Tiers in GraphicSettings

We have low, medium and high tiers in graphic settings.

How is a tier selected at runtime for each platform? The only sentence the docs have about this is that a tier is automatically detected by the GPU.

How is this selection done? Which devices fall into which tier? What are the rules? How are we supposed to know which devices go into which tiers so we can use this feature?



Thanks!

 

This has been asked and never answered in places such as:

https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/p...ers-settings-in-the-graphics-settings.448054/

and

https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/u...ojects-settings-player-other-settings.456587/

and

https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/p...ers-settings-in-the-graphics-settings.448054/

and then Alexy mentioned one brief nugget of info here - a hint at a whisper of maybe the start of an actual answer:

https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/no-render-path-in-the-settings.428851/#post-2772829

...but then it fell silent again.

 

@aleksandrk Thank you *very* much!

 

About Vulkan?

 

The tiers don't make any sense... Was this something we couldn't do with code before?

 

I feel like these platforms should be listed in the Graphics Settings UI somewhere.

 

@aleksandrk What tier would web assembly builds fall under? Thanks

 

From what I've heard, this tier system is pretty much automatic depending on hardware. This isn't graphics level, which is what you'd put on your game's option gui

 

So Unity still supports DX9? I actually thought it was completely scraped.

 

Can you please tell me if this is correct?

Id like to enable Cascaded Shadows on iPhoneX - i think it can handle it.

In GraphicsSettings uncheck 'UseDefaults' for Tier 3 and check 'Cascaded Shadows' so its available for tier 3
Then to i add a script that will detect when it is an iPhone X and change the graphics Tiers?

Something like:

Code (CSharp):

1. deviceID = SystemInfo.deviceModel;
2. if(deviceID == "iPhone10,3 " || deviceID == "iPhone10,6"){
3. // This is an iPhoneX
4. //now change the graphics tier to tier 3
5. Graphics.activeTier = GraphicsTier.Tier3
6. }

And i guess I would put this at the start of the game? Or could i use it at anytime to enable or disable Tier 3 at will?

 

Thank you. I can put the code at the start of the game before i load the main scene. I thought that shaders were compiled at the stat while the game loads so will it still affect the shaders? Anyways i think cascade shadow dont have anything to do with shaders, is that correct? so i guess it wouldnt matter?

 

Do i have to change the graphics tier each scene? Or can i just change it once at the start, and it will stick for the rest of the game?

 

BTW the tiers are working - i have HDR enabled on iPhone XS with this - thank you

 

why does Unity just put more detailed description about tier in the manual ? we as developer dont konw the rules about how tiers are devided.

 

The updated documentation in unity manual.

These settings allow you to make platform-specific adjustments to rendering and shader compilation, by tweaking built-in defines. For example, you can use this to enable Cascaded Shadows on high-tier iOS
devices, but to disable them on low-tier devices to improve performance. Tiers are defined by Rendering.GraphicsTier.

 

Its getting somewhere, but we need direct manual control over the shader quality Tiers.
Especially on Mobile Hardware, the Tier has significant graphical influence with little to non performance impact on current Mobile Hardware.

Currently I am working on a 3d VR Apllication for standalone Hardware (Snapdragon 845 on a UHD Display), where Tier 2 (and Tier 1) results in horrendous frenzy and glittering edges. Where Tier 3 significantly calms down the percieved overall Image and needs only margial Antialaising, where even 2x MSAA ist pretty neat.

For the time beeing, I am bound to the Standard Renderpipeline on Open GLES 3, since URP is not only missing proper working Tier Settings, but also has some severe performance Drawbacks and, which are hard to find... especially when using the XR Rig (Performance Test Szenario ~21 FPS on Multiview) instead of the classic manual 2 Camera Setup (~40 FPS on Single Pass). Target FPS is 90 FPS, The Test Szenario has scaled load for Test Reasons only. Sadly Vulkan is also no option an the moment, since the needed overall quality und technical stability just isnt ready... both on Android and Unity Side, but I am looking forward to the day, when its fully usable and stable.

 

Is anyone aware of a way to control the tier settings? I recently built for Quest (a Tier 2 platform because it supports OpenGL ES 3.0), but the only shaders that were generated for the build were Tier 1.

In the past Unity always generated all three tiers for shaders, and we filtered them out with a IProcessShader class. Now it seems to only generate a single tier. Is there a setting I missing somewhere?

Unity URP 10
Unity 2020.2.1f1

 

Same here. I suppose it conflicts a bit with the "Universal" part of URP, but I'd really like to force shader model 4.5 or higher for all shaders; and avoid compiling or including any fallbacks.

 

The tiering system based on OpenGL versions doesn't seem to be reliable anymore - old underpowered phones have upgraded to OpenGL 3.0+, and Google has stats that ~90% of phones are now on OpenGL 3.0+. (https://developer.android.com/about/dashboards).

I've got an HTC Desire 650 (2016 -
gpu:Adreno 305) and a Samsung S7 (2017 - gpu:Mali-T880 MP12) and they are in OpenGL 3.0 and 3.2 respectively, even though both are quite underpowered. Both are reported as Tier2.

Are there any plans on updating the tiering system?