This site may earn chapter commissions from the links on this page. Terms of use.

Fable2

Information technology's been over eighteen months since we starting time visited the topic of DirectX 12 and what features and benefits information technology would bring to modern gaming. Much has happened since. Windows 10'southward launch and the debut of Ashes of the Singularity brought the first hints of DirectX 12 gaming performance, every bit did Legend Legends, which debuted some weeks later. We've also covered the piece of work existence done on Vulkan, the open-source, Linux-friendly DX12 competitor (now not expected to debut until 2022), how that software might affect the hereafter of Valve and the visitor'south push for its own SteamOS, and the debut of DirectX 12 on the Xbox One as well.

From debates over the importance of asynchronous computing to confusion over exactly which characteristic sets are and aren't supporting on current hardware, DirectX 12 was one of the most important stories we covered in 2022. This story will get-go you off on a discussion of its capabilities and advantages compared with DirectX 11, and if you desire more nuance, feel complimentary to consult the links above.

Enter DX12

Microsoft and Nvidia first took the lid of DirectX 12 at GDC 2022. The new API promised to evangelize the aforementioned depression-overhead benefits of AMD's custom Mantle UI, along with vastly improved performance and superior hardware utilization compared with DirectX 11. Even better, DirectX 12 (and D3D 12) are backwards uniform with well-nigh every unmarried GPU from the GTX 400 to the present 24-hour interval. At present, only Nvidia's Kepler and Maxwell cards are DX12 compatible, but the company has promised that Fermi compatibility is coming in a future update.

Microsoft has published a blog postal service and accompanying API samples that illustrate how much more than powerful the software is, while acknowledging some of the flaws in the DirectX 11 API. Ane of the cardinal problems with DX11 is that it's about incommunicable to multi-thread the 3D rendering path. Game rendering ends upwardly running almost entirely on a single CPU thread, bogging downwardly the rest of the system. DirectX eleven also makes certain assumptions almost the underlying hardware that take proven to map poorly to GPUs from both AMD and Nvidia.

Here's a threading comparison between DX11 (top) and DX12 (bottom):

DX11 - DX12 CPU comparison

Encounter how, in DX11, the unabridged workload is hanging on a single thread with extremely depression utilization on the other threads? That'southward a problem — with the kernel-mode driver running on the same thread as the game and the D3D layer, there'southward just not much for the other threads to practice. The 2nd graph shows how, by splitting the workload more evenly, the game tin hit much lower latencies. Better latencies translates directly into college frame rates.

3DMark - DX11

3DMark – DX11

3DMark DX12

3DMark – DX12

This pair of screenshots from 3DMark 2022 further illustrate the difference. Full CPU time is dramatically reduced in DX12 by efficiently reallocating data across all cores.

OS and GPU support

DirectX 12 is currently supported on all Nvidia GPUs based on Kepler and Maxwell. That's the vast bulk of the 6xx series and all of the 7xx and 8xx graphics cards. Fermi support is coming soon, which will extend support all the way back to the 400 and 500-serial as well.

AMD supports DirectX 12 on all GCN-class hardware dating back to the launch of that family in 2022. All AMD GPUs from the HD 77xx family (or to a higher place), the Hd 85xx family (or above), and the Radeon R5 family (or above) all support DirectX 12. This includes the various iterations of GCN, from i.0 – 1.2.

One thing to empathise is that while DirectX 12 is a common API, that API has different optional features, defined as characteristic levels. AMD's get-go-generation GCN products support DirectX 12 at the 11_1 feature level , as practice Nvidia'south Fermi and Kepler cards. Cards based on Hawaii, Tonga, and Fiji back up the 12_0 feature level. More information on this, and a comprehensive comparison between AMD, Nvidia, and Intel, tin can be found here.

Windows 10 is the simply operating organization that supports DirectX 12, which means if y'all want in on these features you'll demand to take advantage of Microsoft'south gratis upgrade (or buy a new PC with W10 preloaded).

How'due south operation?

There are several facets to DirectX 12 functioning, and the benchmarks themselves are very early. Equally our Ashes and Fable Legends previews demonstrated, AMD gains some ground on its rival in DirectX 12. The gap isn't enormous, and it varies depending on which cards you compare. The GTX 980 Ti yet wins Legend Legends overall, though the Fury X closes that gap in Ashes of the Singularity. Overall, it'south also early on to draw conclusions.

If you're trying to suss out what GPU to purchase, my answer is this: With both AMD and Nvidia set to introduce cards based on xiv/16nm technology within the side by side 6-9 months, information technology's probably best to expect and see what each company brings to the table. If you accept to buy a GPU today, y'all tin expect proficient DX12 performance from either vendor. The relative departure between the 2 hasn't withal been shown to be large enough to justify fans of one company or the other jumping ship. If the early trends hold, DX12 is a bit improve for current AMD cards than it is for Nvidia, but I'm not prepare to commit to that every bit fact.

Based on what we've seen and then far, DirectX 12 won't automatically deliver higher frame rates as if by magic. Its value is in the way it loosens the stranglehold on multi-threaded CPUs, giving developers the option to use rendering techniques that take advantage of this new ability. We've too seen the option to run GPUs from two different vendors in the aforementioned PC, and there'south reason to recollect DX12 could indirectly improve AI calculations too.

Check out our ExtremeTech Explains series for more in-depth coverage of today's hottest tech topics.