Tim Sweeney

And so I bought the biggest CRT you could buy at the time because this was a CRT. It was 24 inches. It weighed like 100 pounds. I had back pain for a week after I installed it, but it got me 1920x1200 view in 1996. In 1996, that was pretty cool. So I upgraded to a 90 MHz Pentium and did a lot of programming on that. It was on the 90 MHz Pentium.

These were the main consumer computers at the time, and I'd optimized the Unreal Engine software render on that, which was... And Pentium was the first superscalar architecture in consumer computing. It could run up to two instructions at a time. And if you wrote your assembly code very carefully, you could get absolute maximum throughput.

These were the main consumer computers at the time, and I'd optimized the Unreal Engine software render on that, which was... And Pentium was the first superscalar architecture in consumer computing. It could run up to two instructions at a time. And if you wrote your assembly code very carefully, you could get absolute maximum throughput.

These were the main consumer computers at the time, and I'd optimized the Unreal Engine software render on that, which was... And Pentium was the first superscalar architecture in consumer computing. It could run up to two instructions at a time. And if you wrote your assembly code very carefully, you could get absolute maximum throughput.

So I'd gotten my texture mapping code down to six CPU cycles comprising 11 instructions. And that was required for every pixel on the screen. And that was just enough performance to deliver that. But Dell came out with these new workstations, and Intel had just launched the Pentium Pro, the first out-of-order processor.

So I'd gotten my texture mapping code down to six CPU cycles comprising 11 instructions. And that was required for every pixel on the screen. And that was just enough performance to deliver that. But Dell came out with these new workstations, and Intel had just launched the Pentium Pro, the first out-of-order processor.

So I'd gotten my texture mapping code down to six CPU cycles comprising 11 instructions. And that was required for every pixel on the screen. And that was just enough performance to deliver that. But Dell came out with these new workstations, and Intel had just launched the Pentium Pro, the first out-of-order processor.

And so I basically bought the absolute maximum configuration that money can buy. It cost $7,000. I had a gigabyte of memory in 1996. Wow. And a 200 megahertz CPU. So it tripled the speed of compiles and just made me massively more productive. So that's why I was using throughout Unreal Engine development and shipped with that.

And so I basically bought the absolute maximum configuration that money can buy. It cost $7,000. I had a gigabyte of memory in 1996. Wow. And a 200 megahertz CPU. So it tripled the speed of compiles and just made me massively more productive. So that's why I was using throughout Unreal Engine development and shipped with that.

And so I basically bought the absolute maximum configuration that money can buy. It cost $7,000. I had a gigabyte of memory in 1996. Wow. And a 200 megahertz CPU. So it tripled the speed of compiles and just made me massively more productive. So that's why I was using throughout Unreal Engine development and shipped with that.

Well, at the time, so we did most Unreal Engine development before the first real GPUs came out. And, you know, the 3D effects Voodoo won. The first GPU that actually delivered serious performance compared to software rendering. The first GPU that was really gainful came out in the end of the development, and we supported it really quickly, but it was not the target all along.

Well, at the time, so we did most Unreal Engine development before the first real GPUs came out. And, you know, the 3D effects Voodoo won. The first GPU that actually delivered serious performance compared to software rendering. The first GPU that was really gainful came out in the end of the development, and we supported it really quickly, but it was not the target all along.

Well, at the time, so we did most Unreal Engine development before the first real GPUs came out. And, you know, the 3D effects Voodoo won. The first GPU that actually delivered serious performance compared to software rendering. The first GPU that was really gainful came out in the end of the development, and we supported it really quickly, but it was not the target all along.

And so development was focused on just building... There are two parts of the engine, right? There's all the gameplay systems that manage the simulation and physics and so on. That's all written in very high-level C++ code. And maintainability is as much of a goal as performance, because we had to build massive amounts of systems over time.

And so development was focused on just building... There are two parts of the engine, right? There's all the gameplay systems that manage the simulation and physics and so on. That's all written in very high-level C++ code. And maintainability is as much of a goal as performance, because we had to build massive amounts of systems over time.

And so development was focused on just building... There are two parts of the engine, right? There's all the gameplay systems that manage the simulation and physics and so on. That's all written in very high-level C++ code. And maintainability is as much of a goal as performance, because we had to build massive amounts of systems over time.

But the one thing that was really a bottleneck was graphics. the cost of rendering a single pixel was really high. And so you had to do everything you possibly could to optimize the rendering of pixels on screen. And so we were talking about how many CPU cycles. When you say your CPU runs at a gigahertz or whatever, that's a billion instructions per second.

But the one thing that was really a bottleneck was graphics. the cost of rendering a single pixel was really high. And so you had to do everything you possibly could to optimize the rendering of pixels on screen. And so we were talking about how many CPU cycles. When you say your CPU runs at a gigahertz or whatever, that's a billion instructions per second.

But the one thing that was really a bottleneck was graphics. the cost of rendering a single pixel was really high. And so you had to do everything you possibly could to optimize the rendering of pixels on screen. And so we were talking about how many CPU cycles. When you say your CPU runs at a gigahertz or whatever, that's a billion instructions per second.

How many instructions do you need to run to get a pixel on screen? And so there's a constant challenge to optimize that down. And, you know, there was also a competition among all of the graphics programmers who'd often send emails, you know, like bragging to each other about what new technique they've discovered, you know, to try to get the cost down.