I’ve had fun shopping for graphics cards, especially when a power user is within earshot. I’ll innocently ask the salesperson, “What’s your slowest graphics card?” The reaction is precious.
As I’ve confessed before, I’m not a gamer. Years ago I edited a videogame magazine and didn’t realize how weary I had become of games until the magazine unexpectedly folded. I stopped playing that day and haven’t resumed since. That’s why I don’t need fast graphics. Playing a YouTube clip is the most taxing graphics workload demanded of my computer.
Often, I won’t even buy a graphics card. I’ll scrounge a hand-me-down from a friend or cannibalize a junked PC. My oldest computer in regular use contains a discarded engineering sample of an Nvidia GeForce4 Ti-4200 from 2002.
Are you cringing yet? Mock me no more, power users. I’m reconsidering my wayward ways.
Not that I’m renewing an interest in games. I’m still such a nerd that I’d rather punch code than shoot pixels. No, what’s making me waver are the nongame programs for GPUs. This software is enabled by Nvidia’s CUDA platform for general-purpose computing on GPUs, AMD’s similar ATI Stream, Microsoft’s Direct Compute API, Apple’s Grand Central Dispatch, and Khronos Group’s OpenCL. I’ve been around the industry a while and don’t use the term “revolutionary” lightly, but GPU computing is the most exciting thing I’ve seen in years.
It also changes the equation for PC shoppers. There are legions of us nongamers, you know. For years we’ve been happy with crappy graphics. But now, if we want to clean up our amateur video, we need a graphics card that can run MotionDSP’s vReveal. If we anticipate transcoding much of that video, we’ll want a system that can run Elemental Technologies’ Badaboom. If we’re editing high-res digital images, we’ll crave a GPU that accelerates Adobe Photoshop.
GPU computing will alter the priorities of users and system designers. Bargain PCs that safely economized on graphics suddenly seem less attractive. Eventually, even casual users will grasp that the performance of some apps will depend more heavily on the GPU than on the CPU. And that’s definitely a game-changer.
Tom Halfhill was formerly a senior editor for Byte magazine and is now an analyst for Microprocessor Report.
Comments are closed on this article
davey
December 27, 2009 at 8:41pm
GTX-V8 BOY I FEEL SORRY FOR THOSE WHO DONT HAVE AT LEAST A GTX-295 AND A I7 WITH 6GB ! WAS A GAMER BEFORE I GOT ONLINE ! NOW I HAVE SPENT TIME LEARNING MORE ABOUT WHAT IS UP AND COMING IN THE REAL WORLD OF COMPUTING ! ALL I DID BEFORE GAMING WAS TO EXPERIMENT WITH WHAT I COULD DO TO WINDOWS XP AND VISTA WITHOUT CRASHING THE SYSTEM ! SO DONT CUT ON US GAMERS ALOT OF US LIKE TO LEARN AND SHARE OUR RESULTS WITH THE WORLD TO MAKE ALL THINGS BETTER IN THE END !!!!
B1Gx5MurF
December 21, 2009 at 5:49pm
I think ATI started hardware accelerating HD streaming content with their 9.11 catalyst release. For me there's definitely an improvement, but its not really noticeable unless i'm trying to do like a dozen other things at the same time.
What gets me excited are the possibilities in new content. Quake Live for example, I remember when I spent $2k to build a system that could play that game, but now those same system requirements can run in a browser. This could be a preview at possibilities of cloud computing.
Another is folding@home, cpu's cant even come close to matching even mid range gpu's, I wonder what other applications which aren't really feasible using cpu power could come out of the woodworks
visibly_stealthy
December 19, 2009 at 1:14am
why would I reply without reading the entire comment? I can't think of one person who uses their computer for just gaming. I'm sure they use media players and internet browsers and such, not my point but still, carrying on games are one of the very few things I can think of that require a computer full potential. Save for scientific research and the like. Maybe if you are playing blu-ray's but even that doesnt require very much computational power mostly gpu horsepower. And if games aren't productive I guess the military uses some games as a pre-training platform for no inherent reason? I guess I'll keep my mouth shut since I have no idea what I am talking about, and am primitive to you. I'll stick with being a gamer that's a power user, but not a power user for the simple given fact that I am gamer!
In the hands of a master, any object can become a field improvised, lethal weapon.
jonahkirk
December 18, 2009 at 5:45pm
Of course gamers are power users. Have you seen the wattage our 4890's in quad crossfire suck down? It ain't a 1200 W power supply for no reason. LOL
visibly_stealthy
December 18, 2009 at 5:05pm
"what's with gamers calling themselves power users, when all they do is game?" What an ascinine question. So that means, because I play games I'm a gamer, And because I'm a gamer, I'm a poweruser that only play's games? That sounds stupid, yet is what is being implied by your question. Sure I could spend 5 seconds coming up with a few different analogies to make my point. but your point is moot, and would require but a paltry rebuttal to prove you are ill informed.But I have wasted enough of my time on this. Because I need to go be a poweruser that only games.....................as previously stated, you sound like an idiot.
In the hands of a master, any object can become a field improvised, lethal weapon.
lien_meat
December 18, 2009 at 10:54pm
I'm talking about people that don't do anything but game, know nothing about computing, and somehow think they are a power user. It's different. Read the full comment before commenting back how about.
lien_meat
December 18, 2009 at 1:05pm
I don't really game much either. I find it a huge waste of time. None of my computers have decent video cards (read laptop with integrated intel, desktop with a 6 series nvidia)...but the day will probably arrive when even my work will necessitate something that can do gpu computing well. That's probably when I'll buy a decent video card.
And hey...just wondering...what is with gamers calling themselves power users...when all they do is game.
Gaming no more equates you as being a power use than does running photoshop. Gaming isn't even a productive use for a computer... I'm fine with the term if it's used to distinguish those that know how to use a computer to it's potential rather than just game...but that's not often the case...
nekollx
December 18, 2009 at 6:42pm
"rather than just game..."
You know they say The World is just a game....
------------------------------
Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
Raspop
December 18, 2009 at 6:28pm
Break out the Nobel Prize nominations, we've finally found someone who can use a computer to its full potential.
DJFresh
December 18, 2009 at 2:27pm
You come to this site and question power user status of gamers? We are the ones driving innovation idiot. You wouldnt have all this cheap power if it wasnt for us. There would be no Moore's law. You wouldnt have real unassisted 3d displays in 10 years if it wasnt for us. Remember that.
lien_meat
December 18, 2009 at 3:44pm
I'm not talking about hardware here. I DO realize that gamers do move the hardware industry forward. I would NEVER deny that.
I'm talking about being a power user...
Maybe you don't know the real definition of a power user:
"A power user is a user of a personal computer who has the ability to use advanced features of programs which are beyond the abilities of "normal" users, but is not necessarily capable of programming and system administration." -from wikipediaYou know what...you just answered my question on why this happens so often. Gamers actually do believe that having and using beefy hardware does actually classify them as a power user...wow...just wow.
nekollx
December 18, 2009 at 1:12pm
mainly cause Gamers, the hard core ones anyway, are pushing the milits oftheir harware and tweaking the OS to get the best performance.
------------------------------
Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
lien_meat
December 18, 2009 at 2:25pm
yeah...I'll agree that hard core gamers are often power users...but many plain jane gamers that don't know crap about their computers or OS consider themselves power users as well...just because they game...that's what I was trying to get across. Sorry for the confusion.
dpomales
December 18, 2009 at 12:36pm
Excellent point, I used to run bare foot too. Maybe I still am. After graduating to Windows 7 64bit professional, I realize those days are over. I love my Visiontek Radeon HD 4650 GPU system. It is running on a GA-61PME-S2P Gigabyte motherboard. I originally loaded the OS to a ECS GeForce 6100SM-M motherboard. The ECS motherboard started to fail because of old age ( leaky electrolytic capacitors ). I saw that the Gigabyte motherboard had the same chipset so I installed and booted it without reloading the OS. The RAID-0 striped array was detected and came up without a hitch on Windows 7 64 bit. Supplemental drivers installed automatically. Okay I had to redo my license with Microsoft, but that was the only problem. I expect the Gigabyte motherboard to last longer. This is due to it's use of aluminum capacitors and ferrite cores on the inductors for the four phase voltage regulator on the AMD AthlonX2 64bit processor. Details...
Biceps
December 18, 2009 at 12:24pm
Sir, I have an extra AGP-slot 7800 Nvidia card that I will GIVE you. No one should have to suffer with a 4200. No one, you hear me??!
logicmaster2003
December 18, 2009 at 11:49am
GeForce4 Ti-4200 from 2002 ?
Mine.. one of my 3 PC is running on ATI-8500DV (year sub-2000) for almost 10 years now ! - I use it on a daily basis to record tv shows :)
JasonCross
December 18, 2009 at 11:12am
Grand Central Dispatch? Am I missing something? Everything I've ever read about it points to GCD being a task-parallel thread pooling system for multicore CPUs. There's no access to GPU hardware in there, that I have seen (I'm not a programmer, I'm just going by what I've read). Now, Apple is supporting OpenCL, so there's still that avenue for GPU acceleration in Snow Leopard.
nekollx
December 18, 2009 at 10:35am
The interesting thing is is in this future you propote now even non gamers will have a lower hurdle to entry. Joe Bob gets a GPU powered pc to watch movies,a few months later he reads about The Sims 5, interested he checks the back of the box "Hey i can run this." And takes the box home that day instead of hitting up some random forum to find out why his new game doesn't run and learning he needs a GPU.
------------------------------
Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
MeTo
December 19, 2009 at 6:30am
But the GPU will be low end and run about 10 FPS so he will have to buy a new video card to play the game.
Print
