Brand loyalty is about to grow stronger than ever if Hydra delivers...

[emp]

I'm sure most of you have heard already about the Hydra 100 and Engine, however I wanted to get your thoughts on a related issue that plagues us since... well... ever. Brand loyalty (Fanboyism) has always existed and to some point it'll always exist, but with the Hydra allowing for multi-GPU linear scaling as long as the GPUs are from the same manufacturer it might just exponentially increase this trend. For instance, I see myself buying a Hydra if it delivers, and will definitely have to keep buying from ATI just to keep my older cards longer (which is a very nice bonus feature).

What are your thoughts? Will we see flame wars of legendary proportions from now on? Do you think this'll be another AGEIA incident with a lot of promises, but not worth it at the end? I for one do not think so, since image rendering is vital to games and it can be easily measured and benchmarked to prove it's worth.

For those that are unaware on what is Hydra or what does it do:

www.lucidlogix.com

 

[spathotan]

It will go down the tubes. The company will be bought by Intel/Nvidia/AMD and it will vanish overnight or be turned into garbage. Anything to good to be true in this industry is never safe, be it from competition, cost, or end results.

 

[Guest]

hehe

it's a great idea... potentially could be a game changer...

but i think there are simply too many variables... even if they worked past those...

it doesn't have the financial backing as say intel to produce and market and continually work out the flaws on such a system... I think it will fail in the end... but if it had the right backing...

 

[kazuya-kun]

I'm going to assume that the Hydra engine will increase in average fps but in turn have an insane amount of problems with stuttering in the games, or have an insane lag which wouldn't be worthwhile for fps games where frames really matter.

Remember the data first has to go through Hydra before it gets sent to the cards themselves, means more delay and other troubles.

 

[makotech222]

yeah whichever way this company goes, its probably a great idea to invest in stocks for it. if its gets bought out, stocks go up. If its really good, stocks go up.

 

[Guest]

but if it just crashes and burns...

stocks go down

 

[eklipz330]

i don't understand graphics scaling on 'steroids'

aren't steroids bad? will they make my gonads shrink? -__-

STAY AWAY FROM HYDRA

but yeah, if it does work, innovation will kick in, and the reason to pick a certain vendor might actually become harder... instead of 'physx' and 'havok'... who knows, maybe they'll start bundling games, or aftermarket heatsinks for free... who knows, it might push competition to the limit

 

[eklipz330]

http://www.lucidlogix.com/about/investors.html

intel is an investor in hydra

 

[emp]

I wonder if Intel is investing in Hydra, because it might have special plans for Larrabee with it? It would be interesting for Larrabee to receive "special" boosts over nvidia and ATI on this platform.

 

[PsyKhiqZero]

I don't see what brand loyalty or fanboyism has to do with the hydra. If the hydra forces you to use gpu in the same family it merely a compatibility issue then.

But should the hyrda succeed I think that it will really be good for gpu manufactures, regardless of who sells the it. With linear scaling w/o the need for special code in games, mid range pc enthusiast will be more willing to buy 2 or even 3 gpus for their systems.

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

Emp this is old news, we discussed it like 1-2 months ago when it first PR'ed.

Nice promises, but few people think it will work well in general DX10 titles, and even fewer think it'll work with different hardware.