AMD & NVIDIA GPU VR Performance - theBlu: Encounter @ [H]

[FrgMstr]

AMD & NVIDIA GPU VR Performance - theBlu: Encounter

We are changing gears a bit from Virtual Reality gaming today and are going to focus on a VR experience. theBlu has been around since the inception of the recent VR consumer market. You don't play theBlu, but rather experience it. That said, it can be punishing to lesser GPUs, and this time we see very different performance results from AMD.

 

[KazeoHin]

Wow, quite interesting to see the RX480 actually perform! maybe a glimmer of hope for AMD Fanbois?

 

[MavericK]

theBlu was one of my first VR experiences and it was awesome. Highly recommended for first-time users of VR, really shows you what immersion is.

I think we have seen that Unity seems to be a lot more forgiving on AMD cards as well.

 

[KazeoHin]

theBlu was one of my first VR experiences and it was awesome. Highly recommended for first-time users of VR, really shows you what immersion is.

I think we have seen that Unity seems to be a lot more forgiving on AMD cards as well.

Well, Remember who hands out fistfuls of cash to the other free, indie-friendly engine....

 

[Shintai]

Good to see AMD not failing for once in VR

 

[Algrim]

Today we find out that the AMD Polaris GPU does have VR prowess, but apparently it is not as easily coaxed out as that of NVIDIA's and its new Pascal architecture.

I found this to be a really odd sentence considering that the 980 Ti also appears to have considerable VR chops, at least based on all [H] reviews so far.

 

[Dayaks]

I think my kids would get a kick out of this. Interesting results.

 

[jbc029]

I found this to be a really odd sentence considering that the 980 Ti also appears to have considerable VR chops, at least based on all [H] reviews so far.

I think he's just comparing new architectures. Both Hawaii and Maxwell are more than capable VR solutions, as well, but they aren't *new*.

 

[GameLifter]

I'm happy to see AMD do well in this title. At least we know for sure it's possible for them to do well in VR.

 

[jbc029]

AMD isn't terrible as far as VR goes, they just definitely are not on top like they keep saying they are. Overall, they're fairly competent, considering that once you're sub 1% on reprojection, there is no gameplay difference between any card.

The Fury gets lambasted because it *should* be completing with a 1070, not a 1060.
Edit: To be clearer, the Fury isn't really competing with a 1060. There's a *large* gap between a 1060 and a 1070. The Fury lives comfortably in there for the most part, usually closer to the 1070 than a 1060 but it's definitely more middle of the gap. You'd almost think it was part of the NV product stack from where it lands between them.


The 480 gets hammered because it can't seem to reliably stay out of reprojection. Nearly it's entire dropped frame count on the leader board comes from two titles where it's so bad that it's almost entirely unplayable (Project Cars and Pool Nation). Outside of those two, the dropped frame rate is actually a bit lower than a 1060, but the biggest difference...the only one that *really* matters is that the average frame render time is 1.5 ms faster for a 1060 so far (again looking at titles where the 480 isn't just flat out broken). That 1.5 ms avg is the difference between 43% overall reprojection on a 480 vs 24% reprojection on a 1060.

 

[jbc029]

Also, just from the viewpoint of framing theBlu as an experience, folks should also try out the Abyss long enough to see the jellyfish migration. That's pretty impressive, too.

 

[MavericK]

Also, just from the viewpoint of framing theBlu as an experience, folks should also try out the Abyss long enough to see the jellyfish migration. That's pretty impressive, too.

I hear there is a new-ish "surprise" near the end of that one, too. (wasn't in there when I first played it)

 

[razor1]

AMD isn't terrible as far as VR goes, they just definitely are not on top like they keep saying they are. Overall, they're fairly competent, considering that once you're sub 1% on reprojection, there is no gameplay difference between any card.

The Fury gets lambasted because it *should* be completing with a 1070, not a 1060.
Edit: To be clearer, the Fury isn't really competing with a 1060. There's a *large* gap between a 1060 and a 1070. The Fury lives comfortably in there for the most part, usually closer to the 1070 than a 1060 but it's definitely more middle of the gap. You'd almost think it was part of the NV product stack from where it lands between them.


The 480 gets hammered because it can't seem to reliably stay out of reprojection. Nearly it's entire dropped frame count on the leader board comes from two titles where it's so bad that it's almost entirely unplayable (Project Cars and Pool Nation). Outside of those two, the dropped frame rate is actually a bit lower than a 1060, but the biggest difference...the only one that *really* matters is that the average frame render time is 1.5 ms faster for a 1060 so far (again looking at titles where the 480 isn't just flat out broken). That 1.5 ms avg is the difference between 43% overall reprojection on a 480 vs 24% reprojection on a 1060.

Well I agree with your post, good post, but I have a problem when AMD marketing, talked so much shit about Maxwell being poor at VR and now we see that they have no damn problem and beat out GCN handily last gen and Polaris.

Pretty much what AMD has been doing has been "targeting" supposed weak spots of their competition without even knowing what is real and what isn't.

This is the same thing they did with Async. This is the same thing they did with VR. This is the same thing with LLAPI's. Should we actually start second or in this case third guessing AMD (their failures in timely delivery of products and what they deliver isn't actually what have talked about, already make us second guess their capabilities) but now even their adverting, and marketing, pr, what not all of it is spewing out crap. Its completely systemic.

What is worse then this, people actually believe in the crap AMD talks about too, because the things they are talking about, at that time, very few people actually knew what they were even talking about it, AMD marketers didn't even know most of the things they were talking about (technical marketers).

The laymen that believe this stuff can be fan boys or what not, but man that belief is a direct effect of AMD's marketing, that does no one any favors when the truth comes out at a later date down the road. Till that point AMD is all smug, high and mighty, then after that point they start making changes to their marketing material so they don't need to talk about it anymore, like it never really existed lol.

If they are doing the same things with Zen, well they will be totally screwed, cause marketing isn't going to help them sell anything there.

Everything that AMD has done since Bulldozer on the CPU side and the r600 on the GPU side, on paper they looked great, but reality has been pretty short on all of their CPU products, and a few of their GPU products since those points. So Polaris looked great on paper, but reality showed us something quite different. Zen looks great on paper, I hope it holds up to the litmus tests when it comes out. Vega looks great on paper, again same as Zen, hope it holds up.

Everything from VR, LLAPI's, Async compute, Open GPU, first three are utterly not what AMD has stated, in their favor, and the last Open GPU doesn't seem to have taken off much.

 

[Omegas]

This may be an odd question, but in any of your tests have you ever glanced at how much ram the RX480 and 1060GTX are using?