GTX 1660: Show RT Support as On or Off?

[W1zzard]

GTX 1660 supports ray tracing via emulation in shaders, which technically makes it a supported feature and GPU-Z reports that (it probes DirectX ray tracing for support)

A reader now requested that GPU-Z should still show it as "off":

"RT really not available on GF 16xx series. Emulation isn’t a real feature. It is better to uncheck this box so as not to mislead users."

Not sure myself, either is fine with me. What do you think?

 

[3x0]

Interesting question. Is there a possibility to specify that it's "software supported" only? Maybe leave the "Ray Traycing" checkmark format as is, and provide a tooltip on hover specifying if it's HW or SW supported.

I mean, same question could apply to DX9 support for Intel ARC GPUs...

 

[DarkDreams]

It's a tough question. As I own a 1660 Super I went and checked some games. In Ghostrunner I can enable raytracing and do get a beautiful looking powerpoint presentation, but on other games like Shadow of the Tomb Raider raytracing (Nvidia RTX) is completely grayed out and not available. Consequently I would lean towards 'not supported' since it is defenitely not guaranteed to be available when hardware supported raytracing would be.

 

[Naki]

* Tooltip as a previous poster suggested.

* And/OR, owner-drawn/custom symbol for the checkbox!
Instead of showing the built-in checkbox checkmark image show a custom icon you choose yourself to be proper for this.
Maybe a bullet (circle) or square icon could work?

Curious users would rest the mouse pointer over the owner-drawn checkbox, then getting the tooltip to explain it.

EIDT: Voted "Supported" but see my suggestion above too.

 

[agent_x007]

Ray Tracing is supported as "DXR 1.0", but with no "DirectX 12 Ultimate" feature level support.
+ Pascal based GPUs should have the same limitations.

Most games with Ray Tracing/Path Tracing at this point require "DXR 1.1" (or DX12 Ultimate/FL12_2) to enable RT, so emulation from Pascal/16-series won't run them.
Which is probably the reason why user requested RT to be shown as not supported on 16-series cards.

Alternative option is replacing "Ray Tracing" support tick box in GPU-z, with "DirectX 12 Ultimate" one.

 

[Boombastik]

supported via software emulation (pascal, 1660)
for the others supported via hardware acellaration

The best of two words.

 

[StefanM]

supported, tool tip with some explanation from here:

Ray Tracing, Your Questions Answered: Types of Ray Tracing, Performance On GeForce GPUs, and More

Check out our in-depth article to learn more about ray tracing on GeForce RTX and GTX GPUs, and to discover how ray-traced games perform.

www.nvidia.com

 

[regorwin56]

Interesting question. Is there a possibility to specify that it's "software supported" only? Maybe leave the "Ray Traycing" checkmark format as is, and provide a tooltip on hover specifying if it's HW or SW supported.

I mean, same question could apply to DX9 support for Intel ARC GPUs...

I agree with your idea. I think it is more accurate to divide it into no support at all, software support, and hardware support.

 

[R0H1T]

How about a partially greyed box or something? Showing emulated on hover.

 

[regorwin56]

I agree with your idea. I think it is more accurate to divide it into no support at all, software support, and hardware support.

I think GPUZ should make different prompts for these graphics cards that have software support but hardware does not support Ray Traycing to distinguish other graphics cards that do not support Ray Traycing at all.

It feels a bit contradictory to let GPU Z say that these graphics cards do not support Ray Tracing but also say that it has Ray Tracing supported by software.

 

[Super Firm Tofu]

Maybe a checkbox for RT Support and another for RT Hardware?

 

[regorwin56]

I thought it would be possible to add similar hints for Ray Tracing
Let it show his level of support

 

[Naki]

Maybe a checkbox for RT Support and another for RT Hardware?

No room in the fairly small window of GPU-Z for 2 such checkboxes.
It's already quite crowded as is.

Maybe for the future version that will have the GUI majorly reworked (which W1zzard has shared he may create in the future).

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Think you have a typo in your title
on or off not on of off.

 

[regorwin56]

No room in the fairly small window of GPU-Z for 2 such checkboxes.
It's already quite crowded as is.

Maybe for the future version that will have the GUI majorly reworked (which W1zzard has shared he may create in the future).

I agree with you and I think (partially greyed box) this method is not very good. GPUZ never seems to have this display state.

Although I agree to let GTX1660 show as supporting RT in GPUZ. But I hope GPUZ should show that he does not have full hardware support.

 

[Lew Zealand]

Maybe keep the box but relabel it as HW Ray Tracing? With that in mind, I'll vote Not Supported.

Whenever I have a peek in GPU-Z on the 1660 Super, I always do the RT checkbox doubletake and think: oh yeah, software emulation.

 

[Naki]

I agree with you and I think (partially greyed box) this method is not very good. GPUZ never seems to have this display state.

Although I agree to let GTX1660 show as supporting RT in GPUZ. But I hope GPUZ should show that he does not have full hardware support.

Partially greyed box was not what I suggested.
I suggested for it to have a square or round icon in it, not grayed out.

(Grayed out was suggested by another poster, аnd I do not like that idea either.)

Mock-up with square icon would look something like this -->

And resting the mouse pointer on it should clarify further.

 

[regorwin56]

Partially greyed box was not what I suggested.
I suggested for it to have a square or round icon in it, not grayed out.

(Grayed out was suggested by another poster, аnd I do not like that idea either.)

Mock-up with square icon would look something like this -->

View attachment 292105

And resting the mouse pointer on it should clarify further.

In fact, this situation is a bit similar to NVIDIA Tesla/Fermi. They can run some DX11/DX12 games, but GPU Z does not display 12 (11_0) like Kepler.

 

[agent_x007]

There is no Tesla class cards that work with DX11 only games.
As for Fermi : DX12 on it is the most limited and broken fetature that was ever officially realeased on NV cards up to this point.
In other words : You get way less problems from showing "not supported" than "supported with limitations" at this point. Answering ALL topics about why this DX12 YYZ game doesn't work on a card that GPU-z specifies as DX12 compatible (at the same level as Kepler), is just too big of a pain.

 

[AusWolf]

I voted "supported". If it can do it, it can do it. Emulation or not, it doesn't matter. 2 FPS or 200 doesn't matter, either.

The check box only says "ray tracing", not "hardware ray tracing".

 

[lowrider_05]

It definitely supports Raytracing, even tho its slow but it can do it so SUPPORTED

 

[Vya Domus]

If it's supported, then it's supported, whether it's hardware accelerated or not. Maybe you could signal in some way to the user if the card has hardware acceleration for it or not.

How are Volta cards like Titan V handled ? As far as I know Volta does not have RT cores either but it was RT capable.

 

[bug]

It's not part of the RTX family, Nvidia themselves say nothing about RT: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/graphics-cards/compare/?section=compare-16
It doesn't have the HP to make anything meaningful of emulated RT either. I would say show it as "off" or possibly "emulated in software".

 

[agent_x007]

If it can do it, it can do it. Emulation or not, it doesn't matter. 2 FPS or 200 doesn't matter, either.

Well, problem with RT emulation is that almost nothing with RT option supports it at this point.
You get "your GPU doesn't support RT" error, or RT enable option simply isn't present in the game menu. So, does DNF (did not finished), counts as supported (like 0FPS) because one or two games and single benchmark can enable RT in emulation mode on them ?

 

[Outback Bronze]

You need to make things idiot proof these days.

Somebody might think "Hey I can do Ray Tracing in games". Um, no you can't.

Voted Not Supported.