3 ms·

Tbh, we should more readily abandon GPU vendors that refuse to go with the times. If we cater to them for too long, they have no reason to adapt.

afandian 8mo ago
I had a relatively recent graphics card (5 years old perhaps?). I don't care about 3D or games, or whatever. So I was sad not to be able to run a text editor (let's be honest, Zed is nice but it's just displaying text). And somehow the non-accelerated version is eating 24 cores. Just for text. https://github.com/zed-industries/zed/discussions/23623 https://github.com/zed-industries/zed/discussions/23623 I ended up buying a new graphics card in the end. I just wish everyone could get along somehow.
- ronsor 8mo ago
  The fact that we need advanced GPU acceleration for a text editor is concerning.
  - ianlevesque 8mo ago
    Text editor developers get bored too!
  - deleted 8mo ago
    [deleted]
  - jsheard 8mo ago
    Such is life when built-in laptop displays are now pushing a billion pixels per second, rendering anything on the CPU adds up fast. Sublime Text spent over a decade tuning their CPU renderer and it still didn't cut it at high resolutions. https://www.sublimetext.com/blog/articles/hardware-accelerated-rendering https://www.sublimetext.com/blog/articles/hardware-accelerat...
    - the8472 8mo ago
      Most of the pixels don't change every second though. Compositors do have damage tracking APIs, so you only need to render that which changed. Scrolling can be mostly offset transforms (browsers do that, they'd be unbearably slow otherwise).
      - simonask 8mo ago
        That’s not the slow part. The slow part is moving any data at all to the GPU - doesn’t super matter if it’s a megabyte or a kilobyte. And you need it there anyway, because that’s what the display is attached to. Now, the situation is that your display is directly attached to a humongously overpowered beefcake of a coprocessor (the GPU), which is hyper-optimized for calculating pixel stuff, and it can do it orders of magnitude faster than you can tell it manually how to update even a single pixel. Not using it is silly when you look at it that way.
        Dylan16807 8mo ago
        Sure, use it. But it very much shouldn't be needed, and if there's a bug keeping you from using it your performance outside video games should still be fine. Your average new frame only changes a couple pixels, and a CPU can copy rectangles at full memory speed.
        imtringued 8mo ago
        I'm kinda weirded out by the fact that their renderer takes 3ms on a desktop graphics card that is capable of rendering way more demanding 3D scenes in a video game.
        afandian 8mo ago
        I have no problem with it squeezing out the last few percent using the GPU. But look at my CPU charts in the github link upthread. I understand that maybe that's due to the CPU emulating a GPU? But from a thousand feet, that's not viable for a text editor.
        8mo ago
hyperman1 8mo ago
No. I remember a phone app ( Whatsapp?) doggedly supporting every godforsaken phone, even the nokias with the zillion incompatible Java versions. A developer should go where the customers are. What does help is an industry accepted benchmark, easily ran by everyone. I remember browser css being all over the place, until that whatsitsname benchmark (with the smiley face) demonstrated which emperors had no clothes. Everyone could surf to the test and check how well their favorite browser did. Scores went up quickly, and today, css is in a lot better shape.
- aeldidi 8mo ago
  The Acid2 test is the benchmark you’re thinking of, for anyone not aware: acid2.acidtests.org
Octoth0rpe 8mo ago
> we should more readily abandon GPU vendors This was so much more practical before the market coalesced to just 3 players. Matrox, it's time for your comeback arc! and maybe a desktop pcie packaging for mali?
- dyingkneepad 8mo ago
  The market is not just 3 players. These days we have these things called smartphones, and they all include a variety of different graphics cards on them. And even more devices than just those include decently powerful GPUs as well. If you look at the Contributors section of the extension in the post, and look at all the companies involved, you'll have a better idea.
  - adithyassekhar 8mo ago
    There are still three players in smartphones realistically. ARM makes their Mali line, which vendors like Mediatek license and puts straight on their chips. Qualcomm makes their custom Adreno gpus. (Derived from Radeon Mobile). They won't sell it outside snapdragon. Samsung again licensed Mali from ARM, but in their flagship exynos's they use AMD's gpus. They won't sell it outside exynos. PowerVR makes gpus that are so outdated with features that Pixel 10 phones can't even run some benchmarks. And then there's apple.
Animats 8mo ago
NVidia says no new gamer GPUs in 2026, and increasing prices through 2030. They're too focused on enterprise AI machines.

afandian 8mo ago

I had a relatively recent graphics card (5 years old perhaps?). I don't care about 3D or games, or whatever. So I was sad not to be able to run a text editor (let's be honest, Zed is nice but it's just displaying text). And somehow the non-accelerated version is eating 24 cores. Just for text. https://github.com/zed-industries/zed/discussions/23623 https://github.com/zed-industries/zed/discussions/23623 I ended up buying a new graphics card in the end. I just wish everyone could get along somehow.

ronsor 8mo ago
The fact that we need advanced GPU acceleration for a text editor is concerning.
- ianlevesque 8mo ago
  Text editor developers get bored too!
- deleted 8mo ago
  [deleted]
- jsheard 8mo ago
  Such is life when built-in laptop displays are now pushing a billion pixels per second, rendering anything on the CPU adds up fast. Sublime Text spent over a decade tuning their CPU renderer and it still didn't cut it at high resolutions. https://www.sublimetext.com/blog/articles/hardware-accelerated-rendering https://www.sublimetext.com/blog/articles/hardware-accelerat...
  - the8472 8mo ago
    Most of the pixels don't change every second though. Compositors do have damage tracking APIs, so you only need to render that which changed. Scrolling can be mostly offset transforms (browsers do that, they'd be unbearably slow otherwise).
    - simonask 8mo ago
      That’s not the slow part. The slow part is moving any data at all to the GPU - doesn’t super matter if it’s a megabyte or a kilobyte. And you need it there anyway, because that’s what the display is attached to. Now, the situation is that your display is directly attached to a humongously overpowered beefcake of a coprocessor (the GPU), which is hyper-optimized for calculating pixel stuff, and it can do it orders of magnitude faster than you can tell it manually how to update even a single pixel. Not using it is silly when you look at it that way.
      - Dylan16807 8mo ago
        Sure, use it. But it very much shouldn't be needed, and if there's a bug keeping you from using it your performance outside video games should still be fine. Your average new frame only changes a couple pixels, and a CPU can copy rectangles at full memory speed.
      - imtringued 8mo ago
        I'm kinda weirded out by the fact that their renderer takes 3ms on a desktop graphics card that is capable of rendering way more demanding 3D scenes in a video game.
      - afandian 8mo ago
        I have no problem with it squeezing out the last few percent using the GPU. But look at my CPU charts in the github link upthread. I understand that maybe that's due to the CPU emulating a GPU? But from a thousand feet, that's not viable for a text editor.
        8mo ago

hyperman1 8mo ago

No. I remember a phone app ( Whatsapp?) doggedly supporting every godforsaken phone, even the nokias with the zillion incompatible Java versions. A developer should go where the customers are. What does help is an industry accepted benchmark, easily ran by everyone. I remember browser css being all over the place, until that whatsitsname benchmark (with the smiley face) demonstrated which emperors had no clothes. Everyone could surf to the test and check how well their favorite browser did. Scores went up quickly, and today, css is in a lot better shape.

aeldidi 8mo ago
The Acid2 test is the benchmark you’re thinking of, for anyone not aware: acid2.acidtests.org

Octoth0rpe 8mo ago

> we should more readily abandon GPU vendors This was so much more practical before the market coalesced to just 3 players. Matrox, it's time for your comeback arc! and maybe a desktop pcie packaging for mali?

dyingkneepad 8mo ago
The market is not just 3 players. These days we have these things called smartphones, and they all include a variety of different graphics cards on them. And even more devices than just those include decently powerful GPUs as well. If you look at the Contributors section of the extension in the post, and look at all the companies involved, you'll have a better idea.
- adithyassekhar 8mo ago
  There are still three players in smartphones realistically. ARM makes their Mali line, which vendors like Mediatek license and puts straight on their chips. Qualcomm makes their custom Adreno gpus. (Derived from Radeon Mobile). They won't sell it outside snapdragon. Samsung again licensed Mali from ARM, but in their flagship exynos's they use AMD's gpus. They won't sell it outside exynos. PowerVR makes gpus that are so outdated with features that Pixel 10 phones can't even run some benchmarks. And then there's apple.

Animats 8mo ago

NVidia says no new gamer GPUs in 2026, and increasing prices through 2030. They're too focused on enterprise AI machines.