NVIDIA responde a las acusaciones de AMD sobre PhysX

Por lo menos a nosotros (aunque está claro que estas declaraciones están escritas para todos los medios, y probablemente desde hace algún día tras leer las declaraciones de AMD en Bit-tech), parece que desde NVIDIA alguien nos lee, ya que hemos recibido rápidamente un correo con el siguiente comentario acerca de dichas declaraciones de AMD y que publicamos tal cual en inglés. Esto lo dice Nadeem Mohammed, el manager de la división de PhysX:

Recently, an interview ran with an AMD developer relations manager, who claimed that NVIDIA (after acquiring Ageia) had purposely reduced the performance and scalability of NVIDIA PhysX technology, with regards to CPU core utilization.

I have been a member of the PhysX team, first with AEGIA, and then with NVIDIA, and I can honestly say that since the merger with NVIDIA there have been no changes to the SDK code which purposely reduces the software performance of PhysX or its use of CPU multi-cores.

Our PhysX SDK API is designed such that thread control is done explicitly by the application developer, not by the SDK functions themselves. One of the best examples is 3DMarkVantage which can use 12 threads while running in software-only PhysX. This can easily be tested by anyone with a multi-core CPU system and a PhysX-capable GeForce GPU. This level of multi-core support and programming methodology has not changed since day one. And to anticipate another ridiculous claim, it would be nonsense to say we “tuned” PhysX multi-core support for this case.

PhysX is a cross platform solution. Our SDKs and tools are available for the Wii, PS3, Xbox 360, the PC and even the iPhone through one of our partners. We continue to invest substantial resources into improving PhysX support on ALL platforms--not just for those supporting GPU acceleration.

As is par for the course, this is yet another completely unsubstantiated accusation made by an employee of one of our competitors. I am writing here to address it directly and call it for what it is, completely false. NVIDIA PhysX fully supports multi-core CPUs and multithreaded applications, period. Our developer tools allow developers to design their use of PhysX in PC games to take full advantage of multi-core CPUs and to fully use the multithreaded capabilities.

There is lot more I say on this topic; however, I really have to get back to my day job, which is working to help make gaming great for all users! And today that includes cracking open a new copy of Dark Void, the latest PhysX title, which incorporates some awesome particle weapon effects, an insane Disintegrator gun with fluid particles and jetpack with physical smoke turbulence. I know, hard work, right? But someone has to do it!

Happy 3D gaming!

Nadeem Mohammed
Director of Product Management, PhysX

En términos generales, Nadeem Mohammed dice que estuvo con PhysX desde antes de la adquisición de NVIDIA y que desde que NVIDIA compró AGEIA no se han realizado cambios en el código del SDK con el propósito de reducir el rendimiento de PhysX por software o el uso de las capacidades multihilo.

Cita que es el programador quien se encarga de aplicar la API y pone el ejemplo de 3DMark Vantage, donde vemos como en el test PhysX aparece una puerta más por cada núcleo que tengamos, hasta 12, así que, si se quiere, se aprovecha el multihilo. También comenta que siguen desarrollando la API para todas las plataformas y que hay SDK para las consolas e incluso para iPhone.