KingSaulDo developers need to update their games?

HDDs can take advantage of DirectStorage, wherein game data stored on them is directly accessed by GPUs

zmeulAnd we're going back to pre-caching like the engines of old, instead of textures streaming

zmeulAnd we're going back to pre-caching like the engines of old, instead of textures streaming

btarunrMicrosoft also added a means for a game to know whether compressed assets are being decompressed by the GPU, or whether a software (CPU) fallback is engaged for reasons such as incompatible compression/file format. This feedback mechanism allows the game to adjust its asset quality (such as texture resolution), to compensate for the reduced decompression performance.

Nicholas Steelordering commands to minimize HDD seeking and this requires a buffer to simultaneously hold multiple commands in (NCQ, Native Command Queuing). With SSD's the Seek time is the same regardless of where data is physically located, which is why they don't need buffering.

chrcolukInteresting, recognition that directstorage is not just about loading times but also shifting processing off the CPU which is a common bottleneck.

Guwapo77I thought that was the entire point of Directstorage was to bypass the CPU or did I miss something?

TumbleGeorgeThere was a time... when Nvidia wanted everything to be done by the graphics card, without a CPU. I even forgot when that was. On the subject, there is no way to completely exclude the CPU from any computer configuration activity. In this case, the aspiration is to have the part of the asset decompression tasks performed in the most demanding part of the GPU. But Direct Storage performs several different tasks simultaneously.

Nicholas SteelDirectStorage v1.0 and v1.1 work with HDD's, the problem was that commands weren't buffered so the HDD couldn't optimize the order of operations to minimize Seek Time. The newly added Buffered mode enables the HDD to optimize operations fed to it in order to minimize Seek Time.

Read Sector 7
Read Sector 7049
Read Sector 9
Read Sector 14
Read Sector 3

Before it would process them in the order it received them in, with Buffered mode it can re-organize the commands.

Read Sector 3
Read Sector 7
Read Sector 9
Read Sector 14
Read Sector 7049

SATA III originally introduced the ability of re-ordering commands to minimize HDD seeking and this requires a buffer to simultaneously hold multiple commands in (NCQ, Native Command Queuing). With SSD's the Seek time is the same regardless of where data is physically located, which is why they don't need buffering.

The_EnigmaSince it supports Sata SSDs connected via ahci mode, does that mean it also supports SSDs that are in a storage pool via Storage Spaces or a software raid through Intel driver?

MusselsSo, they're pre-loading some content instead of all of it on the fly?
It made sense to preload some of it regardless


back when they first introduced programmable shaders, with their dream of servers and enterprise setups using their GPUs instead of CPUs


Good description of the change and how it works, a completely logical change at their end - sounds like NCQ or a way to make sure NCQ works correctly


any kind of software involved, is going to add a CPU burden - why would you want to run games off such a thing?

Nicholas SteelI've just now updated my message to clarify some things.

Guwapo77I thought that was the entire point of Directstorage was to bypass the CPU or did I miss something?

GodrillaWhile this Is not directly related does anyone know why we don't have variable textures ( like variable shaders) Where the texture assets load in as a percentage of the full asset based on the vram the end user has instead of potatoe graphics with some titles found on the 8 gig vram 3070 by Steve at Hardware Unboxed. Or the textures acting like nanite where they load more efficiently in your direct visual periphery instead of potatoe graphics?

GodrillaWhile this Is not directly related does anyone know why we don't have variable textures ( like variable shaders) Where the texture assets load in as a percentage of the full asset based on the vram the end user has instead of potatoe graphics with some titles found on the 8 gig vram 3070 by Steve at Hardware Unboxed. Or the textures acting like nanite where they load more efficiently in your direct visual periphery instead of potatoe graphics?