Difference between PS2.0 cards and PS3.0 with HDR?

[PvtRyan]

I have a 9800 pro (PS2.0) and never really expected to be able to run Lost Coast and DoD:Source with HDR on. But I can (highest settings), and it looks damn pretty. However, before they came out, I was told 9800 pro's and below wouldn't have the full glory of HDR, and it would be a glorified bloom effect. And you needed a PS3.0 card to experience it in full glory, but from the looks of it, that's not the case. So is there actually a difference in HDR quality between a PS2.0 card (9800 pro) and a PS3.0 card (newest Nvidia's)?

 

[Beerdude26]

I doubt it. I don't think they added in 3.0 shaders just to make nVidia users happy. I may be wrong, though

 

[WhiteZero]

Even the slightly older nVidia cards (6 series) had PS 3.0, along with the newer ATi cards.

 

[melat0nin]

I believe the HDR in Source is created using Pixel Shader 2.0, therefore any PS2.0 card will show it perfectly (framerate being a separate issue). Far Cry's HDR, for instance, is PS3.0 therefore you need a PS3.0 card to see it. That might have been what you referred to. Whether developers will stay with 2.0 for HDR in new games is debatable. Hopefully Valve/Source will, cos I wonder if PS3 can create better looking, better performing HDR (considering how pretty Lost Coast is with PS2.0 HDR).

I might be wrong but that's the gen as I understand it.

 

[Cole]

Valve had to redo there HDR 3 different times to get it working smoothly on low end video cards but it did sacerfice some quality in HDR, nothing that horrible though.
The difference betwen PS 2 and PS 3 is vast. The insturction sizes and much MUCH MUCH higher in 3.0. The difference between 2.0b and 3.0 is minimal but still enough to put some developers(specifically the ones with Nvidia) no support for 2.0b.

Anyway don't expect other games to give support for 2.0 HDR. Only Source games will feature that really.

 

[Asus]

At the bottom of this page is a screen shot of PS3.0 vs PS2.0b in Lost Coast. It also works with regular PS2.0 cards.
Farcry uses Nvidia's version for their HDR (OpenEXR). They were the early adopters. It does not currently work on ATI PS3.0 cards since it's using Nvidia's OpenEXR.
Splinter Cell:Chaos Theory's HDR works with PS3.0 and PS2.0 (regular) but looks a little different. ATI's new PS3.0 cards work just like Nvidia's PS3.0 cards though in this game. No OpenEXR use.

Nvidia cards cannot do AA while HDR is on. ATI's high end cards can.

I agree, in the future I wouldn't expect too much support for PS2.0 with the HDR. Some may but some won't. It takes extra time to program backwards compatible gfx modes. Example, Splinter Cell:Chaos Theory shipped with a PS3.0 and PS1.1 mode. They later patched it to let PS2.0 cards show their stuff.

HDR is the only kind of shader that has come out so far which may need more pixel shader instructions than PS2.0 can deliver. UT2007 will probably change that though. :O

 

[Cypher19]

HDR is the only kind of shader that has come out so far which may need more pixel shader instructions than PS2.0 can deliver. UT2007 will probably change that though.

Actually, with some shadow mapping work I've done on my own, PS2.0 wasn't up to snuff, so I've had to use PS2.b (X000 series cards and up). And that's with the shadow maps being seperated completely from the lighting (it wasn't a very optimized demo, and it was seperate mainly because I was working on one other feature that I eventually abandoned), whereas the final version of my renderer I intend to have up to 8 fully shadowed lights all done in one pass.

Nvidia cards cannot do AA while HDR is on. ATI's high end cards can.

Not natively on the hardware, but I've come with up a trick that will allow for (kind of) hardware AA with HDR on even PS2.0 cards. Needs just a little bit more tweaking, but it's basically done.

 

[Przemek]

The Source engine does not use PS3.0 to do HDR. It's all PS2.0 instructions, so there's no visual difference between the HDR quality on a Radeon 9550 and a Radeon X1800 or GeForce 7800GTX... only the speed changes

I have R9800Pro too and I also was delighted to be able to play Lost Coast on highest settings Valve knows how to optimize their code :>

 

[Unfocused]

How is Far Cry using PS 3.0 if it was released way before PS 3.0 cards were introduced? What am I missing?

 

[Beerdude26]

How is Far Cry using PS 3.0 if it was released way before PS 3.0 cards were introduced? What am I missing?

Updates lol

 

[Asus]

How is Far Cry using PS 3.0 if it was released way before PS 3.0 cards were introduced? What am I missing?

It was patched.
PS1.1 for whats on the CD but they patched it twice and put PS2.0b, PS3.0 and HDR in there.

The Source engine does not use PS3.0 to do HDR.

Well they said internally they render differently so I assume it would be similar to Farcry's 1.2 patch where it was 2.0b and 3.0 just without a visual difference. So they don't use any time-saving techniques through 3.0? I probably should have just labeled it 7800 vs x850.

Actually, with some shadow mapping work I've done on my own, PS2.0 wasn't up to snuff, so I've had to use PS2.b (X000 series cards and up).

Yeah I ment ps2.0b. I knew with some games programers have said they could make more complex shaders than PS2.0's spec although PS2.0b gave a lot more room to work with for now.

Not natively on the hardware, but I've come with up a trick that will allow for (kind of) hardware AA with HDR on even PS2.0 cards. Needs just a little bit more tweaking, but it's basically done.

Cool. That will be nice. Some people can't live without AA.

 

[Cypher19]

Oh, and I forgot one thing. An IQ difference may come into play when translucent objects are involved. I know on my X800Pro that when underneath the water in Lost Coast the sky looks like crap because of the forced LDR, but I assume that proper HDR blending would make it look a lot better. Can anyone do a screen comparison of an underwater shot?

 

[JellyWorld]

Nvidia cards cannot do AA while HDR is on.

So that's how I got a playable rate in Lost Coast with HDR on and AA maxed.

 

[Cole]

So that's how I got a playable rate in Lost Coast with HDR on and AA maxed.

Thats a Source thing and how it does HDR, but Nvidia Cards cannot normally do AA with HDR.