AMD Offers Mantle For OpenGL-Next, Pushes Mantle To Workstations

[schmidtbag]

nah, i could argue something else. gameworks IS cuda based, so cuda somehow can't simply die off as you state. still, nvidia stated they use best tech for the problem in every part of Xworks. hairworks for example uses DirectCompute (not cuda) which is exactly the same thing amd uses in tressfx and can as such work on any amd card

i could also argue about something else "Mantle is a proof of concept". REALLY? show me one statement where they said anything remote to that. i can show you zillion claims how they can compete with dx/gl or how dx is no competition since it will only work with last windows

i could also argue about "AMD doesn't have the resources to port mantle to linux right now". there are 2 possibilities here
- give out specs... ahhh, right... not even intel can get those. they are so open
- if company like amd can't afford few developers for that, maybe it is better to sign up for bankrupcy, or don't they have resources to pull money for filling papers?

Huh? I never said CUDA was going to die. CUDA is going to live on for a while - it's doing pretty good right now in the server world. I'm not even saying Mantle is going to die, but what I am saying it it could die and it wouldn't be a problem - just an inconvenience to EA and AMD, as they invested the most time into it.

AMD never said Mantle is a proof of concept, I'm saying that. AMD has a problem with poor CPU performance. The way I see it, they create an API that enhances the performance of the weakest aspect of their hardware and suddenly their products look much better. Since the main premise of Mantle is to decrease processor overhead, Intel, Nvidia, MS, and Khronos have nothing to lose by investing their time into implementing the same idea into DX, openGL, or whatever. That being said, AMD no longer has a reason to continue working on it anymore. They were probably well aware that if their plans came to fruition (which it did), DX and OGL were going to phase out Mantle since they are far more "established". If AMD just simply said "BTW I've got an idea that could improve the overall performance of games" nobody would listen to them, so they had to actually make something to prove that they have an effective idea. If I'm wrong about this, then AMD would not be willing to give away so much information to the development of openGL. I'm sure AMD is working directly with MS too.

AMD really doesn't have the resources to maintain Mantle, especially outside of Windows. Their drivers have always been bad even on Windows and I'm sure they're well aware of it. You don't seem to have a good grasp of how a business is run - you don't just give away information that you worked toward, not without a price and especially not toward a company that makes more money in profit than yours does in net income. AMD doesn't need to file for bankruptcy but they would if they hired the amount of developers it would take to get them ahead. The development of Mantle was crucial to the success of AMD's processors, because GPU overhead could be the one thing that makes AMD not an ideal gaming platform.

[justmy2cents]

Huh? I never said CUDA was going to die. CUDA is going to live on for a while - it's doing pretty good right now in the server world. I'm not even saying Mantle is going to die, but what I am saying it it could die and it wouldn't be a problem - just an inconvenience to EA and AMD, as they invested the most time into it.

so, they can't afford few developers (you say that in 3rd paragraph), but at the same time can pi$$ away thousands and thousands of man hours?

AMD never said Mantle is a proof of concept, I'm saying that.

so, let me see. you're amd spokesperson?

AMD has a problem with poor CPU performance. The way I see it, they create an API that enhances the performance of the weakest aspect of their hardware and suddenly their products look much better. Since the main premise of Mantle is to decrease processor overhead, Intel, Nvidia, MS, and Khronos have nothing to lose by investing their time into implementing the same idea into DX, openGL, or whatever. That being said, AMD no longer has a reason to continue working on it anymore. They were probably well aware that if their plans came to fruition (which it did), DX and OGL were going to phase out Mantle since they are far more "established". If AMD just simply said "BTW I've got an idea that could improve the overall performance of games" nobody would listen to them, so they had to actually make something to prove that they have an effective idea. If I'm wrong about this, then AMD would not be willing to give away so much information to the development of openGL. I'm sure AMD is working directly with MS too.

actually, if you read mantle info like i did, story is different. amd actually acknowledged they make shitty drivers. at that point i actually gained respect for it. whole point of mantle was making less complex and at the same time more effective methods where developer not only has more and faster access, but at the same time driver is much less error prone. great idea, i admit. the cpu being weak link is not amd specific thing, it is just a matter of evolution where cpu simply can't handle data to pass it to gpu fast enough, no matter if gpu in question is amd or nvidia. and exact quote you say amd couldn't simpy say, they said it at start before they started swinging left and right

i lost my respect on mantle when i saw how they are handling ?Open? word. mantle is as open as locked safe inside another locked safe, behind bullet proof doors and hell, let's put the building into a cage too. ooohhh, and we only let in white people who are 178.2cm tall and weigh 75.3kg

You don't seem to have a good grasp of how a business is run - you don't just give away information that you worked toward, not without a price and especially not toward a company that makes more money in profit than yours does in net income.

you just don't give away information? #.#' remember... it is ?Open? API by their own words. shouldn't they publish it if it is open? when you say open it shouldn't matter who asks for it. i wouldn't mind the least if they'd been honest like NVidia and close the fscking thing instead of lying about ?Open?. as i said i liked mantle on first presentations and at that time no Open was mentioned

also, if they gave info out since it is open, shouldn't that spare them money which you say they lack ?

AMD doesn't need to file for bankruptcy but they would if they hired the amount of developers it would take to get them ahead.

so, it's either bankrupcy or crappy drivers? lol, which differs from what i said... how?

The development of Mantle was crucial to the success of AMD's processors, because GPU overhead could be the one thing that makes AMD not an ideal gaming platform.

so... it is crucial for their success and yet two paragraphs up you claim "it wouldn't be a problem - just an inconvenience to EA and AMD"? #.#'

[Sdar]

Will be Cross platform, very important for us.

[blackiwid]

Wow, yes u can debate over the details of mantle and cuda and so on.

But to argue about which is more free or more open company/solution is out of the question.

The argument that nouvou dont need a microcode is maybe true, but to do what, basic 3d operation poor fan control and clock control etc.

The point is nvidia as company does nothing or nearly nothing to help that happening, so what do u want to send a message, please gpu vendor dont pay some linux developers and give no specs free then we will support u best?

Omg, and having a free microcode even RMS dont see that as a problem in general he sees microcode as hardware, and it seems thats a valid point, u cant hide nsa backdoors in it, u cant put survalence code into it that uses than the linux driver to send this information to amd right?

So the only critical part about amds microcode firmware is not that its not open, its that its not fix, so driver developers cant target it as a fixed hardware.

And I think the other firmware are more a sideeffect because they had to reverseengineer so much that maybe some stuff was easier to reverseengineer in the firmware than on the driver level or at least they had to play around with that bits so long that they learned how it works more.

IF firmware replacement would be a priority for any amd driver developer it should be possible for them to replace that too.

But from a technical standpoint it makes most likely no sense to replace that, the only reason would be consernence over antifeatures, and in reality that should not happen.

you could always load older versions of that firmware as far as I understand it, so they cant make regressions as example when they want to sell newer hardware.

The only fear I would have is when they had a mechanism like Microsoft xbox 360 has, that they can burn a transistor or something with a update so that u dont can downgrade your firmware anymore.

But even then u would loose some small functionality maybe thats the worst that could happen, as long as nsa doest spy on me or something similiar I have no big problems with it.

So if you dont care about freedom go ahead buy nvidia cards, but dont argue that u should buy nvidia cards if you want opensource or free drivers.

BTW this updateable firmwares proved some advantages in the past, because of a update they could implement vdpau without violating some intellectual proprietary of a 3rd company under linux, at least I understood it that way.

[blackiwid]

When we all have at least Coreboot on all our machines if not the gnu freeer version and use all the gnu linux version, we can talk about if amd firmwares are the devil.

[justmy2cents]

But to argue about which is more free or more open company/solution is out of the question.

when was who is more open in question? never. NVidia is closed source, makes good drivers, period. amd has opened documentation and provides developers to work on OSS drivers, which are awesome unlike catalyst which is catastrophe. i'm all for giving the amd some glory on oss work (hell, i love them for that), but don't also praise projects which are just as closed as NVidia and bash them while praising equally closed amd counterparts

arguing was actually not about which company is more open. quite contrary, it was about which named amd parts are not open and were praised here like second coming of openess here. tressfx being one of those, mantle the second.

Will be Cross platform, very important for us.

and they changed the tune how many times since then? will be cross platform, won't be, will make opengl extensions, won't make those, will be, won't be... where are we now? o lost my count, they are swinging left and right daily

[blackiwid]

when was who is more open in question? never.

There:

AMDs open source drivers still require closed source microcode and firmware...If you want to be truly open you have to use an older NVIDIA card with nouveau.

arguing was actually not about which company is more open. quite contrary, it was about which named amd parts are not open and were praised here like second coming of openess here. tressfx being one of those, mantle the second.

hmm tressfx I dont konw much about maybe u are right there, I think they paid a big price for that, either nearly no game use it or at least nobody markets with that feature. Maybe I use to much adblock or soemthing but I nearly never seen any ads or something about that feature.
But again u maybe have here a valid point.

On mantle I see it different, they opened up their stuff for khronos and tell them that they are happy if they use as much as possible of mantle and will not sue them for doing so. So they did not open up for everybody directly but indirectly they did.

But of course its no big open thing yet, thats true, I think we praise em for showing how much microsoft and directx sucks. Thats good for linux too in some way, and it helps the other apis or pressures their makers to make it something good.

But we will see it in the future, its not clear if it will become open, or not, on physx we know its proprietary forever and will be forever.

But that was not my major point. mostly I was pissed about that statement that u should buy nvidia hardware if you want more freedom or a more free driver or something like that.

[justmy2cents]

There:

you should respond to blackout then. i never even remotely claimed anything like that.
in my book, everything is simple
- NVidia makes awesome blob, provides near 0 to community. making it best performing driver for gaming or if you need modern gl (and don't mind blob)
- AMD makes terrible blob. provides quite a lot to OSS drivers. oss being perfect for desktop and they work really well here
- intel makes great gpu with least resources for servers

do I like blob? no, but in few cases i need 4.4gl and NVidia is the only thing that works. as soon as 1st FOSS driver with support for that shows i'm buying that card no matter the cost as long as it will have somewhere around GTX750 performance. open source drivers are simply much easier to maintain. any machine that does not need 4.4 is amd here and every server is intel

do I hate closed source? no. i'd need to hate 90% of my friends then. it's just matter of business model and belief what is best for them, all i can do is respect them for standing behind their belief. but, that also spells i won't ever use their works unless i have no choice, since my belief is equally valid as theirs

hmm tressfx I dont konw much about maybe u are right there, I think they paid a big price for that, either nearly no game use it or at least nobody markets with that feature. Maybe I use to much adblock or soemthing but I nearly never seen any ads or something about that feature.
But again u maybe have here a valid point.

On mantle I see it different, they opened up their stuff for khronos and tell them that they are happy if they use as much as possible of mantle and will not sue them for doing so. So they did not open up for everybody directly but indirectly they did.

But of course its no big open thing yet, thats true, I think we praise em for showing how much microsoft and directx sucks. Thats good for linux too in some way, and it helps the other apis or pressures their makers to make it something good.

But we will see it in the future, its not clear if it will become open, or not, on physx we know its proprietary forever and will be forever.

no shit, and 1+1=2
they only did that in order to retain as much R&D and GCN compatibility as possible. opengl next is more or less last nail in the mantle coffin and amd knows that. they are just trying to salvage as much as possible here. it was completely closed until this last nail

and i don't doubt physx will be proprietary in future, i have no delusions about that

But that was not my major point. mostly I was pissed about that statement that u should buy nvidia hardware if you want more freedom or a more free driver or something like that.

again, i was never claiming that. my claims went on some amd closed solutions being praised while bashing nvidia for equally closed counterparts (actually, nvidia is less closed on those as they at least support multiplatform. you could say instead locking it behind 5 doors with racial preference like amd, they only locked it behind 3)

[schmidtbag]

so, they can't afford few developers (you say that in 3rd paragraph), but at the same time can pi$$ away thousands and thousands of man hours?

On what, exactly?

so, let me see. you're amd spokesperson?

No... then I would be saying "I am speaking on behalf of AMD". What I'm saying is my speculation, if I somehow haven't made that clear enough already.

actually, if you read mantle info like i did, story is different...

I'm not seeing your point. But supposing I did, everyone here knows to take what AMD says with a grain of salt. I like them and I my main rig is an all-AMD system, but if what they show isn't REAL data, I never take anything they say seriously anymore. Their description of Mantle's abilities and features were blown out of proportion.

i lost my respect on mantle when i saw how they are handling ?Open? word. mantle is as open as locked safe inside another locked safe, behind bullet proof doors and hell, let's put the building into a cage too. ooohhh, and we only let in white people who are 178.2cm tall and weigh 75.3kg

If the code is being used to contribute toward open source projects, why do you care? Not only would you not do anything about it but if OpenGL is allowed to take from it, what difference does it make in the end? At that point, all the important code anyone would care about has been extracted and open-sourced.

so, it's either bankrupcy or crappy drivers? lol, which differs from what i said... how?

AMD/ATI has been surviving pretty long with crappy drivers without going bankrupt. That should be enough of an answer to your question.

so... it is crucial for their success and yet two paragraphs up you claim "it wouldn't be a problem - just an inconvenience to EA and AMD"? #.#'

Well when you dismiss my opinion then sure, this makes no sense. All I'm saying is Mantle was designed to act as a proof of concept and their investment in it ensured other APIs would follow their lead. You can't be convincing without a functional prototype; Mantle, to me, is just a prototype that has the potential to remain permanent. But if it doesn't, it won't be missed.

[log0]

...
and they changed the tune how many times since then? will be cross platform, won't be, will make opengl extensions, won't make those, will be, won't be... where are we now? o lost my count, they are swinging left and right daily

So how often did they change their tune exactly? Do you have anything to back it up? Any AMD statements you can link to?