http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/07/12/e

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Thanks for the common knowledge and a link that doesn't work?

"Milk was a bad choice!"

Actually the majority of the stuff Cobra puts out there is usually very informative. And while the most of us already know that integrated graphics suck, it's interesting that this guy took a shot at Intel.

"Mark Rein, vice president of Unreal studio Epic, told a packed audience of game developers that Intel's integrated graphics...."

"....is not good enough to play the latest games and that "We would all be better off," if Intel exited the graphics market."

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/07/12/epic_integrated_graphics/

LOL...I just didn't understand the thread. Weird subject, and a non-functioning link...

"Milk was a bad choice!"

Meh. it was late.

Anyhow the point of that post was that gaming companies are fed-up with making their games compatible with the the slowest set of graphics cards that are produced in that time frame and I don't blame them either. If Intel isn't going to make a half decent IGP then they need to get out of the IGP sector altogether, because when you have a company like Intel making sub-par IGP's it doesn't allow the game companies to produce a video game the way they truly wanted to.

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I'd counter that though with the fact that no one honestly makes a good IGP for gaming.

The net result of removing Intel IGP's would be an increase in cost of lower end computers, especially laptops. My company issued me an HP laptop with an Intel IGP in it. I'm a network engineer; the IGP in there is all I'll ever need in it to do my job.

PC gaming is such a small slice of the total computer use pie that in this situation, it shouldn't even count. If you want better graphics, go get a computer with a better video card.
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But the gaming companies have to be compatible with the slowest IGP card out there to date which bogs down what they want to do with the game.

Nvidia 61xx and ATI X200 were the only 2 IGP's to ever pass all graphic benchmark test without failing in the process. You can run newer games that came out recently on these grpahics cards in 800 by 600 format with these cards. You can't with the latest Intel IGP's. All the gaming companies want are all IGP's to do that.

I don't think it would raise the price at all. ATI already makes IGP;s for intel boards and in fact it's cheaper to buy an Intel board with an ATI X200 IGP in it then it is an Intel board with a Intel IGP 945G in it.

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"If you want better graphics, go get a computer with a better video card."

I couldn't agree more with the above, elite gamers only make up but a tiny fraction of computer users worldwide hence there is very little incentive to make entry level and productivity machines into GPU workhorses and it would indeed raise prices.

"But the gaming companies have to be compatible with the slowest IGP card out there to date which bogs down what they want to do with the game."

It might be hurting the bottom line for some developers because they may not move as many titles, I don't believe they have to support every integrated chip or any if they deem it fit not to do that.

Computer Components

From what I read all graphicas cards and IGP's have to be supported within the first 2 years after they come out. It's part of some hardware/software agreemnt junk.

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"But the gaming companies have to be compatible with the slowest IGP card out there to date which bogs down what they want to do with the game."

First off, they don't have to do this. It's their choice.

Secondly, I don't buy into it costing them many sales among gamers. PC gamers tend to allow games to pull them into buying hardware they need to run it, not push them to another game or no game at all.

What are the hottest PC games lately? FEAR and Oblivion. Despite their relatively high required specs, they sell quite well.

Thirdly, I have no problem with developers doing this. It often times results in a leaner, better coded product that runs better on all hardware.

I'm sorry, but from what I've seen of Oblivion, sure the graphics are good, but the hardware required to run the game with that quality at a fluid speed is rediculous, especially when you compare it to something like HL2, which granted doesn't look at good, but runs well on machines costing far less. And HL2 isn't a slouch in image quality.

Lastly, developers never seem to understand it's not the graphics that make the game. It's the game play. id makes great engines, but they don't turn out gameplay quality nearly as well as Valve for example. It's no wonder Valve games sell far better.

"From what I read all graphicas cards and IGP's have to be supported within the first 2 years after they come out. It's part of some hardware/software agreemnt junk."

I'll believe it when I see it.

"I don't think it would raise the price at all."

First off, how we buy hardware is not how OEM builders like Dell and HP buy hardware.

Secondly, why are ATI IGP's that cheap in the first place? ATI would want to charge as high a price as possible while selling as many as possible. But they know they can't charge but so much with other companies providing a competing product, such as Intel.

Hey, I hate SiS chipsets in video cards, motherboards, you name it. But god bless them for being around to help drive prices lower. :-)

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"First off, they don't have to do this. It's their choice"

If it was there choice then the head guy of Unreal wouldn't be complaning about Intel IGP's in the first place, because they could set there own standards without having to deal with IGP's that came out within the last 2 years.

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I'm not disputing they're pressured to write their code to allow for these old IGP's to run the game. But there's no law that says they have to code like this.

Plus, can you even say this is a bad thing when it often leads to more efficient code?

"Milk was a bad choice!"

It depends. If the company is pushing graphics as its key selling point then it can be a bad thing, because they can't utilize the code in which they want to if they have to support older hardware.

Well like I said, the head guy of Unreal wouldn't be complaining about Intel IGP's if there wasn't some sort of software/hardware minimal requirement standards agreement somewhere. Or else his argument would be pointless if they were allowed to set their own hardware standards.

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