Friday, September 16th 2016
AMD Actively Promoting Vulkan Beyond GPUOpen
Vulkan, the new-generation cross-platform 3D graphics API governed by the people behind OpenGL, the Khronos Group, is gaining in relevance, with Google making it the primary 3D graphics API for Android. AMD said that it's actively promoting the API. Responding to a question by TechPowerUp in its recent Radeon Technology Group (RTG) first anniversary presser, its chief Raja Koduri agreed that the company is actively working with developers to add Vulkan to their productions, and optimize them for Radeon GPUs. This, we believe, could be due to one of many strategic reasons.
First, Vulkan works inherently better on AMD Graphics CoreNext GPU architecture because it's been largely derived from Mantle, a now defunct 3D graphics API by AMD that brings a lot of "close-to-metal" API features that make game consoles more performance-efficient, over to the PC ecosystem. The proof of this pudding is the AAA title and 2016 reboot of the iconic first-person shooter "Doom," in which Radeon GPUs get significant performance boosts switching from the default OpenGL renderer to Vulkan. These boosts aren't as pronounced on NVIDIA GPUs.
Second, and this could be a long shot, but the growing popularity of Vulkan could give AMD leverage over Microsoft to steer Direct3D development in areas that AMD GPUs are inherently good at - these include asynchronous compute, and tiled-resources (AMD GPUs benefit due to higher memory bandwidths). AMD has been engaging aggressively with game studios working on AAA games that use DirectX 12, and thus far AMD GPUs have been either gaining or sustaining performance better than NVIDIA GPUs, when switching from DirectX 11 fallbacks to DirectX 12 renderers.
AMD has already "opened" up much of its GPU IP to game developers through its GPUOpen initiative. Here, developers will find detailed technical resources on how to take advantage of not just AMD-specific GPU IP, but also some industry standards. Vulkan is among the richly differentiated resources AMD is giving away through the initiative.
Vulkan still has a long way to go before it becomes the primary API in AAA releases. To most gamers who don't tinker with advanced graphics settings, "Doom" still works on OpenGL. and "Talos Prinicple," works on Direct3D 11 by default, for example. It could be a while before a game runs on Vulkan out of the box, and the way its special interest group Khronos, and more importantly AMD, promote its use, not just during game development, but also long-term support, will have a lot to do with it. A lot will also depend on NVIDIA, which holds about 70% in PC discrete GPU market share, to support the API. Over-customizing Vulkan would send it the way of OpenGL. Too many vendor-specific extensions to keep up drove game developers to Direct3D in the first place.
First, Vulkan works inherently better on AMD Graphics CoreNext GPU architecture because it's been largely derived from Mantle, a now defunct 3D graphics API by AMD that brings a lot of "close-to-metal" API features that make game consoles more performance-efficient, over to the PC ecosystem. The proof of this pudding is the AAA title and 2016 reboot of the iconic first-person shooter "Doom," in which Radeon GPUs get significant performance boosts switching from the default OpenGL renderer to Vulkan. These boosts aren't as pronounced on NVIDIA GPUs.
AMD has already "opened" up much of its GPU IP to game developers through its GPUOpen initiative. Here, developers will find detailed technical resources on how to take advantage of not just AMD-specific GPU IP, but also some industry standards. Vulkan is among the richly differentiated resources AMD is giving away through the initiative.
Vulkan still has a long way to go before it becomes the primary API in AAA releases. To most gamers who don't tinker with advanced graphics settings, "Doom" still works on OpenGL. and "Talos Prinicple," works on Direct3D 11 by default, for example. It could be a while before a game runs on Vulkan out of the box, and the way its special interest group Khronos, and more importantly AMD, promote its use, not just during game development, but also long-term support, will have a lot to do with it. A lot will also depend on NVIDIA, which holds about 70% in PC discrete GPU market share, to support the API. Over-customizing Vulkan would send it the way of OpenGL. Too many vendor-specific extensions to keep up drove game developers to Direct3D in the first place.
111 Comments on AMD Actively Promoting Vulkan Beyond GPUOpen
With 1080Ti coming out so late, you have to wonder if Volta will be delayed further.
As for DX11, you can see that the same hardware can deliver more performance under DX12. You may choose to believe it's because the hardware wasn't used to its fullest under DX11 (not necessarily a driver problem) or you may choose to believe DX12 is putting pixie dust in the cards. I'm not going to try to convince you either way.
@Ungari Why do you keep calling it "Paxwell"? It's Pascal or are you trying to make some sort of "protest" because you don't like NVIDIA?I see what you mean... ;)
Don't get me wrong it's awesome - just not reading into it until I see it happen for majority of games
The current discussions on the future of API's is a philosophical error when we discuss contemporary cards.
community.amd.com/thread/202636
community.amd.com/thread/200378
community.amd.com/thread/200351
Also I am still waiting to see this thing you're talking about where the fury X is almost as fast as a 1080... lol. I'd like to believe it - would sure love a bench.^ this. Im gonna go find some posts with RejZor raging about how his 4870 will be better than the 280 "when games catch up" or the 5870 vs 480 or the 6xxx vs the GTX 5xx... or how the 7xxx series had way more compute than the GTX 6xx and will crush nvidia when the devs pull their heads out of their green asses.
oh wait... it just keeps repeating.
Meanwhile nVidia fanboys can put on a blindfold and throw a dart at a list of recent titles and 95% of the time hit a title where nV cards dominate. :/ hmm.
And what id like to know is why cant we all get along
You don't optimize hardware to a low level api, you optimize software to a hardware exposed by a low level api.
At this moment, people are using exposed parts by DX12 to better optimize for AMD because frankly, there's a lot of optimizing to do compared to their DX11 renderer. There is some valid argument that async compute IS better supported on AMD's side, but it's not a valid argument for the way you are using it as NVIDIA also supports several things AMD doesn't:
And that's just a random example.
to me it is only becoming more and more clear that NV has the power, knowledge, money and position to create astounding new gen cards and to push the boundaries of GPU´s.
They - do - NOT
They prefer to let the little guy splonder about and pace themselves at its rate of average development.
Sometimes AMD gets ahead a little bit, but they quickly fix that in a matter of months (example: 1060 release)
Intel is doing the same thing. Putting down a roadmap to 2022 for 14nm...sigh
So I am all in support of AMD where possible and give due credit.
And it´s idea/tech now being promoted in a major deal is I think a good thing and should be viewed as such.
(=> I will not advise people to buy cr*p thou)
I won´t be surprised if NV suddenly pulls of cards in their next gen that give even better support of the new API than AMD.
They had it all along, but wanted to milk fanboys with the Maxwell first.
I had been playing fallout4 on fullHD with a 2007-gen CPU and a 2011GPU (Q6600+6850)
If you wanted to play new titles in 2000 with a PC from 1992;...though luck.
sidenote:
I should pick up on an old topic about 9800pro vs 6600GT.
Many were certain the 6600GT was better.
Imagine you were the CEO of one of these companies that released the best possible product in 2016 (despite having no competition) and in 2017 you struggle coming up with something better and your profits plunge. You don't loose money, you just make way less than you did in the previous year. Will you still have a job after the shareholder's meeting?
By making Vulkan the standard API of Android, AMD may have just secured a massive advantage in their bidding....
A lot will change by the time we see Samsung ditch Mali, but right now AMD has a (disputable, imho) software advantage while Nvidia has the hardware.