Project CARS Devs Address AMD Performance Issues

jwcalla said:
Here is the issue: nvidia is better dedicated to making the gaming experience as good as possible.

So where is AMD's PhysX counterpart that the devs can plug in to get the same functionality for AMD cards? Is that HairFX? Or should devs write their own library from scratch using OpenCL (which BTW has been a trainwreck in AMD drivers)?

Same thing with GameWorks. Hey, nvidia is trying to push the envelope of what PC games can do. What is AMD doing? I'll bet that what you find in GameWorks is code that takes advantage of some of the architectural details of nvidia GPUs (Kepler, Fermi, etc.). You know, all that "low-level" crap some of you people fawn over. And now we have some here demanding that developers should just stick to the high-level standards of DirectX for the purposes of abstraction. Just wait until you see how bad it gets when DX12 / Vulkan titles start rolling out and things are fundamentally broken at the level of an individual GPU line.
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Yep, except that you cannot turn off the proprietary stuff in this game. :rolleyes:
 
cageymaru said:
If you buy the game and try it, there is an Nvidia sign on every corner damn near. I love SMS, but let's be honest with ourselves. :)
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Well if they ever release it for Linux I might give it a try, even though I have no wheel / pedals.

But I'll say this ahead of time: AMD's OpenGL drivers are even worse than their DX drivers. And I am sure that will be blamed on nvidia too.
 
ManofGod said:
Yep, except that you cannot turn off the proprietary stuff in this game. :rolleyes:
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Then AMD can cowboy up and make their own PhysX substitute.

If nvidia provides the best experience for gaming, that's what people are going to buy. If AMD expects to survive by relying on the "sympathy sale", they're guaranteed to fail.
 
jwcalla said:
Then AMD can cowboy up and make their own PhysX substitute.

If nvidia provides the best experience for gaming, that's what people are going to buy. If AMD expects to survive by relying on the "sympathy sale", they're guaranteed to fail.
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Except Nvidia did not make PhysX but bought it. Oh, and you mean you did not hear the whining and crying on this forum that Mantle was going to destroy the PC Gaming market? It was going to fracture it, yada, yada, yada. You know what, I think AMD does not to play hardball and screw Nvidia by pushing their own proprietary standards that only works on AMD cards.

Sounds good to me. :D
 
ManofGod said:
Except Nvidia did not make PhysX but bought it. Oh, and you mean you did not hear the whining and crying on this forum that Mantle was going to destroy the PC Gaming market? It was going to fracture it, yada, yada, yada. You know what, I think AMD does not to play hardball and screw Nvidia by pushing their own proprietary standards that only works on AMD cards.

Sounds good to me. :D
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Freesync only works on AMD cards. Granted only a few of them, but it's still a proprietary solution. Sure NVIDIA could write their own version of Freesync, but they don't cry about AMD not writing the driver for them.

If you don't want to support games that run poorly on AMD cards, you won't have a lot of games to choose from.
 
ManofGod said:
*Shrug* That is nice. :rolleyes: Me, I am older now and wiser with how I spend my money and more aware of what is going on. (You probably are aware of what is going on as well but care not to admit it.) That's ok, the producers of this game clearly cannot manage to be on the up and up so, they will not get my money.

That is one thing I have found I am more capable of then I used to be when I was younger, sifting the wheat from the chafe. So, did you run any races today or did you just decide to criticize everyone else for what they purchase that does not match up with yours?
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If you were older and wiser you wouldn't spend this much time rolling eyes and replying to people at a problem that was and still is AMD's/ATIs incompetence to deliver good gaming experience (not just hardware) to it's user base.

If my sig wasn't there would you still ask? If in my sig i'd list all my other CPUs and GPUs i have and had over time would you still ask? You're just grasping straws for the problem at hand and unfortunately just proving my first post here. "All is well AMD we love you, everybody else is just wrong/stupid/fanboy/out to get you/alien/etc. carry the same way on." They need to step up their game.
 
DPI said:
Removing Gameworks wouldn't make AMD drivers suck less.

But I do love how people try to rationalize what ALWAYS boils down to AMD not being able to get their act together.
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Gameworks is DRM on driver optimizations. AMD may or may not do a good job with optimizing games vs nVidia here and there, but this is an issue of a company using a tool that AMD competitor provided to lock others out of optimizing the code.
 
Wierdo said:
Gameworks is DRM on driver optimizations. AMD may or may not do a good job with optimizing games vs nVidia here and there, but this is an issue of a company using a tool that AMD competitor provided to lock others out of optimizing the code.
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But Mantle. /sarcasm
 
PRIME1 said:
If you don't want to support games that run poorly on AMD cards, you won't have a lot of games to choose from.
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I'm looking at all the GTX 970 vs R9 290X game benchmarks right now (the Nvidia being about a year newer), and while there are some that the Nvidia card is winning on, there are about the same it loses on. *scratching head*

2560x1440 (1440p) R9 290X vs GTX 970

Battlefield 4, Ultra, 4x MSAA
46.8 vs 48.9

Crysis 3, Very High, SMAA
45.1 vs 43

Assassin's Creed Unity, Ultra High, FXAA
29.5 vs 32.8

Far Cry 4, Ultra, SMAA
57.8 vs 53.9

COD Advanced Warfare, Extra, FSMAA
81.5 vs 87

Ryse: Son of Rome, High, SMAA
55.6 vs 46.3

Tomb Raider, Ultimate, FXAA
62.4 vs 65.5

Shadow of Mordor, Ultra, High Textures, FXAA
65.7 vs 57

Metro Last Light Redux, Max, Post-AA
48.9 vs 48.9
 
Wierdo said:
Gameworks is DRM on driver optimizations. AMD may or may not do a good job with optimizing games vs nVidia here and there, but this is an issue of a company using a tool that AMD competitor provided to lock others out of optimizing the code.
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Then let AMD make their own version of Gameworks that developers can use. I don't know how it behooves us to coddle this company that has been clearly phoning it in for years now.
 
I still don't see why they couldn't use DirectCompute. You know, because graphics cards from both companies (and Intel?) support it. We still haven't gotten confirmation if the PhysX is CPU or GPU. But I would be shocked if this game's PhysX didn't support GPU acceleration.
 
So many tears! It's soooo tasty. Although I commend the AMD/ATI fanboys as there has to be someone to buy them to create marketplace competition.

As one of my favorite horrible cliches states, "the definition of insane is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results."*

*Refer to post regarding 9800pro.
 
haste. said:
So many tears! It's soooo tasty. Although I commend the AMD/ATI fanboys as there has to be someone to buy them to create marketplace competition.

As one of my favorite horrible cliches states, "the definition of insane is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results."*

*Refer to post regarding 9800pro.
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That's nice since I am sure you were first in line for complaining about Mantle and how it was going to fracture the market, yada, yada, yada. :rolleyes: Do not come bitching here when your precious 970 is $699 if there is no more competition.

Must be a fanboy for pointing out the obvious, that NVidia bought out this game. Hey, no biggie, enjoy your proprietary stuff being shoved down your throat.
 
The thing about Mantle was that it didnt take anything away from NVidia.
And Mantle methods are now included in DX12 and a new version of OpenGL.
 
Nenu said:
How do you know it is offloading some PhysX to the GPU?
You quoted your earlier post, but that didnt confirm this either
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Well let me explain a little bit more. The basic PhysX calculations are being done on the CPU. There is no difference in what Nvidia and AMD sees in that regard. The smoke effects and others are done on the Nvidia GPU whereas the CPU is still responsible for an AMD system. When you do a burn out in a circle with the weather set to Clear, the frame rate drops to almost single digits with the higher settings enabled in the game on an AMD system. Doing a burnout in a circle is one of the first things that you want to do in a racing game.

It is the fact that AMD drivers rely more on CPU performance than Nvidia drivers that there is such a discrepancy in performance. I already showed where there is a 20% to 50% performance boost by running the game on Windows 10 even though the game is DX11 only. SMS and AMD are working together to fix the situation as SMS is sure that something can be done within the AMD drivers to lessen the load. Likewise AMD needs more information and help from SMS to correct the situation. One party isn't more culpable than the other. They both knew that the game wasn't ready for AMD users to purchase. That's why they kissed and made up already. ;)

I never said that the basic calculations were being done on a GPU for Nvidia. I see that someone is running around creatively misquoting me on other forums just like the person creatively quoted Ian Bell. Which is really sad since all SMS wants to do is get the game working on AMD finally. Really they want to be able to sell the game to as many people as possible. They like money like most of us. Hopefully this will be fixed very soon!

And I can tell you emphatically that at no point in the past year did AMD performance become acceptable in the game. It got better as in frame rate went from single digits to almost 30 fps with a few of the higher settings enabled. But we never saw 60 fps unless we disabled most of the graphical features of the game and cut the rain off. Even then when coming around to the grandstands the frame rate would still drop to 40 fps. That is jarring when you go from 70 fps to 40 fps in seconds. The weather system is a major component and thus selling point of the game. 19 fps with Thunderstorm enabled is not acceptable to me. That's where it has been for the past year. Don't spin tires or throw mud in the rain. 20 cars on the grid can become a slideshow in the rain if you have an AMD card.

Driver revisions are not the issue here. Performance didn't tank because something was working before and is now broken. It was broken from the beginning. Even the test that I quoted a few pages back only uses 9 AI cars and a i7-5960X when the default is 19 on some tracks. I'm sorry, but a GTX 560 and a R9 290X competing for supremacy is not the definition of properly optimized. That's the fault of AMD and SMS.

Personally all I care about is getting the game working properly for everyone. That's the only reason I've been speaking up for better drivers and communication between the companies over the years. Read the Project Cars thread in the PC gaming section to see that I've been jaded about the launch for a long time.

I really like the game as it's freaking awesome. Dirt Rally and Project Cars are the gold standards for easily accessible PC racing nowadays. Dirt rally plays nicely with AMD and Nvidia. Why can't Project Cars?

No edit button so hopefully I didn't make a mistake. ;)
 
Thanks for the comprehensive response.
I'm not best pleased with AMD either, I just switched from a 290x to a 980 because I've had enough of them.
But I'd like to be clear on any issues.
 
jwcalla said:
Here is the issue: nvidia is better dedicated to making the gaming experience as good as possible.
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What does that even mean? What is AMD's goal with their graphics division? To dedicate themselves to selling oranges on the highway, and the gaming experience is just a hobby for their free time?
 
magoo said:
Someone has finally come out and said what I've experienced for the last 10 years with ATI/AMD GPU products......

They just put out late and crappy drivers, sure it happens on the NVidia side too, but AMD jesus.....

I feel like an abused child....I just keep coming back for another beating.:eek: hoping against hope that this time it will be different......

It doesn't look like there's ever going to be a cure for this.:(
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Hoo hoo, My last, active attempt to use AMD was a mobile, software switchable GPU. Oh hell no. After dealing with the 4xxx series DP implementation, 57/5800 series crossfire support, then the switchable GPU on my laptop, I finally gave up all hope in AMD. The mobile GPU was mostly morbid curiosity, to see if it would be any good, as it was replacing an early nVidia Optimus setup (which worked relatively flawlessly).

AMD hardware was often timely to the market, and awesome when it worked. Drivers? Their Achilles heel. I wish they would just get their act together on the software, but they haven't. When Intel (briefly?) overtook their IGPs in video pulldown support, I quit using their entrylevel GPUs as HTPC video cards, as well.
 
I have had Project Cars for almost 3 years now, as an original WMD contributor. Game runs amazing until weather affects hit on my AMD 290x, then its fucking page flipping slow. AMD best get their shit together. I don't blame the Project cars devs for this one bit.
 
jeremyshaw said:
Hoo hoo, My last, active attempt to use AMD was a mobile, software switchable GPU.
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And there are those of us that have horror stories with NVidia on mobile, such as during the last two chip QA debacles with high failure rates from overheating or the NVidia driver problems where Optimus capable systems weren't switching to dedicated graphics requiring users to go into the BIOS and disable integrated graphics entirely.

And driver performance wise, I just look at the numbers and for every game that NVidia excels at, there's an AMD counterpart where NVidia is lagging. In this case, its just a matter of a game specifically developed on NVidia technology, so its not really rocket science or indicative of some widespread driver deficiency among AAA titles.

Honestly, AMD also has a better track history of innovating lately and offering great bang for the buck. NVidia invested in a die shrink first, which is nice and all but not exactly rocket science and was really just needed to stay competitive. Far more exciting IMO are new hardware techs like high bandwidth memory that AMD is bringing to market. AMD has also had a better track history with their dual-GPU card offerings, and with DX12 allowing for both chip's memory to be utilized we should see some great 4K gaming options (I'm hoping that also turns my 295x2 into a true 8GB card rather than a 2x4GB).

I'll just buy whatever is on sale with the best bang/buck, but I certainly wouldn't dismiss AMD cards or you're short-changing yourself. :)
 
Ducman69 said:
What does that even mean? What is AMD's goal with their graphics division? To dedicate themselves to selling oranges on the highway, and the gaming experience is just a hobby for their free time?
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I dunno, maybe they're just sitting around collecting paychecks? Or maybe it's a completely dysfunctional company that can't get anything done? One thing for sure is that in terms of the gaming experience they're not bringing as much to the table as nvidia is.

Or, to be less diplomatic, AMD is an all-around mediocre company at best. And no amount of trying to make us feel guilty for not supporting the poor wittle victim AMD is going to help their case.
 
jwcalla said:
I dunno, maybe they're just sitting around collecting paychecks? Or maybe it's a completely dysfunctional company that can't get anything done? One thing for sure is that in terms of the gaming experience they're not bringing as much to the table as nvidia is.

Or, to be less diplomatic, AMD is an all-around mediocre company at best. And no amount of trying to make us feel guilty for not supporting the poor wittle victim AMD is going to help their case.
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Remind me to laugh my head off if Nvidia becomes a monopoly and you will pay their prices or nothing at all. :D Sorry but, NVidia brings their proprietary crap into the game devs camp that locks out the competition. So you do not like the truth, tough, deal with it. :D

I will not buy proprietary games and will invest my money into places that deserve it. Nvidia is not a place that deserves it but, hey, I am sure you like having their stuff shoved down your throat whether you like it or not.
 
ManofGod said:
Remind me to laugh my head off if Nvidia becomes a monopoly and you will pay their prices or nothing at all. :D Sorry but, NVidia brings their proprietary crap into the game devs camp that locks out the competition. So you do not like the truth, tough, deal with it. :D

I will not buy proprietary games and will invest my money into places that deserve it. Nvidia is not a place that deserves it but, hey, I am sure you like having their stuff shoved down your throat whether you like it or not.
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Forget it, enjoy what you have, I know I will. (All AMD hardware running without issue and places all my games quite well.)
 
ManofGod said:
Remind me to laugh my head off if Nvidia becomes a monopoly and you will pay their prices or nothing at all. :D Sorry but, NVidia brings their proprietary crap into the game devs camp that locks out the competition. So you do not like the truth, tough, deal with it. :D

I will not buy proprietary games and will invest my money into places that deserve it. Nvidia is not a place that deserves it but, hey, I am sure you like having their stuff shoved down your throat whether you like it or not.
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The guy who's always toking smoke from Microsoft's ass is now complaining about "proprietary crap"? Seriously?

If nvidia charges a million dollars for a video card I won't buy it. Because I have enough restraint and freedom to understand how exchanging money for goods works in my life. AMD will get my money when they show up. But they're not going to get a pity sale from me, that's for sure.
 
The entire point of DirectX is to "bring proprietary crap to game devs to lock out [OS] competition".

smh i give up
 
+1
I've done my best to support them.
Didnt get the same back.
 
schoolslave said:
Someone doesn't know how software/hardware abstractions work and what drivers are supposed to do...
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Indeed... :). I think everyone saw this coming, though, when articles like these showed large signs of issues with forthcoming games in near-finished or approaching finished states on those cards:

http://www.computerbase.de/2014-12/early-access-spiele-benchmarks-test/

I do hope for better competition in the GPU industry still, but it hasn't been looking any better of a prospect of happening as time goes on :(.
 
GoldenTiger said:
Indeed... :). I think everyone saw this coming, though, when articles like these showed large signs of issues with forthcoming games in near-finished or approaching finished states on those cards:

http://www.computerbase.de/2014-12/early-access-spiele-benchmarks-test/

I do hope for better competition in the GPU industry still, but it hasn't been looking any better of a prospect of happening as time goes on :(.
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Well, that is what happens when a game dev uses something that locks out another competitor. Such as the way things are I guess. However, I would not play a game from a dev that insults my intelligence like they have just now.
 
4saken said:
I have had Project Cars for almost 3 years now, as an original WMD contributor. Game runs amazing until weather affects hit on my AMD 290x, then its fucking page flipping slow. AMD best get their shit together. I don't blame the Project cars devs for this one bit.
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Why do you blame AMD for not being able to GPU accelerate nVidia's PhysX smoke & weather?

Why do you blame AMD for not being able to GPU accelerate nVidia's CPU-PhysX?

Why don't you blame the developers who knew fully from the start, by building their game around PhysX & GameWorks (look at all the NV logos ingame!), it would cripple AMD performance? They could have used Intel's Havok physics engine like other racing games. But no, they had to side with NV to cripple AMD performance.

Btw, this isn't some random stuff, it comes straight from their developers & engineers on their forum, THEY ADMIT now the problem on AMD is PhysX crushing CPU performance, something that doesn't happen on NV setup because when NV MADE PHYSX, they made it so CUDA compatible GPUs can accelerate some its features.
 
If any of you think so little of AMD, that their driver optimizations suck, find me non NV sponsored games where they run poorly in, where a weak GTX660 spanks a R290X.

You cannot find such crap because neutral developers are not that awful to go and deliberately cripple performance of one vendor.

Every NV sponsored game so far has launched with terrible performance on AMD. The reverse is not true, very few AMD sponsored games run poorly on NV, and the recent ones, BF4, BF Hardline, Alien Isolation, Civ BE, Dirt Rally, NV is as fast or faster. The results are undeniable, NV sponsorship cripples AMD performance. Unbiased gamers know it.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2430693
 
ManofGod said:
Well, that is what happens when a game dev uses something that locks out another competitor. Such as the way things are I guess. However, I would not play a game from a dev that insults my intelligence like they have just now.
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That's really besides the point. Nvidia actively supports their product, whether that is through sending engineers/techs to game devs/companies or through drivers that are actually stable and functional (usually ;)).

I think you are looking at too small of a picture here. Go to any large university, what GPUs are used to do grad research - Nvidia. Why? Because trying to get any support/information from AMD is like pulling teeth (I went to PSU, multiple professors complained about AMDs reluctance to provide acceptable customer support and/or dev aids). Nvidia on the other hand actually responds to phone calls/emails and even provides hardware kits for free or at greatly reduced prices. The truth is that AMD just cannot compete, even if they released a superior product, because their support infrastructure and ecosystem have been so reduced as to be almost non-existent (at least in the gaming and GPU-aided research segments).

AMD has a very robust GPU division, but the support is just crap. Unfortunately, I think this is mostly due misguided leadership at AMD and them not really knowing where to take the company (I think there are a few larger hardware/IT companies which are struggling with this).

And yes, Nvidia bought Physx, but at least they found a way to accelerate that using GPUs, pretty impressive tbh. What has AMD brought to the table? Mantle? You mean the poorly documented API where there is nobody who responds to emails/calls....once again the problem of AMD lacking the resources to staff such support. Without active support, developers usually do not adopt things due to the risk (wasting manhours trying to figure out how the API works, tweaking for efficiency, etc) is just not worth it when even the benefits of said API are not clear and there are no reps to help.
 
Bahanime said:
If any of you think so little of AMD, that their driver optimizations suck, find me non NV sponsored games where they run poorly in, where a weak GTX660 spanks a R290X.

You cannot find such crap because neutral developers are not that awful to go and deliberately cripple performance of one vendor.

Every NV sponsored game so far has launched with terrible performance on AMD. The reverse is not true, very few AMD sponsored games run poorly on NV, and the recent ones, BF4, BF Hardline, Alien Isolation, Civ BE, Dirt Rally, NV is as fast or faster. The results are undeniable, NV sponsorship cripples AMD performance. Unbiased gamers know it.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2430693
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No, the result is that Nvidia works with game developers to maximize performance on their platform using APIs/drivers that actually work, whereas AMD sends nobody except for a sparse documentation and expects the gamedevs to figure it out on their own. Hence why "Nvidia-sponsored" games have better performance on Nvidia hardware vs. "AMD-sponsored" games on AMD hardware.

I'm not saying AMD GPUs are bad, but honestly the company is bleeding money and just cannot compete in the support department with Nvidia.
 
jwcalla said:
I dunno, maybe they're just sitting around collecting paychecks? Or maybe it's a completely dysfunctional company that can't get anything done? One thing for sure is that in terms of the gaming experience they're not bringing as much to the table as nvidia is.

Or, to be less diplomatic, AMD is an all-around mediocre company at best. And no amount of trying to make us feel guilty for not supporting the poor wittle victim AMD is going to help their case.
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I could give two craps about AMD as a company, but I picked up a R9 295x2 as an upgrade for $625 last year, and its been kicking ass and taking names. Its my first watercooled card, but along with my 240mm 4790K, its so awesome having such ridiculous overall performance with low case temps and quiet operation.... and at, what, $400 less than NVidia fanbois are shelling out to match it? Sorry, but you may have green blood, but I can't afford to burn the green in my wallet like that. Your loss if religious devotion to a company is preventing you from enjoying all the good video cards the market has to offer. ;)

I also recommended a Vapor-X 290x to a buddy, and its an absolutely gorgeous well designed card too that's whisper quiet and delivering excellent performance and he told me he's been enjoying it as well. The 390x and 395x2 we can expect to come out soon, if priced right, is also likely to be another class leader that NVidia is going to have to struggle to keep pace with. Especially with DX12 becoming available, since we see some decent increases with mantel, NVidia splashing its logo over every game (hint hint paying for optimization) advantage is likely to disappear.

Likewise with DX12, the IMO currently inferior AMD processors are likely to see a big performance bump. But even right now just on DX11 you can build an attractive AMD gaming rig, knowing that you're likely to get a nice "turbo" boost in a few months thanks to all those cores.

For example, swing by Microcenter and pick up a FX8320e OC'ed @ 4.2Ghz + Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 for $180 and pair it with a 295x2 for $599 with a Korean AMH A399U for $599 and you should be good for 4K gaming on GTA 5 on a budget. And w/ DX12 if I understand correctly that processor should see significant performance increase thanks to its 8 real cores and the 295x2 will effectively double in memory capacity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNigQD5xkqw (as that shows, even well below 4K resolution, the CPU really doesn't matter much)

Most people buy an AMD product when they see good value in it, its that simple. All of the console manufacturers didn't "pitty purchase" AMD hardware, they did so because NVidia wasn't able to compete at the time. Project CARS, one game, has problems with its physx implementation which only runs well on NVidia hardware, and if that's your most important title in your library certainly that is a priority for you. If you're playing other games where even a single 290x on mantle beats even a GTX 980 like some titles do (which BTW costs almost as much as my 295x2), obviously you're going to lean the other direction.
 
schoolslave said:
No, the result is that Nvidia works with game developers to maximize performance on their platform using APIs/drivers that actually work, whereas AMD sends nobody except for a sparse documentation and expects the gamedevs to figure it out on their own. Hence why "Nvidia-sponsored" games have better performance on Nvidia hardware vs. "AMD-sponsored" games on AMD hardware.

I'm not saying AMD GPUs are bad, but honestly the company is bleeding money and just cannot compete in the support department with Nvidia.
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You didn't address the issue.

Neutral games = AMD performs fine, R290X is close to 980.

NV game = R290X is 25-50% behind 980. In Project Cars, the latest NV game to be released, a GTX660 is faster than R290X.

If AMD drivers are bad and they can't provide support, why is their performance great in NON NV SPONSORED? Really, try to find a neutral game where AMD is behind by that much, you cannot, it does not exist.

Can you even for a tiny bit, accept that NV sponsorship, whether it be via hardware, software engineers, or funds for marketing the game (NV game Ubisoft $2M to market Assassin's Creed for example).. that they do it with a string attached for the developers, to not optimize for AMD. Or is that beyond your ability to accept because you love NV so much you see no fallibility in their actions.
 
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