Yeah, it is. I don't have any hard statistics, but I believe they are indeed somewhat pushing it. They said that the iPad 2's GPU allowed for them to do so much more (there's quite a big difference between GTA 3 on the first generation iPad and GTA 3 on the second generation iPad).
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Why the iPad 3 might not be using PowerVR SGX600 series
- Thread starter MythicFrost
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there is no need of running games at full resolution...
2D games at full resolution - piece of cake for the GPU
3D games? - develop it at non retina resolution with AA (like dead space) and you are good to go
You do realize that looks absolutely terrible?! A 1024*768 image on a 2048 * 1536 display?
The retina display exists to show its beauty, to give us sharpness. It would be a bad choice from Apple if they decided to ship the device with a retina display, market it as a gaming device (or as one if its key features) and than put in a GPU that's not able to create retina-quality images when it comes to games.
Nope, it would look just as it looks right now. Dead Space as I said early uses Antialiasing so there are not jaggy pixels to be seen. I think Real Racing does this too?
Keep in mind that the new retina display is going to be using the same screen inches...
yeah...i hope they will have a significant upgrade. like going to MP4. meaning 4 cores. or the 6 series... One of these it will be, because there isnt anything better.
I know. What you are suggesting is terrible. Remember iPhone 3GS (non-retina) apps on the iPhone 4? They looked exactly the same on both devices, and that's just the problem. Actually, one could argue that they looked worse on the iPhone 4 because you could now notice 4 pixels were used as 1.
Apple will NEVER allow this situation to happen. They will throw in a decent GPU. The retina display is absolutely useless if there's no visual difference!
I can't even understand why you are even suggesting this.
Can you imagine what would have happened if Apple threw in an incapable GPU in the iPhone 4 and all games would look exactly the same as on the 3GS? Anger across consumers (where is my retina resolution?!) and lawsuits regarding false advertising.
You are ignoring the AA factor in the games, I'm implying every game should have them to look good in the ipad3. A non AA game would look terrible, I know.
I doubt you would be able to see any pixels playing infinity blade with good AA in an iPad 3
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You are talking about a game that runs at a resolution at 1024 * 768, that is going to be upscaled to 2048 * 1536 and than say that "good AA" will solve everything.
That's not the case. Apple is going to ensure that, for example, Infinity Blade 2 will be able to run at 2048 by 1536 (with retina graphics) at the same performance as on the iPad 2 with 1024 by 768.
Good AA doesn't solve anything. There is still the fact that you are pushing a 1024 by 768 game instead of a 2048 by 1536 resolution. AA doesn't "fix" that.
Tell me, what is the benefit of a retina display if the GPU is not capable of producing retina-quality images?
Current video game system aren't capable of perform good with 1080P so I don't believe a tablet GPU can drive the Retina Display amount of pixels for 3D games.
Have you seen my previous post? The screen capture of Infinity Blade with AA? I'm typing from my iPad 2 and I can't see the pixels unless I look really close? It's not as good as a Retina Display, I know that, but is not really that bad
It doesn't matter whether it looks good on the iPad 2 or not. It must look crisper and sharper on the iPad 3 with similar performance as on the iPad 2.
You can't compare the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 to the iPad by the way. PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 games are really advanced. That's a different discussion, but they are simply not one-to-one comparable.
You are saying that the GPU won't matter because than games will just look the same as on the iPad 2. What's so great about that? The point of the retina display is that everything looks sharper. Apple will only use the same GPU as used now, if all current apps are able to give similar performance on retina-quality.
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I don't even understand why I am having this discussion with you. You are undermining the whole idea of a retina display: the idea that everything looks extremely sharp (and no the iPad 2 is not extremely sharp). You are saying that just doubling the resolution in every direction is just fine for 3D games - which means 3D games will look exactly the same as on the iPad 2. That's a very undesirable situation. Improving so much in hardware (display), only to come to the conclusion that you are unable to make good use of this hardware.
Don't get me wrong pal, I'm in for a full retina experience, it's just that I don't want to be disappointed!
I only tried to make you see how Apple/developers could face the possible fact that the mobile GPU are not ready yet to be used to play intensive 3D graphics at such resolutions. I hope I'm wrong.
Current ipad2 GPU benchmarks are at about 12 Gigaflops and the new 6 series exceeds 100!
The x360 ranks at 240 Gigaflops
The x360 ranks at 240 Gigaflops
Ok, just did a quick + dirty test. Profiled the GPU utilisation on my 4S as I was doing some profiling on it anyway. Played around a bit in the system, scrolling around, opening + closing stuff, resizing the screen in the browser, all the usual stuff. GPU usage was generally 5-10%, and peaked at 20% (this was extremely rare).
Stretching that figure out a bit and using the peak, it could handle 5x more screen area. That's enough to drive a retina iPad - and the 4S GPU is under clocked. You'd be hitting near 100% utilisation now and then, but it would be rare. It'd generally be hitting 25-50% utilisation.
So yes, the A5 would handle a retina iPad display for the vast majority of non-game apps
Cool, thanks for the info, I appreciate it
Neither Infinity Blade 2 or GTA3 are fully utilising the SGX543MP2. It's just too powerful, and considering both games support 30 FPS on an iPad 1, double the frame rate + additional effects isn't enough to push the GPU -- when we have a GPU that can only run at 30 FPS on the SGX543MP2, that's a real game.
There is a need, and it's that these games will look significantly better. Running games at 1024x768 isn't good enough.
Real Racing 2 can be output to the TV at 1080p when wired, and it runs at 30 FPS.
Look at what we know:
Real Racing 2:
1024x768 > 800k pixels > 60 FPS (or higher, as v-sync limits game to 60)
1920x1080 > 2.1m pixels > 30 FPS (or higher, as v-sync limits game to 30 if far enough under 60)
2048x1536 > 3.4m pixels > ?? FPS (possibly 15-20)
As you can see a 3D game can run at 1080p on the TV at 30 FPS, and games already support higher than 1024x768 resolution, so only doing 1024x768 on the iPad 3 would be meh.
To be honest I'm starting to think I'm mistaken about these games running at 60 FPS. I'm looking at Real Racing 2 and no where does it say it runs at 60 FPS anywhere, I attached a core animation profile to my 4S and played Real Racing 2 and it only showed ~35 FPS, GTA3 ran at about 25-35 FPS, and Infinity Blade 2 only ~35 FPS. Even the standard Infinity Blade only runs at about 35 FPS too. Perhaps these results are wrong? I'm not sure.
From a little bit of reading, I also found out that the 1080p version of Real Racing 2 that outputs to your HDTV runs at 1080p but without AA.
From a little bit of reading, I also found out that the 1080p version of Real Racing 2 that outputs to your HDTV runs at 1080p but without AA.