NVIDIA has released new beta drivers, Forceware version 91.31 for WinXP/2k/2003 which weigh in at 32MB.
Archive for the 'Technology' Category
June 14th, 2006
XYZ Computing has a review of Razer’s new Krait mouse, optimized for MMO and RTS gaming. How does it fare; is it good, or a gimmick?
The criteria for an appropriate mouse for each style of gaming are different, or at least Razer would want you to think that this is the case. With the market starting to accept products like gaming mice and gaming keyboards, it was only a matter of time until someone introduced a mouse for a certain type of game. While it is easy to be skeptical of such an idea, Razer has a great reputation and may actually be onto something here.
May 28th, 2006
ATI, in a recent meeting in London, mentioned that Microsoft won’t release a version of DirectX 10 for Windows XP, instead making it an exclusive Vista feature. This is likely to encourage gamers to upgrade when Vista is made available sometimes in 2007.
This decision has raised the ire of some gamers who feel they shouldn’t have to upgrade their operating system to play a game. EVE Online announced that they will upgrade their popular space MMORPG’s graphic engine to include DirectX 10 features, and Halo 2 will be a Vista-only title.
During a DirectX 10-related event in London, UK, Richard Huddy, ATI Technologies’ software developers relations chief, said that Microsoft’s Vista will integrate DirectX 10 and DirectX 9 APIs for different types of hardware, but the current Windows XP will not get DirectX 10 support, as suggested some rumours earlier. For end users this means that to get the most advantages of the new-generation graphics processing units (GPUs), the new OS will be required.
May 27th, 2006
A while back, we reported that Ubisoft dropped the anti-piracy protection software, StarForce, due to the flood of angry consumers with legitimate copies being affected right alongside those who were trying to pirate the games. Now it looks like the next major player utilizing StarForce, CDV, plans on dropping their licensing of StarForce as well. Citing the reason as being consumer demand, CDV had this to say about the new copy protection scheme that they will be using:
“We believe that TAGES will provide a sensible balance between protecting CDV’s intellectual property rights against piracy, while at the same time minimizing the restrictions experienced by legitimate owners of our products,” explained CDV’s Chief Technology Officer, Teut Weidemann.
May 23rd, 2006
NVIDIA has let me know that they’ve made available new beta Forceware drivers, version 91.28, that adds more SLI support, PureVideo enhancements, and a brand new look to the Control Panel inspired by Microsoft’s upcoming Vista operating system.
May 15th, 2006
GamerWithin talks with John Carmack about the new technology Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is using, called Megatextures.
Q1: What is MegaTexturing technology?
Answer: MegaTexture technology is something that addresses resource limitations in one particular aspect of graphics. The core idea of it is that when you start looking at outdoor rendering and how you want to do terrain and things in general, people almost always wind up with some kind of cross-fade blended approach where you tile your textures over and blend between them and add little bits of detail here and there. A really important thing to realize about just generally tiling textures, that we’re so used to accepting it in games, is that when you have one repeated pattern over a bunch of geometry, the texture tiling and repeating is really just a very, very specialized form of data compression where it’s allowing you to take a smaller amount of data and have it replicated over multiple surfaces, or multiple parts of the same surface in a game since you generally don’t have enough memory to be able to have the exact texture that you’d like everywhere.
In other words, it makes games look better without compromising performance. That’s a good thing.
May 7th, 2006
For those of you who are early adopters and bought the Ageia PhysX addon card, you’ll want to grab the newly available Cellfactor demo, which allows you to try out your new hardware in a game built from the ground up to showcase the PhysX chip. No word on whether or not those who don’t have the PhysX card can play this demo.
PhysX Owners can now get in on the action with the hot new hardware physics accelerated title: CellFactor: Combat Training from Artificial Studios and Immersion Games. All you need is a PhysX accelerator and a decent gaming rig, and you’re ready to get fragging. This demo is multiplayer-enabled and playable offline with customizable bots.
May 2nd, 2006
PC Perspective got some hands-on time with Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter and Cellfactor: Combat Training, both utilizing a PhysX chip. They provide their thoughts on how it performs for games at this early stage of hardware-based physics calculation. They provide videos of the physics-enhanced games to give you a visual idea of what to expect with the PPU.
Our time with the Cell Factor demo showed what a true PhysX game could potentially look like, and it is impressive. The amount of interactivity shown in our videos is unrivaled in any other title out now or that I have seen in development. Unfortunately, this puts developers in a bind — do they create a unique title like this and require a PhysX card to play it, thus cutting out nearly all of their market initially, or do they stick to “effects physics” like we see in GRAW that don’t push the envelope? It’s the same issue that AGEIA and company have been having to address with developers since the technology was first announced last year.
Ages ago, Bitboys garnered a lot of hype as they used a press release battle to challenge ATI and NVIDIA with an upcoming graphics card they planned on putting together that would be real powerful and power games with aplomb. They raised millions via investors, but year after year, their product was regarded as vaporware and the company became the brunt of jokes by gamers.
Recently Bitboys gave up, and restructured, this time focusing on powering the graphics of mobile devices. It looks like this caught the attention of ATI, as they plunked down ~$44 million and bought Bitboys up. Perhaps this was the real goal of the company, rather than competing against the likes of ATI and NVIDIA.
How is DirectX 10 and its Unified Architecture going to benefit gamers? What is the gamer going to need to take and advantage of it? We recently sat down with ATI and talked about DirectX 10 and how their next generation desktop GPU will benefit.
You can read more at [H] Enthusiast.
If there’s ever an indication that physics hardware is here to stay, Microsoft developing a physics SDK for DirectX would be it. That’s exactly what Microsoft plans to do, and by DirectX 11, it’ll be a standard feature. With Ageia’s recently released PhysX physics addon card, the future of gaming looks to become a bit more realistic (and fun, hopefully!)
These early days of physics acceleration are entirely reminiscent of the beginnings of 3D acceleration, and Microsoft is once again stepping in to sort out the mess that is starting to develop. We, of course, have AGEIA and their PhysX API, we have NVIDIA/Havok in bed with each other, and even ATI is brewing something up. It’s getting ugly before it even starts. The consumers don’t want another format/API war, and Microsoft knows that.
April 30th, 2006
Yahoo has an article taking a closer look at Ageia’s PhysX addon card that allows game developers to add powerful, and realistic physics to their games. With graphics reaching a plateau in quality, industry analysts believe that physics in games will be the next big thing to grow in leaps and bounds. Ageia is banking on that with their new physics chip, PhysX.
Buildings will blow up spectacularly, football tackles will become more bone-crunching, and cloth will flutter and crumple, lending a dramatic flair to online role-playing games.
Analysts say Ageia could rewrite the rules of the game for an industry whose $10 billion in annual U.S. sales of hardware and software outstrips Hollywood’s box office take.
I personally think it will work out for Ageia, especially if they manage to lower the cost (currently at $300.) Physics in games as they are today have elicited a feel of wonder and glee, and to make it more realistic and powerful, I forsee a crop of games that immerses us gamers even more than ever before.
April 18th, 2006
Razer sent me an email announcing some new products they have available that are designed for hardcore gaming enthusiasts.
- Razer Krait - A mouse geared towards Real-time Strategy enthusiasts, with 1600dpi, non-slip buttons, on-the-fly sensitivity adjustment, 16-bit data path, gold-plated USB connector, and more.
- Razer Mantis - Cloth-based mousepad made of special woven fibers (Fibertek) surface, oversized dimensions, and a rubber base to ensure stability.
- Razer Armadillo - A cable management system accessory for those annoying gaming sessions where the mouse cord snags and hinders your gaming performance. It secures the excess cable and increases stability and accuracy during fast-paced gaming. Made of heavy-duty construction for a long life.
April 13th, 2006
Well, we heard it from their forums, but now Ubisoft has told 1UP the official word on Starforce. It looks like all the complaining has gotten to the suits.
When questioned Ubisoft represnetatives told 1UP, “Right now, Ubisoft has decided to use an alternative copy protection system to Starforce for upcoming releases and we are investigating other possible steps at this time.”
…When we asked why they were dropping the company Ubisoft representatives said, “Ubisoft takes its customer concerns very seriously and is investigating the complaints about alleged problems with Starforce’s software. Ubisoft’s goal is to find solutions for its customers if there are problems with Ubisoft products.”
April 12th, 2006
It seems a number of gamers using NVIDIA-based video cards have been having problems with the next-generation feature in Tomb Raider: Legend. Bit-Tech tells NVIDIA about it, and they apologized and fixed the problem. As a result, they’ve made available new Forceware drivers, version 84.43 on nZone. If you’re having problems with Tomb Raider: Legend, you may want to grab this driver.
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