AMD has quietly released a new ray tracing graphics technology that can significantly reduce memory usage and allow millions of animated triangles to run at a stable frame rate. However, it is currently unclear whether and when this graphical breakthrough from AMD will have a tangible impact in the gaming sector.
As one of the leading companies in the tech industry, AMD is the manufacturer of Ryzen processors and Radeon graphics cards. Additionally, the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S gaming consoles also utilize AMD hardware. Despite AMD's strong technical capabilities, the PC graphics card market has long been dominated by its main competitor, NVIDIA. However, NVIDIA's flagship graphics card, the RTX 5090, is selling for over $6,500 from third-party sellers on platforms like Amazon and Newegg. In comparison, AMD's Radeon RX 9070 XT graphics card starts at just $799 when purchased directly from retailers.
AMD's Tetrahedral Cage Structure Could Reduce GPU VRAM Usage
Although AMD users have already benefited from Microsoft's Advanced Shader Memory (ASMM) technology, a new ray tracing technique might further narrow the gap between AMD and NVIDIA.
AMD Fellow Holger Gruen stated that AMD's Tetrahedral Cage Approach allows developers to perform ray tracing around unique cage structures in animations, thereby reducing the VRAM demands of the workload. AMD shared a technical demo video showcasing dense grass and trees built using the Tetrahedral Cage structure. Although this technology has not yet been applied in games, it holds promise for helping developers create more complex and detailed environments without consuming excessive memory.
AMD stated that the demo ran on a Radeon RX 9070 XT graphics card with 16GB of GDDR6 VRAM at 1080p resolution and 60 frames per second. While traditional cluster-based methods provide developers with more precise control over vertex animation, they also demand significant amounts of VRAM. In contrast, the Tetrahedral Cage technology used in the video only occupied 1.7GB of VRAM. Using cluster-based technology would require over 80GB of VRAM.
In short, traditional cluster-based technology and Tetrahedral Cage technology each have their uses, with the latter potentially being more suitable for ray-traced vegetation and distant characters.
If game developers adopt AMD's Tetrahedral Cage architecture, it will impact current and future gaming consoles. Both Microsoft and Sony have stated that Project Helix and the PS6 will respectively utilize AMD hardware. This decision by both companies continues a trend that has been in place since the era of the PS4 and Xbox One in 2013. AMD announced that the PS6 and Project Helix will use custom AMD processors, with both consoles featuring the RDNA 5 graphics architecture and Zen 6 CPU architecture.
As the DRAM memory shortage crisis continues to spread, causing prices for RAM sticks, graphics cards, and SSDs to skyrocket, any attempt to reduce VRAM usage will benefit gamers using older or lower-end hardware. It remains to be seen how many developers will apply AMD's research findings in next-generation gaming hardware.
