Consoles aren't good enough for Ray Tracing...

[From Henrik, via Wikipedia]

I remember seeing articles and thought pieces before the release of the current gen console hardware regarding their ability to perform ray tracing (RT, for short) in games. Overall, I think they were pretty pessimistic on the whole and, especially towards release, the Series S was never really considered as a serious RT machine. 

However, since release we've had several games that have proven that there was little to fear and that, if integrated at an early stage in a game's design or within the engine design, ray tracing is perfectly possible. 

So, it's surprising to see this article on Tom's Hardware stating the opposite.

Analyse This: The Story of Hyper Light Drifter... (Part 4)

Into the unknown...

I noticed that, recently, this series had been getting a few views again and I remembered that I had practically written two more entries and never posted them. So I figured that I'd finish what I'd started...

From here on out, we're in pure speculative and analytical territory. These are all observations and connections I've made based on what's in the game... but they're just that: Things my mind sees.

Just a reminder that this series discusses aspects of the game Hyper Light Drifter and will veer wildly into spoiler territory from the get-go.

Enjoy!

Does AMD's Dominance Even Matter...?

 

Over the last year or so, a lot has come to light about how the current generation of AMD's graphics cards are superior to Nvidia's in various ways. While I will mention them here, my intention isn't to dive into these features... the point of this post is to question if they even matter.

The Discrete GPU Market and Where we're Heading... (about supply and demand)

Today, I wanted to do some light coverage and analysis of Tom's Hardware's reporting of Jon Peddie Research's report on GPU shipments over the same time period contrasted with Canalys' report on the size of the PC gaming market and how that's likely to affect not only GPU availability but also GPU pricing going forward...

The Relative Value of GPUs Over The Last 10 Years...

 

Original by Sergei Tokmakov

There's been a comparison that I've been wanting to do for a long time but I just didn't have the time or the energy to take it on. Finally, I had a bit of a break from work and recharged enough to be able to sit down and focus on this to get it done. 

Below, I'll explore the historic pricing versus the relative performance of each generation of graphics cards from AMD and Nvidia over the period of 2010 - 2020*. From that, I will draw out the generational leaps per performance tier and the relative value of each of those jumps as well as the value within each generation. This will also help us try and understand how the price/performance strategy has changed per generation for both companies.

*Yes, I'm aware that the last ten years are technically 2011 - 2021... but the current generation started in 2020, and some data I would need for 2021 doesn't exist yet!