Timeline for What does the z-buffer look like in memory?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
5 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Mar 29, 2021 at 10:42 | comment | added | Simon F | "Depth testing can be turned off/on for each draw call, which can be useful" It could also be counter-productive. Whenever possible (i.e. there are cases when it isn't), the GPUs I've helped develop do the Z-test first and (again if possible) update the Z. Turning it on/off may reduce the chances of rejecting pointless calculations. | |
| Mar 25, 2021 at 21:12 | comment | added | pmw1234 | All that data flowing around does have a performance effect, it has to move in and out of the cache, and there are limits that have to be considered but yeah modern GPU's can be pretty impressive in how much data they can move and processing that can be done. My "old and slow" GPU clocks in at 2 teraflops. | |
| Mar 25, 2021 at 20:50 | vote | accept | Carmo | ||
| Mar 25, 2021 at 20:50 | comment | added | Carmo | Thank you for the detailed answer! So the GPU is specialized to write and read these buffers, huh. I was under the impression that, with the z-buffer, stencil and possibly other stuff, the data would be somewhat too large to handle effectively (with it being in the megabytes already), but I may be underestimating modern data transfer and processing tech. | |
| Mar 25, 2021 at 17:38 | history | answered | pmw1234 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |