CPU power vs programming...

[m25]

Just taking a look @ 2000's and today's games one doesen't notice that increase in detail or overall performance that transition from a P3 700MHz to P4 3.0 GHz should give. I used to play Porsche Unleashed 2000 on a P2 400 but you can't dream of doing the same with NFS2 undergroung though there's not much added.
AutoCAD2004 reccomends 128 MB of RAM; it ramps to 512 for the 2005 and 1GB for the 2006. HOLY SH*T, 8X the RAM while there can be no more than 2% of difference between '04 and '06. Once programmers used to do a lot of optimisations to increase performance on less powerful CPUs but now, with powerful platforms, they just don't and it's not surprising how fast they (and we all) hit the ceiling of the newest technology.

 

[Pain]

I don't know if you've used ACAD, but even if the recommended memory for 2004 is 128M (I don't know what the recommended is) that amount of memory would be much too painful to use in any capacity other than viewing drawings, as example. Heck, 128M is too painful for just the OS alone, let alone for using any demanding application.

I also am not sure how you're coming up with only a 2% difference in options between 04 and 06 but I have to assume it higher. From what I've seen just by looking at the menus (I don't use autocad, but I support it) makes me think it's higher than 2 percent.

 

[mcgruff]

Programming is hard even for quite bright people. That means creating software is expensive. You've got a lot of highly-skilled man-hours to pay for. The extra effort and cost of producing highly-optimised code makes no sense financially if cheap, powerful hardware is readily available.

Really the challenge for a programmer is not to write code for a machine to read: it's to write code which people can read. Easy to maintain code will be less expensive and that's where the main effort goes. It may not be perfectly optimised but it doesn't need to be. It just has to be good enough.

 

[windego]

I'll answer the question about memory usage first. Ok, as you probably know programs typically get more and more bloated each new revision, i.e additional features/eye candy, this in turn adds to both the memory footprint of the binary when loaded and the number cycles it uses to display eye candy widgets.

Generally the new features require more internal data storage to represent the canvas state/objects (graphical). This all adds to memory bloat, just look at vista.

Next, taking advantage of newer processors. Well from what you saying this isn't really a processor bottleneck, it's more down to the graphics card(s) used and the people designing the textures.

I don't personally think software is falling behind hardware overall, however there is always a period of catchup to be expected.

In the context of multiple cores, it's not a simple task programatically to add multithreading. Often program structure has to be rewritten from scratch to create a viable framework. Even when working on new programs, multithreading is difficult to implement efficiently.

You have to deal with alot of issues in a multithreading environment.
(1) Synchronized global resource access (which can be challenging at the best of times).
(2) Re-entrant and non-Re-entrant functions. (Do these functions modify global state/data ?)
(3) Managing thread state (waits/resumes/termination)
(4) Thread communication (event objects[win32]/pipes?)
(5) Unforseen deadlocks/race conditions (these are nasty to debug)

Existing games will never take full advantage of multiple cores unless they are re-designed from scratch. I don't blame companies who choose not to use multithreading, it can add alot of extra development/testing time to a project, and often adds additional bugs to release versions.

 

[m25]

I don't know if you've used ACAD, but even if the recommended memory for 2004 is 128M (I don't know what the recommended is) that amount of memory would be much too painful to use in any capacity other than viewing drawings, as example. Heck, 128M is too painful for just the OS alone, let alone for using any demanding application.

I also am not sure how you're coming up with only a 2% difference in options between 04 and 06 but I have to assume it higher. From what I've seen just by looking at the menus (I don't use autocad, but I support it) makes me think it's higher than 2 percent.

Well, I use it and as for the menus they only look better but have nothing new to bring and many architects/engineers I know think the same; 2006 only takes longet to boot and mekar your graphics heavier. In everyday (2D use), the difference is less than 2%.
While you can work fine with 2004 on a 500MHz machine, 2006 doesn't even install there.
One more thing I have noticed about it; it's 2006 and they still haven't put a stupid option to draw the quote (height) sing. You still have to waste time n to draw it or import it when you're doing a cutoff. No man, I'think programming is becoming less intelligent everyday/

 

[yakyb]

i think the point he is trying to make is that once upon a time programs had to be scrutinised down to the nth degree in order that they can run on a 486 running windows 3.1 however nowadays even tho we all have 2Ghz plus cpus and roughly 1gb ram installed things do not seem quicker.
but i beleive the problem is with overheads. take for example windows xp the first thing i do after a clean install is turn off everything that makes it look nicer (read themes) i also turn off any unwanted services. now translate this to autocad (note i do not know auto cad that well im a pro engineer man myself) im sure that there are little things that are running in the background to make things (apparently) a little easier. now i personally prefer quick response times over things being slighly done for me. now using office as an example it still takes me 10 or so seconds to load up the application why is this you ask? hard drives. whilst cpu's are infinately more powerful than in the times of good old 3.1 hard drives whilst faster still take an age seek and to transfer data note i run office off a raid 0 array so speed is partially increased. an idea i liked but would never risk trying (both for price and stability) is the pci based ram hard drive that was brought out about a year ago and reviewed here at thg (cant remember the manufacturer). i did play around with ramdisk for a while but for some reason it was limited to 32MB so could only really run doom off it and the fact that it wiped on a restart really p***** me off, but hey there is nothing that can be done about that.

Any way ive gone off on a tangent; going back to office that F****G clippy thing is the bane off all things quick, designed to make things easier by asking him a question in his pop up window he only really served to slow things down for those of us who know what we are doing. Clippy is the representation of all things bad about microsoft (not saying that MS is bad infact i like windows but some things do annoy me).

Now looking forward to Vista i have mixed emotions
1.) with integrated DirectX 10 will this really speed up daily use of the system or just serve to make things look pretty/easier to use?
2.) will the clock panel and everything associated with it (not sure if that is still gonna be included forgive my ignorance) only serve to increase cpu usage?
3.) how will the new file system serve to speed things up?
4.) will the new file system even be included? ( last i heard was no!)

personnally i would still run everything off DOS if it allowed 5.1 surround sound 32bit colours resolutions of 1280x1024 and graphics acceleration that allowed me to play far cry just like i do now (only without windows overheads)

however it is these very overheads that allow us to connect to the internet network with mates and watch them die in high res glory. so can we expect programmers to show us that are cpus are alot faster than they once were my answer is they already are but not fully in the way that every one would like. yes they could tidy things up a little but by making programs do things that you wouldnt necessarly notice, auto spell check in word is a good example you know the little read line that appears under your lettering when youve misspelled something, that was not there in 3.1 nor do i think it was there in 95 but when processors became able to cope with the extra load they thru it in for us (thanks by the way Bill).


anyway hope you enjoyed my little rant this pissed me off for a while to until i started thinking bout it. what could be the solution is that with all the different variations of software out there nowadays is to release non pleb versions Windows Vista Non pleb version would be great its symbol being clippy on a noose :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:
lol

 

[windego]

Most of it's down to windows and it's gui eye candy mentality (led by M$ of course). Adds more and more bloat. Just look at the number of windows services running on a default install M$ tried to hide this obscene number by using wrapper processes called services.exe and svchost.exe.

Try installing gentoo linux with X and fluxbox. Base memory usage is about 30/40mb

 

[windego]

Now looking forward to Vista i have mixed emotions
1.) with integrated DirectX 10 will this really speed up daily use of the system or just serve to make things look pretty/easier to use?
2.) will the clock panel and everything associated with it (not sure if that is still gonna be included forgive my ignorance) only serve to increase cpu usage?
3.) how will the new file system serve to speed things up?
4.) will the new file system even be included? ( last i heard was no!)

(1) The directx 10 spec only defines the behaviour of graphics drivers in respect of windows, not the implementation, ergo, graphic card hardware will not likely be changed because of it.

The only thing that will change is the windows vista software driver. M$ want you to think that graphic cards are specifically designed for windows so they can have more control over users and the industry, but the fact is, graphic cards are designed to work independent of OS. It's only the OS specific driver that changes, and thats exactly what will change in vista, not the hardware.

I wouldn't expect to see much in the way of performance increases. If anything you will probably see a decrease because of the extra abstraction layers.

(2) Haven't got a clue (mostly linux user )
(3) There is no new file system. It was shelved due to project time constraints. Even if they had implemented it, it would probably be slower because (acording to speculation) it had to store more information about how files are related, which obviously requires more processing at the basic level.
(4) No. The only thing you get in vista is a bloated 3D GUI, which requires a high end graphics card just to run. That means integrated chipsets will not work well.

 

[m25]

Ok, software require more memory as they are updated but 8X the memory in 2 years is a little scary. My word processor starts slower than my 3D software just pecause it loads al the possible libraries on startup; I bet they could come up with something more elegant.

 

[windego]

Ok, software require more memory as they are updated but 8X the memory in 2 years is a little scary. My word processor starts slower than my 3D software just pecause it loads al the possible libraries on startup; I bet they could come up with something more elegant.

Personally, i use GNU Nano as a basic editor, and openoffice for more fancy writing. I agree that generally office software is bloated and loads slow, even some of the open source stuff.

As soon as you eliminate the gui, you eliminate alot of the bloat. Try a ncurses based editor like nano, it's lightning fast

 

[Guest]

My most beloved example is that of the playstation; They managed to squeeze every last drop out of it in the end. Imagine what you could do with a modern puter...

 

[Pain]

I'm still not sure where you're getting 8x. I looked at the recommended requirements for CAD, it's 256 for 2004 and 512 for 2006. I think both numbers are low and should be a gig for both, 2G's on XP, because as soon as you try to open a drawing of any decent size it's going to slow down. But, minimum requirements accounting for ones threshold for pain I can see at half a gig.

I also question working fine on 500Mhz with 04. I don't know anyone who would want to struggle with that, and I haven't installed anything higher than 2000 on anything less than 1G, simply because the cost of man hours to use it is simply not justified.

This is probably all beside the point, but I guess I'm just not understanding the rant.

 

[windego]

My most beloved example is that of the playstation; They managed to squeeze every last drop out of it in the end. Imagine what you could do with a modern puter...

Your imagination is realised in the form of GNU/Linux

 

[Guest]

My most beloved example is that of the playstation; They managed to squeeze every last drop out of it in the end. Imagine what you could do with a modern puter...

Your imagination is realised in the form of GNU/Linux

I wish I could play games on a Linux system; This is the only thing that holds me back from deleting windoze...

 

[windego]

I wish I could play games on a Linux system; This is the only thing that holds me back from deleting windoze...

You can play some games on it. Doom3, Quake 3/4, Enemy-territory. But i have to agree, games are the only thing that keeps me running a dual boot with windows.

 

[the_guru]

It's all about the money.

It takes longer time to program optimized code and to use low level programming languages. More workhours means a higher cost to develop an application.

Meanwhile the hardware manufacturers want to make money so this is just a cartel between the hardware and software industry.

 

[gman01]

I had a 1mhz commodore 64 in the early 80's.... The 3d shoot'um games on it got pretty amazing.... Because they ony had a 1mhz cpu to deal with, they learned how to be good programers.... Now anyone today can call themseves a programer, but really know nothing about programing for speed, and efficiency....

Imagine if those same programers had the 5ghz(like) CPU's and outragous GPU's we have today.... Kinda like when the games DOOM came out for pc's - It could do what it did because of great programing....

 

[gman01]

My most beloved example is that of the playstation; They managed to squeeze every last drop out of it in the end. Imagine what you could do with a modern puter...

Your imagination is realised in the form of GNU/Linux

I wish I could play games on a Linux system; This is the only thing that holds me back from deleting windoze...

Well all the PS3 games are written with Linux, so when those games are available you may be able to delete windoze - As I have....

 

[m25]

I'm still not sure where you're getting 8x. I looked at the recommended requirements for CAD, it's 256 for 2004 and 512 for 2006. I think both numbers are low and should be a gig for both, 2G's on XP, because as soon as you try to open a drawing of any decent size it's going to slow down. But, minimum requirements accounting for ones threshold for pain I can see at half a gig.

I also question working fine on 500Mhz with 04. I don't know anyone who would want to struggle with that, and I haven't installed anything higher than 2000 on anything less than 1G, simply because the cost of man hours to use it is simply not justified.

This is probably all beside the point, but I guess I'm just not understanding the rant.

I remember 1G for 2006 but who cares, I told you before; they practically eat your RAM and haven't provided for a "Quotes" option in their "Dimensions" menu. If you work with it for a long time, you will noce a lot of these inflexibility issues (not so intelligent, hatches, multilines etc) In my opinion, it could be a far more productive tool than what it is.

 

[Action_Man]

Well all the PS3 games are written with Linux

:roll: It uses a custom OS.

 

[gman01]

Well all the PS3 games are written with Linux

:roll: It uses a custom OS.

custom linux OS - The way Sony makes it sound, it is closer to real linux, than say max OS X.... Since their custom PS3 OS runs all linux software, I would think it will be no big deal to go the other way, and have linux run PS3 games? If linux will need some kind of emulator, I expect to see one released very quickly....

 

[Action_Man]

I'm not even going to bother. You can live in your own little world.

 

[gman01]

I'm not even going to bother. You can live in your own little world.

I suppose you want me to google 'linux sony ps3' for you, and get you some links? I don't follow ps3, but i read http://www.linuxtoday.com/ everyday....

 

[gman01]

I'm not even going to bother. You can live in your own little world.

google:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=linux+sony+ps3&btnG=Google+Search

here is a wikipedia link for you....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3
It has been confirmed that Linux will be pre-installed on the PS3 hard drive. Sony hopes that with its wide variety of features, PS3 will supplant the PC in the home.[21] In addition, Sony hopes that the presence of Linux in every PS3 will encourage independent content creation such as homebrew games.

PS3 to ship with Linux, Sony confirms
http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS2370343858.html

Get your facts straight, before you start putting other people down.... Educating you is like pulling teeth....

 

[Guest]

My most beloved example is that of the playstation; They managed to squeeze every last drop out of it in the end. Imagine what you could do with a modern puter...

Your imagination is realised in the form of GNU/Linux

I wish I could play games on a Linux system; This is the only thing that holds me back from deleting windoze...

Well all the PS3 games are written with Linux, so when those games are available you may be able to delete windoze - As I have....

You can't compare console games to PC games...