For comparison here is the same image with no AA method applied:

4xAdaptive Anti Aliasing

From ATI’s PDF’s on AAA we saw that the performance hit for the use of AAA was relatively small. To confirm this we fired up BattleField 2 and to our surprise on the map we used there was an increase in performance despite the section of game looking better (grass effect was much clearer and more defined).

 

Battlefield 2	Avg
1600x1200 4aa high	70
1600x1200 4aaa high	75

Certainly the IQ benefits are there and if ATI can keep the performance close to that of traditional MSAA they are on to a real winner with Adaptive AA.

Catalyst – things to come

After having the chance to talk to Terry “CATALYST MAKER” Makedon, we have some good news for our readers. Adaptive AA is indeed a big thing, and ATI knows it; so right now it is beta testing its support for previous generation cards as well! As most of you know, before a feature goes out to market, it needs to go through Quality Assurance testing, and TxAA is in that stage for previous generation cards at this point. So expect to see TxAA expanded to more Radeons, probably in the 06.xx series of Catalyst.

Other upcoming Catalyst features are a monitor calibration utility (which will prove quite useful to people with CRTs), a wizard-like program that, together with Avivo, will enable the users to easily transform videos from one format to the other, and (saving the best for last) Dual Core CPU support in the drivers is indeed coming, with pre-alpha drivers already giving more than 10% boosts in games!

High-Quality Anisotropic Filtering:

With X1xxx series of graphics cards ATI is further enhancing the quality of their Anisotropic filtering. The main benefit of the new method is that the angle dependency in previous methods of AF has been removed. This means that the image as a whole benefits from more AF rather than some areas benefiting much more than others. The following Graphics show the benefits in their most basic forms:

With the above in mind we went off to try and track down a real world example of the new HQ AF at work. Unfortunately in all the engines we tried we were unable to see any real advantages, though there was certainly no reduction in IQ. Unfortunately due to the lack of time with the card we have been unable to search further however we will come back to this as necessary. For those interested in the screenshots here they are incase your eyes are better than ours!

Please note the high resolution images are presented in loseless BMP format, please give them time to load.

HQ

HQ

HQ

On the performance side of things the use of HQ AF does result in a small change in performance however not enough to really be noticeable in most engines. To demonstrate this we ran the X1800XT through a CSS: VST run and here are the results:

Counter Strike Source: VST	Avg
1600x1200 4aa 16af	116.74
1600x1200 4aa 16af - HQ	113.43

Avivo:

We’re not going to delve to much into the Avivo technology in this article as we looked at the technology in a recent article. Instead here is a snippet from or previous coverage:

“Think of Avivo as becoming ATI's next-generation video and display platform targeted specifically at delivering the highest quality and performance for this growth in media usage. Avivo incorporates a number of technologies, to help provide new video experiences, and numerous capabilities which represent a quantum leap in quality tailored to the best experience for all display needs.”

Should you wish to read more you can click this link:

HDR

Not a new feature as such, but certainly a new feature for ATI boards HDR is officially supported by ATI as of the X1xxx series of cards. As well as supporting all of the nice HDR effects such as those in Farcry or the upcoming STALKER game ATI have implemented something which comes as a real plus, the ability to use Anti-Aliasing and HDR at the same time (all flavours of AA are supported with HDR).

Those of you who keep up to date with advancements in the graphics industry will be aware that using HDR and AA is something you cant do on Nvidia hardware at the moment. Given that ATI have this up and running now this puts Nvidia at a real disadvantage feature wise.

Additionally ATI supports many HDR formats, such as 64-bit (FP16, Int16), 32-bit (Int10), plus some extra custom formats for the developers to use, if they desire.

3Dc+.

Yes, that ‘plus’ sign means that the new version is improved. Namely, ATI has added support for single-channel textures (with a 2:1 compression), which practically enables the use of 3Dc for luminance maps, shadow maps, material properties, HDR textures and more. After talks I had with several ATI people, they confessed that they are not happy with the current adoption of 3Dc (or more like, the lack of it), since it is a genuinely useful format. They also had some spicy remarks concerning Croteam’s decision to not include it in Serious Sam 2, but I will let your imagination go wild on these ;) They added though that the next version of DirectX will have it, so its adoption will come sooner or later. One of the most impressive use of the new 3Dc+ can be seen in the Toy Shop demo, which when displayed, left the crowd literally speechless with its awesome graphics and attention to detail. As ATI said, without 3Dc there would be no way that this demo would run in a 256MB card, and we believe them – the level of detail and the feel of the demo is remarkable.