HL2 Best Quality HDR to require SM3.0 and FP16 HDR

[Ruined]

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2005/05...st_informania/

"The information comes from a Senior Software Engineer for Valve Software, Gary McTaggart, who was recently interviewed by a german PC Games Hardware magazine.

As part of the Q&A, the magazine asked for some of the technical details behind the new 'Lost Coast' level. He stated that there would be two new quality modes available for the lighting quality on the new level.

There will be a 'Best Quality' setting and a 'Lower Quality' setting as he referred to them.

To be able to experience the 'Best Quality' setting, you will need a graphics processor that is capable of 16-bit Floating Point filtered textures, 16-bit Floating Point targets with alpha bend support, and Shader Model 3.0. The lower quality mode will require 16-bit Fixed Point filtered textures and Shader Model 2.0 support."

Looks like Half Life 2 will have both low and high quality HDR modes. The high quality mode will requre an Nvidia 6600/6800 card or next-gen card, while the low quality mode will work for X800 and 9800 series cards.

Chalk another game up that is going to have better IQ on Nvidia's 6800 series than ATI's X800 series due to the current feature deficit on ATI's cards.