NVIDIA made an update to the PhysX system software, the common backend for all NVIDIA products that support PhysX: GeForce 8 series and above graphics processors, and Ageia PhysX accelerator cards. Version 9.09.0408 packs the following changes and features according to the company:

• Updated runtime to improved operation of Cryostasis Game.
• Supports NVIDIA PhysX acceleration on all GeForce 8-series, 9-series and 200-series GPUs with a minimum of 256MB dedicated graphics memory.
• Experience GPU PhysX acceleration in many games and demos, some of which are highlighted in PowerPack downloads on www.geforce.com.
• Runtime upgrade ONLY for AGEIA PhysX processors users. (New installations should install older PhysX system software such as version 8.09.04 - prior to installing this update).
• Includes the latest PhysX runtimes used in the latest game titles.
• Supports NVIDIA PhysX acceleration on GeForce via CUDA 2.0 for SDK versions 2.7.3, 2.7.2, 2.7.5, 2.8.0 and 2.8.1 (requires graphics driver v177.81 or later).
• Includes all the latest PhysX SDK Runtimes.
• Supports control of your GPU PhysX configuration from the NVIDIA display driver control panel. (requires graphics driver v180.00 or later)

The software is available for Windows XP and Windows Vista, from the NVIDIA website.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA PhysX System Software 9.09.0408 WHQL

In an interview with Godfrey Cheng, Director of Technical Marketing in AMD's Graphics Products Group, Bit-Tech.net has quoted him saying that standards such as PhysX would die due to their proprietary and closed nature. Says Mr. Cheng:

"There is no plan for closed and proprietary standards like PhysX," said Cheng. "As we have emphasised with our support for OpenCL and DX11, closed and proprietary standards will die."

Bit-Tech.net interviewed the AMD person to get the company's take on EA and 2K's decision to adopt NVIDIA PhysX across all of their worldwide studios, earlier this week. Interestingly, when asked about how the major publishers such as EA adopting PhysX across all of their studios would impact the propagation of the API, Cheng responded with saying that monetary incentives provided to publishing houses alone won't help a great deal in propagating the API, and that the product (PhysX) must be competitive, and that AMD viewed Havoc and its physics simulation technologies as leaders. "Games developers share this view. We will also invest in technologies and partnerships beyond Havok that enhances gameplay." he added. PhysX is a proprietary physics simulation API created by Ageia technologies, which was acquired and developed by NVIDIA. You can read the full Bit-Tech.net interview with Godfrey Cheng here.

Following the NGOHQ episode with devising software that lets users accelerate GPU-based NVIDIA PhysX API on Radeon accelerators, and with NVIDIA coming in support of such an effort, a general opinion was made that NVIDIA sought an industry-wide domination of CUDA as the de-facto general purporse graphics processing (GPGPU) architecture, with putting their investment of acquiring Ageia Technologies to good use by pushing the PhysX API. Although it comes as a good news for AMD that their graphics cards that are already optimized for Havoc physics could now support PhysX acceleration, it's not in the best interests of the company that they allow the growth of CUDA and components based on it to this extent, since AMD has its own FireStream line of products and a GPGPU architecture in the making.

TG Daily spoke with Richard Huddy, Manager of Worldwide Developer Relations, and Godfrey Cheng, Director of Product Marketing, two key individuals with AMD. When it comes to the most interesting question of PhysX implementation on Radeon, Mr. Cheng says that AMD has no problems encouraging the use of feature-enhancing 'middleware', and that they have no arguments in NVIDIA going ahead with propogating their PhysX middleware as long as they don't put Radeon accelerators into a unfair disadvantage.

In a dramatic turnaround of events, NGOHQ.com, the creators of a special system software that allowed users of the ATI Radeon graphics accelerators to use proprietary features of NVIDIA graphics accelerators such as GPU-accelerated version of the NVIDIA PhysX game physics API, claim that in fact NVIDIA wanted to help them with this effort. On June, the 26th we had covered reports of the said outfit improvising a driver after proving that NVIDIA's proprietary GPGPU architecture, CUDA was flexible enough to work on a ATI RV670 graphics processor.

Although NVIDIA bought AGEIA Technologies only two months ago (on February 13, 2008), the GeForce creator informed recently that the conversion of AGEIA's PhysX API engine to CUDA programming language that interfaces with the GPUs is almost complete. Upong completeion of CUDA, owners of GeForce 8 and 9 series graphics cards will be able to play PhysX-enabled games without the need of an additional AGEIA PhysX PCI card. The big question here is, how much will this PhysX addition worse the frame rate in games. Well for now we only know that NVIDIA showed off a particle demo at its recent analysts day that was apparently similar to Intel's Nehalem physics demo from IDF 2008. For the record, the Nehalem demo managed 50,000 - 60,000 particles at 15-20 fps (without a GPU), while NVIDIA's demo on a GeForce 9800 card achieved the same level of particles at an amazing 300 fps, quite a boost. NVIDIA's next-gen parts (G100: GT100/200) in theory can double this score to top 600 fps. Manju Hegde, co-founder and former CEO of AGEIA added that in-game physics will be the "second biggest thing" in 2008.

Video card giant NVIDIA, which completed the acquisition of AGEIA Technologies the day before, is now starting to port AGEIA's PhysX engine software to run on its GeForce 8 cards, according to The Tech Report. During a financial call, NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hseun Huang revealed that the ported engine will bring enhanced physics capabilities to all of the company's existing GeForce 8 cards.

We're working toward the physics-engine-to-CUDA port as we speak. And we intend to throw a lot of resources at it. You know, I wouldn't be surprised if it helps our GPU sales even in advance of [the port's completion]. The reason is, [it's] just gonna be a software download. Every single GPU that is CUDA-enabled will be able to run the physics engine when it comes... Every one of our GeForce 8-series GPUs runs CUDA.

Huang also added that the integration shall encourage people to spend more on graphics processing hardware, and maybe start to buy two or three graphics cards, where one of them will work for physics only.

NVIDIA, the world leader in visual computing technologies and the inventor of the GPU, today announced that it has completed the acquisition of AGEIA Technologies, Inc., the industry leader in gaming physics technology. AGEIA's PhysX software is widely adopted with more than 140 PhysX-based games shipping or in development on Sony Playstation 3, Microsoft XBOX 360, Nintendo Wii, and gaming PCs. AGEIA physics software is pervasive with over 10,000 registered and active users of the PhysX SDK.

NVIDIA, the world leader in visual computing technologies and the inventor of the GPU, today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire AGEIA Technologies, Inc., the industry leader in gaming physics technology. AGEIA's PhysX software is widely adopted with more than 140 PhysX-based games shipping or in development on Sony Playstation3, Microsoft XBOX 360, Nintendo Wii and Gaming PCs. AGEIA physics software is pervasive with over 10,000 registered and active users of the PhysX SDK.

When Intel announced plans to buy out Havok back in September, AMD began talking to Havok themselves to try and get the physics company in their hands. Talks faltered when Intel offered Havok $100 Million USD, and Intel acquired Havok and a lot of Intellectual Property. Not one to be left in the dust, AMD is currently in talks with Ageia. If Ageia offers AMD a reasonable price, they will be more than happy to acquire it. After all, according to AMD's head of developer relations, "I would say that they [Ageia] would probably grind themselves out of business in a year or so, but now they have an opportunity to sell themselves for a lot of money instead". If AMD does end up acquiring Ageia, they will get quite a lot of Intellectual Property, a new market segment, and an advantage for AMD developers. If talks falter, though, Ageia would more likely than not receive offers from the likes of NVIDIA, Sony, and several other hardware/software developers.

AGEIA is planning to gain more popularity this weekend, by offering new low prices for its dedicated physics processing unit (PPU). This holiday season, you will be able to get a PCI PhysX card with 128MB GDDR3 onboard memory for just $99. The offer, which will run throughout the holiday shopping season will see major online shops like Newegg and TigerDirect sell the card at $99, significantly lower than the original $150+ price tag.

AGEIA has just announced that its PhysX UT3 Mod-Kit will be available tomorrow. As seen at the Leipzig Games Conference AGEIA PhysX owners will get the promised PhysX-powered mod featuring a tornado which tears the battlefield apart as the game progresses. In addition, the tornado actually sucks rockets into the vortex if they're fired too close and presents a real moving hazard to the player. Actual footage of the tornado can be seen here.

AGEIA Technologies, the pioneer in hardware-accelerated physics for games, today announced the introduction of the AGEIA Adaptive Physics EXtensions (APEX) Development Platform. AGEIA APEX provides game designers, developers and modders with a series of PhysX asset libraries and tools which help streamline the implementation of best-in-class in-game physics. This new offering saves engineering time and increases efficiencies throughout the development of next-generation titles, regardless of the platform, and enables designers to more directly utilize AGEIA's powerful physics engine.

As you know, Warmonger is nearing its announced ship date. We've recently undergone some additional online field testing, both internally and externally with a select group of PhysX beta testers and have gotten great feedback. We want to take advantage of the suggestions we've gotten from the gaming community and ensure this game is absolutely a showcase for hardware-accelerated physics and UE3 engine capabilities. Therefore, there will be a slight delay in shipment in order to make a few functional adjustments and server infrastructure improvements. We are committed to rolling this out in time for the holidays.

AGEIA published today cinematic trailer showing the capabilities of Unreal Tournament 3 engine when played with PhysX card.

Our first sneak peek includes a look at in-game footage of a PhysX-powered mod featuring a tornado which tears the battlefield apart as the game progresses. In addition, the tornado actually sucks rockets into the vortex if they're fired too close and presents a real moving hazard to the player.

Click here to watch the sneak peek movie.

AGEIA Technologies announced today the world's first PhysX Mobile processor, the AGEIA PhysX 100M, for high performance gaming notebook PCs. The new PhysX 100M mobile part is designed to operate, "with power dissipation of nearly 10W under gameplay conditions." It also includes power management features not seen in the desktop version, to throttle down the clock speed and prevent overheating or if the chip is in idle. The new AGEIA PhysX 100M processor is available now. Exciting gaming notebooks powered by AGEIA PhysX Mobile Technology are expected to hit the market very soon.

We are enabling enthusiasts to enjoy games their way: whenever and wherever they want. AGEIA PhysX Mobile Technology further expands our position in the gaming market and we look forward to seeing new laptops bring gamers the freedom to enjoy incredible physics action on the go.

said Manju Hegde, CEO of AGEIA Technologies.

John Carmack's statement last week that he is "not a believer in dedicated PPUs" and that "multiple CPU cores will be much more useful in general" was the reason for Ageia's Dan Forster answer in a recent Bit-tech article. Forster was quoted saying:

When it comes to the CPU side, dual-core, quad-core, whatever then the main problem is threading. How are you ever going to thread the two things together? It's all about timing, when the physic effect hits then how is the second core going to time it and cooperate? At the moment, there's not a single game that supports multi-threading even at a basic level. I reckon we're years out with that and it's already been about for two years. The games that are being developed now only use it a bit, for A.I. and so on where they don't need extreme threading.