NVIDIA has just announced its next-generation graphics cards, the NVIDIA Ampere line. These 30XX graphics cards, like the previous year’s 20XX graphics cards, will support ray tracing as one of their primary benefits – and will also have dramatically enhanced performance, compared to last year’s NVIDIA graphics cards.
If you’re thinking of heading to a computer shop and upgrading your graphics card to an NVIDIA RTX 20 or 30 series, you may be wondering exactly what ray tracing is – and how it works with NVIDIA RTX graphics cards. Find out now.
What Is Ray Tracing, And What Does It Do?
Ray tracing has been used in computer graphics for a very long time – and is often used to create CGI effects in movies, animations, and in other non-real-time rendering settings. If you’ve been to a cinema in the last 20 years, you’ve seen examples of ray-traced 3D graphics!
However, until recently, consumer computers were not powerful enough to use this graphics technology in real-time rendering applications, such as a video game that needs to display a 3D environment in real time, at rates of up to 60 frames per second or higher.
Basically, ray tracing is a way to simulate the physical behavior of light more accurately. Using ray tracing, a computer can calculate the color of each pixel – tracing the path the light would take between the eye of the viewer, and a specific part of a virtual 3D scene. Then, these pixels can be shaded accordingly to mimic natural light.
In other words, ray tracing uses advanced computer graphics to create more lifelike optical effects, including reflection and refraction, light scattering, and chromatic aberrations and other dispersion phenomena. The unique graphics architecture in NVIDIA RTX graphics cards allows game developers to implement this feature into their video games – improving overall realism.
To simplify things further, we’ll just say this: ray tracing makes video games look more natural and lifelike. And thanks to the NVIDIA RTX series, ray tracing is being used in a number of different video games that are available now, as well as some that are being released in the near future.
What Games Support Ray Tracing With NVIDIA RTX Graphics Cards?
Ray tracing is not a technology that can just be added to any video game – the game must be developed with it in mind. Here are a few of the games that can take advantage of NVIDIA RTX ray tracing technology.
- Amid Evil
- Battlefield V
- Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare
- Control
- Deliver Us The Moon
- Justice Online
- JX3
- Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries
- Metro: Exodus
- Minecraft
- Quake II RTX
- Shadow of the Tomb Raider
- Wolfenstein: Youngblood
A number of other games are slated to use NVIDIA RTX ray tracing in the future, too, including titles like Cyberpunk 2077, Doom Eternal, Dying Light 2, and Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2. Check out this list for more updates!
NVIDIA RTX Graphics Cards Offer Unparalleled Performance – Upgrade Today!
The NVIDIA RTX 20 series and 30 series graphics cards provide incredible performance for desktop PCs and are ideal for gamers who will settle for nothing less than the best.
Want to upgrade your gaming PC? Don’t Google for a computer shops near me. Instead, shop online with GTR Computers to get everything you need. View our selection of graphics cards here or browse our selection of powerful pre-built gaming desktops – and shop now.
Lastly, don’t get caught out with old hardware! Take some time to check out various laptop specials retailers are offering on new and used laptops