Outerra forum
Outerra Engine => Technology => Topic started by: Denime on June 27, 2013, 08:08:15 am
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Hi chaps! I'm considering buying a new graphics card soon and I was wondering if it would be useful to use my old one as a dedicated card to run PhysX on it.
I've already searched the forums and I found this thread:
http://www.outerra.com/forum/index.php?topic=239.0 (http://www.outerra.com/forum/index.php?topic=239.0)
But it didn't quite answer my question.
If I use a PhysX dedicated card, will the Outerra engine recognise it and use it for physics processing?
Cheers!
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No, OT will not use it for physics processing currently. OT uses Bullet physics, and even though Bullet can utilize the GPU too, we are currently not using that functionality. There's actually little physics processing at the moment and it wouldn't be any gain, but in the future it will likely change.
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since outerra wants to support as many pc configurations as possible, a solution that doesn't benefit a specific vendor seems to be the better approach ;)
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Thanks for the quick reply, Cameni. Are you planning to implement PhysX or are you sticking with Bullet?
Chaoz, I understand that but I was just curious if there was an off/on button for utilising PhysX with a dedicated PhysX card.
The reason I ask this is because I get a significant drop in frames per second when I make a crater and particles of dirt go everywhere.
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Well that has nothing to do with the Bullet physics at all, those particles run on the GPU already. If they are a performance problem, then it's a problem of your current GPU.
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That's why I asked the question. It would have been useful to make use of a secondary GPU rather than to leave it to gather dust.
Thanks for answering my question though!
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Having two graphics cards in at once are likely to cause more problems than anything. Graphics cards are power hungry, and depending on the type your old one might even consume more power than the new. If your power supply isn't designed to handle it you could have some problems on your hands, and could potentially even cause damage. When I first built my pc at microcenter I got too small of a power supply for the radeon 6970 (requires a 550 minimum, the pc-building "expert" at the store sold me a 520w high current gamer) Right off the bat, the fans on the card were at full blast like a lawnmower and the computer crashed every hour or so. So i ended up returning everything and getting better stuff. Lesson - dont trust those "experts" at computer stores, best buy, home depot, etc. In my experience they usually don't know diddly.
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I completely agree, that's why I always build my own systems and have been doing so for 8 years ;)
I appreciate the advice, but I was just wondering if Outerra supported Physx. My new card runs the game very smoothly, so I don't even need an extra card anyway.
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Good stuff :)
Yea, I last built my own PC in 2001 and lost interest in gaming 'til recently when I built my current system and BOY does technology change rapidly. Felt like I knew nothing going back into it. So many different choices and fancy new gimicky technologies that make no difference half the time.
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Haha, yeah you said it! Having a PhysX card is apparently one of these gimicky technoligies! Very happy I didn't buy a new PSU so I could run it. It would have been a waste of money.