NVIDIA GPU PhysX Pack Preview

by Marco Chiappetta — Wednesday, August 06, 2008, 09:17 AM EDT

Physics: as geeks, we just have to love the subject. We loved learning about geniuses like Isaac Newton and concepts like gravity, acceleration and inertia. Also, typical of geeks, we love gaming. So, combining physics acceleration and gaming just sounds like a really cool idea. For the past several years, we've been learning more and more about physics in gaming in the form of PhysX, a technology created by a company called Ageia. The original approach to PhysX by Ageia was a dedicated PhysX card that sported a PPU (physics processing unit). Ageia partnered with companies like BFG and ASUS to bring the PhysX cards to market. We actually reviewed the BFG version here in the HotHardware labs over two years ago. The entire real-time, in-game physics landscape has changed quite a bit since that time, however. With NVIDIA's relatively recent acquisition of Ageia, we all knew it was only a matter of time before we'd see some kind of announcement or launch detailing what NVIDIA's plans were with the PhysX technology...

NVIDIA GPU PhysX Pack Preview

Tags: Nvidia, PhysX, GPU, Pre, preview, review, view, IE, AC, id, K

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com