Fixing Cloud Gaming
“It is 3me for Cloudgaming 2.0”
Cloud Gaming USA – 11 September 2012
Osman Kent Co-‐Founder – Approxy
CEO -‐ Numecent
www.approxy.com www.numecent.com
:: About me….!
■ CEO of Numecent and Co-Founder of Approxy"■ Approxy is a spin-out from Numecent"
■ Previously co-founder & CEO of 3Dlabs – $1Bn NASDAQ company"■ We were one of the fathers of 3D graphics and the GPU on the PC"■ Approxy CEO and co-founder Dr Ahiska was 3Dlabs’ co-founder as well"
■ Became CEO of Numecent in Jan 2011"■ Numecent invented cloudpaging and application streaming with virtualization"■ And holds the 10 battle-tested and foundational US patents in this field"
■ Enabled recent spin-out of Approxy from Numecent"■ Approxy is focused on transforming cloud gaming"
"
:: About us! Two sister companies – one shared vision! Fric7on free delivery of so<ware from the cloud
• Inventor of cloudpaging • Patented and disrup4ve technology • Fric4on-‐free delivery of na4ve apps from the cloud • Numecent is focused on professional and business apps
• White-‐label provider of cloudpaging for ‘cloud gaming’ • Has its own addi4onal patents • Fric4on-‐free delivery of games from the cloud • Approxy is focused on game applica4ons
We both came out of stealth in March 2012 :: with a bang ::
”Pure freaking magic”
”Makes any app a Web app”
”Instant gra3fica3on”
”Have not seen anything like this before” ,
“As fast as the real thing, even over 3G”
”Blew my mind”
“BLOWN AWAY could change the en3re soVware industry” “magic is the term to describe this”
”Streaming gets a new face with cloudpaging” “massive poten3al for enterprise users”
This is why we became a big story
:: we are a founda3onal enabler for Cloud 2.0 ::
(and Cloudgaming 2.0 by inference)
Fat Cloud with GPUs Thin-client with no GPU
Fat Pipe with no latency
These assumptions shaped the initial concepts of ‘cloud gaming’!
:: Cloud 1.0 – misguided assumptions! Throw everything on the cloud and hope it will stick!
:: This propagated the thin-client myth! Yet your smartphones and tablets are NOT thin clients !!
■ Soon there will be billions of GPUs on earth "■ Moore’s law marches on – client devices are becoming more capable"■ nVidia recently said that GPUs in Tegra’s will soon be faster than consoles today"■ It does not make sense to cram these again into server rooms"
!Perhaps we got confused with ‘physical thinness’
!
"
PCs"are remaining fat"
SmartTVs "are getting fatter"
Mobile Devices"are getting even fatter"
Sensible Cloud Sensible Client Sensible Pipe
A new balance between the cloud and the client!
:: Cloud 2.0 – reality sets in! A balanced approach between the cloud and the client!
:: Let me debunk a cloud myth too! Cloud is NOT about doing everything on the server side!!■ HTML5, WebGL etc. are all about a stronger client!■ The client is reclaiming its position of power"
"■ Off-lining is an important user requirement!■ We cannot rely on internet all the time (at least not yet globally)"■ The mobile App revolution shows that user love local power"
"■ That’s why Dropbox is a beautiful cloud computing experience!■ Sits natively on my PC or Mac – even offline"■ Syncs seamlessly to the cloud without me looking"■ ‘Platform Shifted’ selectively to phones and tablets – as an app"■ Managed by me ‘in the browser’ from the cloud"■ No one argues that ‘Dropbox’ is not a cloud company "
"
“We are to games, what Dropbox is to data”
let’s get back to “Fixing Cloud Gaming”
Is it really broken?
???
(Verba7m from my Cloud Gaming Europe Keynote in January 2012)
It is misunderstood, topologically challenged,
technically challenged. business model challenged,
geographically challenged, & patent challenged
There is imminent and present danger of failure
???
:: Cloud gaming - what is being delivered?! It should be about delivering the best user experience - period!!
■ It is obviously about internet delivery of games"■ But the terminology and the technology are somewhat misunderstood"■ Is cloud gaming == pixel streaming?"
"■ What provides the best user experience – friction free"■ Pixels from the cloud?"■ Downloads from the cloud?"■ Or code from the cloud "
"
Pixels?" Code?" Full Downloads?"
:: Cloud gaming - where are we delivering to?! There is a lot of confusion about the platforms too!!
■ Cloudgaming delivers PC games to PCs – really?"■ But this is now being augmented by other devices"■ PC games on the iPad or SmartTVs always seem to grab the headlines"
■ New platforms are rapidly gaining their own content"■ iOS devices are rapidly becoming a dominant native platform"■ GPUs in those devices are similar to PCs a few years ago"
"
PCs?" TVs?" Tablets?"
Cloudgaming 1.0 is full of severe fric3on points
(and some thought pixel streaming would be the savior)
???
let me share some history first
“origins of pixel streaming”
:: Pixel streaming at 3Dlabs in late 90s! Was driven by platform shifting needs….!!
■ It is always difficult getting native games on a new platform"■ Platform shifting solved the problem (still does today)"
■ We were way ahead of our time"■ Were hampered by bandwidth, latency etc."■ But we time-shared one GPU for multiple clients"■ It was also a way of selling expensive GPUs J "
"
3Dlabs GPU EDGE Servers
PC Games" On a Japanese phone"Pixels"
many years later this method came to define
‘cloud gaming’
(at least for Cloudgaming 1.0)
Edge servers with GPUs
Pixel Streaming"
But there are fundamental problems with this view of ‘cloud-‐gaming’
(except for casual games)
Edge servers with GPUs
Pixel Streaming"
It simply cannot scale!
(does 1800 mean anything to anyone?)
Edge servers with GPUs
Pixel Streaming"
Can’t scale network side
Jitter Contention Throttling Data Caps Ping distance Latency
Can’t scale home side
Try it with 3 sons and a spouse!
Pixel Streaming...
:: Problems of pixel streaming As exemplified by recent industry failures
Pixel streaming can’t scale cloud side Are we going to place 5M GPUs in server rooms? Does not make ecological or economic sense Huge Capex needs make the business model dysfunctional
:: A side note on jitter! Induced by contention ratio or by ISP throttling!!
Download jitter "causes the games"to stall"
Heavier the internet use, the worse the jitter becomes!
Upload jitter "causes command"latency"
so paradoxically pixel streaming will only work well so long as it does not become popular
(and you live close to an edge server – on your own)
Edge servers with GPUs
Pixel Streaming"
However, it is a good idea for pla`orm shiVing
(but s3ll suffers from the same scaling problems)
Edge servers with GPUs
Pixel Streaming"
Cloudgaming 2.0 ≠ ‘pixel streaming’
We need a new topology and approach
And a new balance between the cloud and the clients
Introducing “Cloudpaging™”
Push-‐pull paging of game instruc3ons from the cloud
with local rendering & local pixel streaming
goes well beyond progressive downloads goes well beyond remo4ng
(this technology is protected by a number of US patents)
We don’t stream pixels from the cloud
We transmit virtualized soVware code, a page at a 3me, on demand which then executes on the client inside a sandbox
“1000x more network efficient and scalable
compared to pixel streaming”
Downloads
Linear Streaming Desktop
Virtualiza3on
Pixel Streaming
Progressive Downloads
Cloudpaging
:: Evolution of cloud delivery of games! All the legacy solutions are full of huge friction-points!!
Applica3on Streaming
This technology is new to cloud gaming but is tried and tested technology for professional GPU apps
(One of Numecent’s customers recently delivered their 3 Millionth AutoCAD session)
:: Cloudpaging solves 3 fundamental problems Removing all the fric7on points in the food-‐chain
Deliver it 20x-‐100x faster than downloads And do so fully encrypted and under full License Control Everything is AES256 encrypted – nothing naked to crack
Cloudify any na3ve Windows game – 100% We do this automa7cally – takes a few hours per game Even separate add-‐ins, mul7ple programs and dependencies
Execute at na3ve speeds without install – even offline Done through virtualiza7on – keeps users happy & agile. With transparent, live updates and patches
:: We detect what is needed for instant gratification! Why inflict the rest on the user ? Bring the rest on demand!
Original size"
Initial payload typically 5-10% "
(“a partial”)!
:: The rest is fetched using push-pull paging! Virtualization also provides ZERO installation!!
3 1 2
1 2 3
Virtualization Sandbox"
Virtual MMU
Game Code (Par4al)
■ Low cost server in the cloud (no GPU) ■ Can serve 10,000+ users per server ■ Can be located far away – no ping distance requirement ■ A global solu4on from day one
■ Pull only instruc4ons as used – page at a 4me ■ Leverage the local GPU resource ■ No installa4on hell – execute full speed in a sandbox ■ 100x beYer than progressive downloads ■ 100x less network use compared to pixel streaming
No fat pipes are needed"
HTTP/S"
■ We sta4s4cally infer the rela4onship between page-‐requests and create a highly informa4ve predic4ve engine
■ By predic4vely pushing pages, we increase perceived network performance
■ The graph of inferred page rela4onships gives an extremely detailed data on how users are progressing through apps – a very useful instrumenta4on tool for developers.
■ We are essen4ally mapping the DNA of global so^ware behaviour for beYer network performance
:: Heuristic pushing of pages! Cloudpaging creates a tree of temporal behavior of pages on the server!
The So<ware Genome
:: The new topology of Cloudgaming 2.0 Push-pull paging from the cloud! Local rendering and pixel streaming for platform shifting!
Cloudpaging Servers on AWS
Using the local PC as a proxy GPU. Next year this can become a $100 headless/diskless rendering device
Local pixel streaming over WiFi (no scaling issues)
push-‐pull paging 95% less network use Hugely scalable Fric7on-‐free
Run on your tablet at 60Hz and with gesture virtualiza7on
Home PC “Virtual Console”
User can play games offline without being connected to the network!
(games are playable for a grace period
governed by the licensing policy)
Games can be played with full low latency local peripheral support
:: Can play offline under license control! Plus full support for local peripherals with low latency!!
Games, Apps,
Mixed media …even the OS!
High defini4on, 3D stereoscopic,
mul4player experience
Cloudpaging™
:: Can handle futuristic local multiplayer games! All this requires local rendering and low latency input!!
And we do this at a frac3on of cost and 3me
Cloudpaging Solu3on 1 server = 10,000 users
Legacy Solu3ons 1 server = 50 users max (with GPU sharing)
“We are to games, what Dropbox is to data”
Demo of license controlled game delivery through Dropbox
We deposit a tiny “partial” !into your Dropbox account!
still controlled by our servers on Amazon AWS!
!Provides instant
gratification!
:: Instant gratification! No waiting – even for the initial 5% payload!!
The rest is cloudpaged!on demand!
from our servers on AWS!!
A friction-free experience!
:: The rest is push-pull paged! Using our servers on AWS!!
Cloudpaging is Cloudgaming 2.0
:: delivered now ::
Finally let me make another predic3on
“we ignore the IP issues at our peril”
Cloudgaming will become a patent minefield -‐ soon
Fixing Cloud Gaming
It is 3me for Cloudgaming 2.0
Cloud Gaming USA – 11 September 2012
Osman Kent Co-‐Founder – Approxy
CEO -‐ Numecent
www.approxy.com www.numecent.com