 can run far away and you can still connect to it from your laptop and even connect a controller to your laptop (as my brother did) to play with a controller which runs on a mac and then it uses the ps5 itself

All in all, I found it really cool for what its worth.

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not targeting high-end PCs. They're targeting current generation consoles, specifically the PS5 + 1080p. It just turns out that when you take those system requirements and put them on a PC—especially a PC with a 1440p or 2160p ultrawide—it turns out to mean pretty top of the line stuff. Particularly if as a PC gamer you expect to run it at 90fps and not the 30-40 that is typical for consoles.

Without disagreeing with the broad strokes of your comment, it feels like 4K should be considered standard for consoles nowadays - a very usable 4K HDR TV can be had for $150-500.

I think you're underestimating the computing power required to render (natively) at 4K. Some modern games can't even natively render at 1440p on high-end PCs.

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, you need to go to an optician. I can see the pixels at a comfortable distance at 1440p. Alternatively, you play modern games with incredibly blurry AA solutions. Try looking at something older from when AA actually worked.

You're probably looking up close at a small portion of the screen - you'll always be able to "see the pixels" in that situation. If you sit far back enough to keep the whole of the screen comfortably in your visual field, the argument applies.

Oh goodness no, I sit way further away from the screen than most people. People always drag my screens closer when they have to borrow my desk

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#286
post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I broadly concur. These days, gaming is usually very easy on Linux. Except: If I want to kill some time being chaotic in GTA:V Online, and do that in Linux, then that is forbidden. Single player mode works beautifully, but multiplayer is verboten. (And I'm sure that there are other games that similarly feature very deliberate brokenness, but that's my example.)

This is the part where I just stick with console for specific titles, like the GTA franchise. I feel like Rockstar treats the PC as a second class citizen anyway. I bought my PS5 Pro in anticipation of GTA 6 and the (hopefully) upcoming DragonQuest 12. May my prayers be answered.

Console doesn't work for anything but platformers. Competitive online gaming = PC (Aoe2, BF6, Dark and Darker, Swordai, MWO, The Finals, War Thunder, PS2 etc.).

144fps + Mouse + Keyboard is just superior.

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You have to sit very close to a 4k display to be able to perceive the full resolution. Wait, are you sure you don't have that backward? IIUC, you don't[ ] notice the difference between a 2K display and a 4K display until you get up to larger screen sizes (say 60+ inches give or take a dozen inches; I don't have exact numbers :) ) and with those the optimal viewing range is like 4-8 feet away (depending on the scree…

My first 4K screen was a 24" computer display and let me tell you, the difference between that and a 24" 1080p display is night and day from 1-2 feet away. Those pixels were gloriously dense. Smoothest text rendering you've ever seen. I didn't use it for gaming though, and I've "downgraded" resolution to 2x 1440p (and much higher refresh rates) since then. But more pixels is great if you can afford it. It's one thing…

That's fair, but it makes me wonder if perhaps it's not the resolution that makes it crisper but other factors that come along with that price point, such as refresh rate, HDR, LCD layer quality, etc.

For example, I have two 1920x1080 monitors, but one is 160 Hz and the other is only 60 Hz, and the difference is night and day between them.

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You have to sit very close to a 4k display to be able to perceive the full resolution. Wait, are you sure you don't have that backward? IIUC, you don't[ ] notice the difference between a 2K display and a 4K display until you get up to larger screen sizes (say 60+ inches give or take a dozen inches; I don't have exact numbers :) ) and with those the optimal viewing range is like 4-8 feet away (depending on the scree…

It’s best to think about this as angular resolution. Even a very small screen could take up an optimal amount of your field of view if held close. You get the max benefit from a 4k display when it is about 80% of the diagonal screen distance away from your eyes. So for a 28 inch monitor, that’s a little less then 2 feet, pretty typical desk setup.

Hmm... I still have my doubts, but you make a good point. I'll have to think on this a bit. Thanks for clarifying!

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the part where I just stick with console for specific titles, like the GTA franchise. I feel like Rockstar treats the PC as a second class citizen anyway. I bought my PS5 Pro in anticipation of GTA 6 and the (hopefully) upcoming DragonQuest 12. May my prayers be answered.

Console doesn't work for anything but platformers. Competitive online gaming = PC (Aoe2, BF6, Dark and Darker, Swordai, MWO, The Finals, War Thunder, PS2 etc.). 144fps + Mouse + Keyboard is just superior.

I definitely get the appeal of running FPS and such on PC. I'm much more accurate with a mouse and keyboard combo over a controller, but I'm appealing to the strengths a console does have as well. I own both so I can change up my experience to whichever offers the best one for me.

Re: The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?

#290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait what? Mac and ps5 can ‘crossplay’ video games? Or is ps5 a game?

ps5 as in playstation 5 and I meant that I think that the ps5 can run far away and you can still connect to it from your laptop and even connect a controller to your laptop (as my brother did) to play with a controller which runs on a mac and then it uses the ps5 itself All in all, I found it really cool for what its worth.

Like ‘remote play’?
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