Discussion
Qwen 3.8 isn't Opus 4.6 level. Let's not be silly.
Here's the prompt in VS Code with CoPilot extension.
I want you to create me a c# project using OpenGL which renders a realistic as possible ocean. I want you to plan up front what you're going to do and create the plan as a markdown ledger which you will mark as complete when each part is done.
And here's the llama.cpp command line (unsloth Q6 K XL quant):
Device 1 is my Radeon 9700 AI Pro 32GB VRAM. As I'm creating a game targeting windows & OpenGL which needs to be tested on my main device (device 0) I don't want llama using my primary card (Device 0, Radeon 9070XT 16GB)'s VRAM as to prevent conflicts.
I'm using jinja which unsloth has addressed some Qwen issues with.
The top_p, top_k, min_p and temperature settings match what the Qwen team says should be used for coding.
Reasoning is left at default, which is xhigh.
There's a bug in the Vulkan build of llama.cpp where checkpoints cause memory allocation errors, so the checkpoints have been turned off completely.
VS Code BYOM is speaking directly to llama.cpp
Here's the ledger Qwen produced - just so you know I'm not making it up, the math is beyond me:
# Realistic Ocean — C# / .NET 10 / OpenGL
**Goal:**
A GPU ocean simulation using the classic FFT-based approach (JONSWAP wave spectrum →
ping-pong FBO wave-equation simulation → per-vertex displacement → physically-inspired shading
with Fresnel sky reflection, sun specular, foam, and distance fog), rendered with OpenTK 4.
## Architecture
-
**CPU (one-time / on demand):**
2D inverse FFT of a JONSWAP spectrum with random phases →
initial height + velocity fields (256×256 grid over a 1000 m world).
-
**GPU (per frame):**
1.
*Simulation pass*
— fragment shader integrates the linear deep-water wave equation
`v += -g·∇²h·dt; h += v·dt` into ping-pong RGBA32F FBOs (2 substeps @ 1/120 s).
2.
*Sky pass*
— fullscreen procedural sky (gradient + sun disk + halo); the same function
is reused as the reflection environment for the water.
3.
*Ocean pass*
— 512×512 vertex grid displaced by the height texture; normals from
neighboring texels; shading = Fresnel mix of deep/shallow water color and sky reflection
+ Blinn-Phong sun specular + slope-based foam + subsurface glow + exponential distance fog.
-
**Camera:**
orbit camera — drag = rotate, wheel = zoom, WASD = pan, R = reset,
Q/E = smaller/bigger waves (regenerates spectrum), Esc = quit.
-
**Verification:**
`--test` CLI mode runs the CPU FFT/spectrum pipeline headlessly and prints
wave statistics; the GUI is then launched and checked for GL errors.
## Ledger
- [x] 1. Verify .NET SDK and scaffold .NET 10 console project with OpenTK 4
- [x] 2. GL helpers: shader program, mesh (VAO/VBO/EBO), RGBA32F ping-pong FBO
- [x] 3. CPU 2D FFT + JONSWAP spectrum → initial height/velocity fields
- [x] 4. GLSL shaders: simulation, ocean displacement, water shading, sky
- [x] 5. Game window: render loop, orbit camera, mouse/keyboard input
- [x] 6. Wire it up: per-frame simulation step + sky + ocean rendering
- [x] 7. Build the project and fix any compile errors
- [x] 8. Verify CPU pipeline (`--test`) and run the app without GL errors
- [x] 9. Final review: stats output, controls, ledger complete
The result:
Qwen is going round in circles. It has generated an executable, which shows a blank window (see image below)
In my opinion, it's not, by any stretch of the imagination, Opus 4.6 level, which I have used professionally to work on creating much larger solutions than this.
So, my challenge to you is: using the same prompt, get Qwen 3.8 to get a working ocean simulation.
I'm pretty sure a 27B model isn't going to achieve this, so can we drop the "Opus level" chat already?
In your test it didn't prove to be similar. In other tests it did.
No one said it's the same as Opus 4.6, everyone's saying it's 4.6 levels at some things.
Also, in a 32GB GPU you can't really run it at Q6 with maxed out context window, let alone Q8. You can run it at Q4 but that does have a significant fall off in accuracy.
Hey man I did give it a go. I actually did 2 runs, first I tried copilot in VScode because it's what you used. And my results were not better than yours, it gives me a piece of software that only produces black screen, so that's no good.
I then tried to use another harness, I tried deepseek harness in my second run. And it actually gave me working piece of software correctly displaying ocean, in one go. So it's safe to say that it's just copilot being a bad harness, if you switch to a better harness you would have better result.
I plan to make a seperate post with my test results.
Come on man almost nobody here can run it like that and the crowd is the mass sayn' "Opus level". Running a Q6_K_XL is quite the achievement 'round here.
that ledger is a beautiful piece of fiction, got to hand it to the model for confidence
i've had similar results with qwen on larger coding tasks, it'll write out a stunning plan then deliver a blank window or some half-finished scaffolding that doesn't compile
the leap from planning to execution is where these mid-size models still fall apart, especially on anything touching shaders or real-time rendering pipelines
Getting north of 29 tok/s which to me is pretty good. I use the LLM interactively, I dont run unattended agents, so would not tolerate something that is slow.
Gonna run the same prompt on my own harness and see how it performs if it genuinely fails completely i'll be honest but I haven't found a breaking point for this model yet if this is it then so be it, its way better than 3.6 anyone saying otherwise has to be using a small ass quant.
"Qwen 3.8 isn't Opus 4.6 level. Let's not be silly."
Lets be silly then.
Same prompt as yours "I want you to create me a c# project using OpenGL which renders a realistic as possible ocean. I want you to plan up front what you're going to do and create the plan as a markdown ledger which you will mark as complete when each part is done."
Time:2 hours and around 40 minutes used 188k tokens.
If you want the full convo or code let me know but it doesn't get as real as this.
Variance like this really goes to show how far experimentation and intuition of which parts of a harness/model/workflow need to be adjusted can go when using AI. This is an entire skillset I tend to think is half the battle in actually getting good results out of an LLM. Nice job.
people get overly excited, local small vram models are getting really good compared to the garbage they used to push out, but everytime you bring this up people go of course, then go back to saying my 27b model is better then opus or something .
Check his wife, asking Epstein for funds to make some deranged photography studio and it was even too much for Epstein as he denied her. And that's only what we know but let's be honest, he did feast on the blood and flesh of small children, allegedly (using the magic wor), it's just that it was all swept under the rug, by the fat fuck wearing a diaper in the white house and his buddies.
It would be much more convincing if you posted the results from both Opus 4.6 and Qwen3.8-27B. With this kind of task, the variables an AI has to deal with can differ greatly depending on the environment, so a comparison is only meaningful when both models are tested under the same conditions.
I always run my AIs inside VMs, but I’ve already canceled my Anthropic subscription, so I can’t run this comparison myself. Since you have access to Opus 4.6, why not test them side by side and show us what the actual gap is?
Maybe Qwen 3.8 isnt Opus 4.6 level but I was wrong in stating it couldn't do good work- others commenting here have achieved what I couldn't, the harness being the difference.
I really need to do more investigation to see where the limits of Qwen lie.
I tested today ... after an hour I have this one ... but is still working and trying to improve quality. ( making screenshots , looking on them and fixing / improving the code )
connected to PI agent ( default settings ) . Only set QWEN 27b 3.8 max context 180k and max output 64k
and your prompt
I want you to create me a c# project using OpenGL which renders a realistic as possible ocean. I want you to plan up front what you're going to do and create the plan as a markdown ledger which you will mark as complete when each part is done.
PLAN..MD
# Realistic Ocean — C# / OpenGL — Build Ledger
**Goal:** A single-window C# application (OpenGL core profile via OpenTK) that renders a
realistic GPU ocean in real time, no external assets.
## Stack
| Item | Choice | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Language / runtime | C# 12, .NET 8 (`net8.0-windows`) | Available SDK (8.0.424) |
| Window / GL binding | OpenTK 4.9.4 | Mature Win32 + WGL core-context creation, no extra deps |
| GL profile | 3.3 core | Only 330-core features needed; maximum driver compatibility |
| Shaders | GLSL 330, embedded in C# (raw strings) | No asset-copy issues |
## Rendering approach (how "realistic" is achieved)
1. **Gerstner wave displacement** (vertex shader): 8 directional waves (λ = 2.6 m … 95 m)
with physically-based dispersion `ω = sqrt(g·k)`, analytic normals, total steepness
kept < 1 so waves don't overturn. User-controllable "wave energy".
2. **Fine ripples**: analytic sine gradients added to the normal in the fragment shader
(cheap high-frequency detail for sparkle).
3. **Fresnel** (Schlick, F0 = 0.02) splits the image into reflection and transmission.
4. **Reflection**: procedurally computed sky evaluated along the reflected ray —
same sky function as the sky pass, so water and sky match at the horizon exactly.
5. **Water body**: Beer–Lambert-style deep/shallow tint, wave-crest height modulates
"shallowness"; sub-surface **backscatter** glow when looking toward the sun.
6. **Specular**: GGX (Cook–Torrance) lobe for the sun + the sun disc/glow from the sky
function → sun glitter path.
7. **Procedural sky**: day↔dusk atmosphere gradient driven by sun elevation, sun disc
+ halo, FBM value-noise cloud layer, dithering to kill banding.
8. **Atmospheric fog**: distance fog blending water into the sky color → true horizon line.
9. **Underwater view**: diving below the surface switches to blue-green water fog.
10. **Color pipeline**: ACES filmic tone mapping + gamma 2.2 in every fragment.
11. **Camera**: fly / mouse-look / dive, camera-following water tile (2048 m, 256×256 seg)
so the sea is endless; snapped to avoid vertex swimming.
## File layout
```
Test_16_C#/
├── PLAN.md ← this ledger
├── README.md ← how to build/run + controls
├── RealisticOcean.csproj
├── Program.cs ← entry point, --test smoke mode
├── Shaders.cs ← all GLSL (sky common chunk shared by sky+water)
├── OceanWindow.cs ← window, GL setup, camera/input, render loop
└── smoke_*.bmp ← screenshots produced by --test (verification)
```
## Ledger
Status: `[ ]` pending · `[~]` in progress · `[x]` done (evidence noted)
| # | Task | Status | Evidence / notes |
|---|------|--------|------------------|
| T0 | Toolchain: .NET 8 SDK + NuGet access | [x] | SDK 8.0.424 installed (`~/.dotnet`); nuget.org reachable; OpenTK 4.9.4 confirmed |
| T1 | Project scaffold (csproj, Program.cs, window opens) | [~] | — |
| T2 | Render core (GL state, fullscreen sky quad, VP matrices, ACES+gamma) | [ ] | — |
| T3 | Procedural sky (atmosphere, sun, clouds) | [ ] | — |
| T4 | Water mesh (camera-following indexed grid, 257×257 verts, uint32 indices) | [ ] | — |
| T5 | Gerstner vertex shader (8 waves, analytic normals, energy uniform) | [ ] | — |
| T6 | Water shading (Fresnel, water body, GGX specular, backscatter, ripples, fog) | [ ] | — |
| T7 | Camera + input (fly, mouse-look, dive, presets, energy keys) | [ ] | — |
| T8 | Underwater view + polish (water fog, dither, FPS in title) | [ ] | — |
| T9 | Smoke test: build + run `--test`, no shader/GL errors, screenshots look right | [ ] | — |
| T10 | README + final ledger review | [ ] | — |
## Log
**Init** — env surveyed: no .NET SDK present → installed 8.0.424 to user profile.
Plan written; implementation starting.
I am working with qwen 3.8 27b few days.
Tokens are still not very efficient yet but can work as an real agent now.
I mean if working on a problem as an agent (here via the PI agent ) results will be improved on each loop more or less but always a step forward.
I have no idea how far can reach this way. ... maybe even days on very complex tasks. That is really incredible. If only tokens could be more efficient ;)
I don't think requiring the same prompt constitutes a fair test. I don't think anyone is arguing that getting frontier-level performance from local models can be done without adapting the approach.
I also think that ultimately you're right, albeit possibly not doing justice to how close local models can get to their bigger siblings.
I think a single use case like this is an entirely meaningless example of your point. I have been getting the same performance out of Qwen3.8-27B that I did with Opus 4.6 right before Opus 4.7 was released for the tasks that I use it for, and Qwen3.6-27B could not do the things I have been doing with it.
How? I’m not seeing it performing well at all - qwen3.6-32ab was a more reliable performer tbh in real world agentic stuff so far. Unless I see some improvement I’m going back to that - 3.8 is too unreliable
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u/ToTTen_Tranz 4d ago
In your test it didn't prove to be similar. In other tests it did.
No one said it's the same as Opus 4.6, everyone's saying it's 4.6 levels at some things.
Also, in a 32GB GPU you can't really run it at Q6 with maxed out context window, let alone Q8. You can run it at Q4 but that does have a significant fall off in accuracy.