Mantle API presentation by AMD, DICE and Oxide - AMD Summit 2013

[RoutedScripter]

Mantle API presentation by AMD, DICE and Oxide - AMD Summit 2013 (UPD1: Some Numbers)

UPD4: Secret Demo Slides FOUND!
UPD6: I've mixed some terms, only the secret demo is Oxide, the presentation and slide I made is from Nixxes.
UPD8: OXIDE Demo Video Now Available!
UPD9: Fixed Wrong Oxide Slides Link


This pertains more to software and more to gaming than any other subforum, so after a thought I think it fits here. However for now it's obviously AMD specific.


AMD Presentation:
AMD Mantle Technical Deep Dive - APU13 Event - PC ... (Without Q&A)

OR

https://t.co/04qQ63XkW8

• 1. Register
• 2. Click This Link Again
• 3. Enter email
• 4. Top Right Search "mantle"
• 5. Click: "BREAKOUT: GS-4112 Mantle: Empowering 3D Graphics Innovation"

DICE Presentation:
https://t.co/04qQ63XkW8

• 1. Register
• 2. Click This Link Again
• 3. Enter email
• 4. Top Right Search "mantle"
• 5. Click: "KEYNOTE: Rendering Battlefield 4 with Mantle"

Oxide Nixxes Presentation: (Thief)
https://t.co/04qQ63XkW8

• 1. Register
• 2. Click This Link Again
• 3. Enter email
• 4. Top Right Search "mantle"
• 5. Click: "BREAKOUT: GS-4151 Developing Thief with new AMD technology"

For DICE and Oxide Nixxes I haven't found on youtube, but the AMD presentation on youtube is from a differrent source than the official one, however seems like it's better quality but with the guys making noises (the official stream probably doesn't have those noises but i haven't watched it again)

Also, from the AMD presentation, you can see that AMD has the chief architects for Mantle, I saw some noobhats on neogaf talking about how "EA and DICE made Mantle with AMD helping along", total fud.



TLDR;

• 1. Massive Performance boost for all things GPU over all other PC APIs (we're talking about stuff like 50% - 150% more FPS, it's definitely not only 10FPS, the initial BF4 thing is just the start)
• 2. No more CPU bottlnecking the GPU.
• 3. Zero CPU cost and latency for GPU operations.
• 4. Better visuals possible, techniques, features you never saw on PC before, ever.
• 5. Optimization possibilities would cut costs of many visual options that simply ate it in DX, no more huge FPS drops because someone threw a smoke grenade(for example)
• 6: Multi-GPU Scaling working like it should (which means +90% efficiency)

Updates:

• UPD: Official DICE Slides http://www.mediafire.com/download/s4h21sjyvotdtd1/APU13_Johan_Andersson_DICE_Keynote_FINAL.pdf
• UPD2: Official AMD Slides http://www.mediafire.com/download/756rc480otk58af/GS-4112_Riguer.pdf
• UPD3: I made Oxide Nixxes Slides: http://i.imgur.com/nt5217p.png
• UPD4: SOME CPU NUMBERS - SECRET OXIDE NITROUS DEMO: http://www.hardware.fr/news/13450/apu13-oxide-fait-exploser-limite-cpu-avec-mantle.html (nobody can find the video, it's not in the official archives on AMD's site)

Secret Demo Slides Preview:

---------------------------------------------------------
UPD5: New Q&A Video: AMD Mantle Q&A with Developers at APU13 - YouTube (not the Oxide one, we're still waiting for it to show up if it will)

--------
UPD6: I've mixed some terms, only the secret demo is Oxide, the presentation and slide I made is from Nixxes.

----------------------------------------------------------
UPD7:

Quote of 8pack from OCUK - someone was at the AMD Summit:

Guys alot is happening with this!!! The performance is nothing short of amazing. Watch this space!!

UPD8:
"Secret" Oxide Demo Now Available:

UPD9:
Fixed Wrong Oxide "Secret" Slides Link

UPD10:
New Oxide Demo Video (+7000 units)

 

[RCoon]

TLDR;
1. Massive Performance boost for all things GPU over all other PC APIs (we're talking about stuff like 50% - 150% more FPS, it's definitely not only 10FPS, the initial BF4 thing is just the start)
2. No more CPU bottlnecking the GPU.
3. Zero CPU cost and latency for GPU operations.
4. Better visuals possible, techniques, features you never saw on PC before, ever.
5. Optimization possibilities would cut costs of many visual options that simply ate it in DX, no more huge FPS drops because someone threw a smoke grenade(for example)
6: Multi-GPU Scaling working like it should (which means +90% efficiency)
Here are the slides from the DICE presentation I made: http://imgur.com/a/EIOIE (DICE has more from the application side, from the GPU side it's at AMD presentation)

Those are some very bold claims to make. I doubt they'll make it 100% on any of them, but it's nice to see them trying to make a difference, particularly them claiming that while "other" GPU's could get 60FPS in a game, with mantle they could get 120FPS (from that 50-150% FPS increase you're claiming). That won't happen. I await to see the multi-GPU scaling promises as well, it took them a while to deal with that.

 

[Sempron Guy]

This better be true else it would be another claim like those during bulldozer all over again. Does EA's BF4 Mantle support still on track this december? Can't wait to see the results but for now I'll take these claims with big bag full of salt.

 

[RoutedScripter]

The differences will not be noticable to most, because mantle and support will gradually increase, so will game complexity and vistual effects, which will lower FPS.

These statements probably are too low, the performance increase could probably be even higher, the posibility is there, it just takes programmers to put effort into. The initial BF4 release probably won't show the true power of Mantle at all.

Most of the pessimists around the interwebs are mostly neogaf noobs and other gamer dudes who don't really comprehend what this means, all this hardware is useless without software, and seemingly small changes in software techniques bring big peformance improvements, however not all of that will be noticed in the increased FPS, ofcourse the CPU time and resources will be much lower, and that doesn't directly show up as higher FPS ofcourse.

People who could barely run BF4 would be able to run in good!

 

[Easy Rhino]

does this mean with mantle that if i have a top of the line gpu and an old amd x2 3800 that the cpu will not bottleneck????? that would be huge...

 

[Frick]

does this mean with mantle that if i have a top of the line gpu and an old amd x2 3800 that the cpu will not bottleneck????? that would be huge...

That would be witchcraft.

Seriously thought I want to see it in action and read some proper reviews and stuff!

 

[HTC]

does this mean with mantle that if i have a top of the line gpu and an old amd x2 3800 that the cpu will not bottleneck????? that would be huge...

This may be their intention but i have serious doubts it will work as they claim: seems over optimistic, IMO, but time will tell.

Still, any benefits it may end up bringing makes the tech worth while, no?

 

[Xzibit]

Here is an interesting quote...

James Prior

"With Mantle, an @AMDFX 8350 underclocked to 2GHZ, the game is still GPU bound on a R9 290X - no loss in frame rate"

 

[mafia97]

will gtx 580 support mantle , kepler supports mantle - read somewhere
EDIT : I know gtx 580 is not kepler

 

[Mathragh]

I find it very telling that the guy from dice kept emphasising that he really thinks this is the way forward, and that other vendors should also support this.

 

[SIGSEGV]

Those are some very bold claims to make. I doubt they'll make it 100% on any of them, but it's nice to see them trying to make a difference, particularly them claiming that while "other" GPU's could get 60FPS in a game, with mantle they could get 120FPS (from that 50-150% FPS increase you're claiming). That won't happen. I await to see the multi-GPU scaling promises as well, it took them a while to deal with that.

will gtx 580 support mantle , kepler supports mantle - read somewhere
EDIT : I know gtx 580 is not kepler

it because mantle is an Open API

https://twitter.com/repi/status/400803254147485696/photo/1

huge win for AMD

 

[RCoon]

http://puu.sh/5i4JW.png

That's all incredibly vague. I'll believe it when I see it, and see it, I do not.

Somebody provide me with hard facts, then I'll become a belieber in Mantle.

 

[Mathragh]

That's all incredibly vague. I'll believe it when I see it, and see it, I do not.

Somebody provide me with hard facts, then I'll become a belieber in Mantle.

While ofc they don't prove anything, you should really watch the presentations.

All three are really informative, and all provide a really nice perspective on what this API means for developers.

Its almost shocking how bad the situation apparently sometimes was tbh, although the fact that drivers needed so much tinkering at both sides should've been a major clue(in hindsight).

Also, I find it striking that it is AMD, not Nvidia that came with this. Ofc AMD now has the consoles which make things a lot easier, but Nvidia always likened to profile itself as a software company. I suppose the fact that they would've probably wanted to implement it in a proprietary way would limit its use(see PhysX).

 

[RCoon]

While ofc they don't prove anything, you should really watch the presentations.

All three are really informative, and all provide a really nice perspective on what this API means for developers.

Its almost shocking how bad the situation apparently sometimes was tbh, although the fact that drivers needed so much tinkering at both sides should've been a major clue(in hindsight).

Also, I find it striking that it is AMD, not Nvidia that came with this. Ofc AMD now has the consoles which make things a lot easier, but Nvidia always likened to profile itself as a software company. I suppose the fact that they would've probably wanted to implement it in a proprietary way would limit its use(see PhysX).

I hope nobody get's me wrong, I genuinely want AMD to do all this and make everything better in an Open kind of way. Sadly most companies, not just AMD, tend not to deliver on their promises.

 

[vega22]

ati have had the lead in multi gpu scaling for years, this will only help that but also show nv failings more too.

what i find hard to swallow is it removing any cpu bottleneck.

 

[Easy Rhino]

i just don't see how this is possible. mantle must completely rewrite the rules for coding 3d games...

 

[Mathragh]

I hope nobody get's me wrong, I genuinely want AMD to do all this and make everything better in an Open kind of way. Sadly most companies, not just AMD, tend not to deliver on their promises.

Aye, same here. It sure does look like atleast AMD has their side of the story covered, and I suppose that makes sense since they needed to provide something similar for console developers anyway.
Now its up to the developers, and (hopefully?) Nvidia and Intel to provide support for this aswell. If those presenters are to be believed, there isn't really a big downside to using this API, so from a software development point I suppose mantle makes sense. However, I don't see either Nvidia or Intel easily rolling over and provide support for this, even if it was actually quite doable and gave them a decent performance boost.

 

[TheMailMan78]

There is gonna be a lot of butt hurt people when Mantel turns out to be pixie dust.

 

[RoutedScripter]

This better be true else it would be another claim like those during bulldozer all over again. Does EA's BF4 Mantle support still on track this december? Can't wait to see the results but for now I'll take these claims with big bag full of salt.

This is not a claim, this is the API in which AMD only designed the core of it with help from DICE, It's up to BF4 development team to get it up the speed they have time until december deadline, the game it self does most of the things the DX drivers do in DX games, no more reliance on AMD updates to get your game running (Rage), the developer will be able to put out an emergency hotfix in a day or even hours to fix any kind of GPU problems, unless it's an API problem but games won't get released if that would be the case, they can't work with a buggy API. But with Mantle, it will be much easier to make the game stable enough before it even releases, unlike in DX, which in order to get the game running great, 2 companies would have to cooperate on an inefficinet, buggy old API called DirectX, not to mention OS interaction, windows runs on a buggy and crappy code compared to linux.


This thing doesn't have just performance benefits, it's so much all around improvement.

I don't want to speculate in number too much, but if the initial BF4 demo proves to be significant, then you can only guess what comes when a game that has been designed for mantle from ground up will look like, this is the trick, the available resources will simply be taken for more visuals and tasks so it probably won't be that easy to spot the difference, this number are perfectly realistic, I think they might be too low if you ask me honestly, in the long run.

does this mean with mantle that if i have a top of the line gpu and an old amd x2 3800 that the cpu will not bottleneck????? that would be huge...

Indeed, the API works completely differently and is designed to allow multi-threading easily, it will smoke DX in this area, with DX, the CPU had to spoonfeed the GPU, now GPU works almost (im not sure if it's 100%) independently, and the huge driver and API overheads in CPU are gone, you're looking at somewhere from 50% and up less CPU utilization for the same work

And the quote is

"Mantle will just blow the socks off CPU optimization"

ati have had the lead in multi gpu scaling for years, this will only help that but also show nv failings more too.

what i find hard to swallow is it removing any cpu bottleneck.

If DICE or Oxide Games quickly focuses on mutli-gpu scaling, then Crossfire will absolutely smoke anything you've seen before, utilitzation is now like 40-15%, the more cards you add the less it scales, this will not be with Mantle.

Well there probably will be some CPU bottleneck, I can't say no because I don't know my self for sure, but it will lower it significantly.

Quote: "On PC it's like above 50% but on Consoles is just a little bit, we want to get that down to console levels"

Which means, for example, on PC, if your APP uses 50% CPU resources, 50% of that is wasted on Spoonfeeding, so with Mantle, your CPU would then have ~25%.

i just don't see how this is possible. mantle must completely rewrite the rules for coding 3d games...

Indeed



http://techreport.com/news/25651/ma...ite-games-dice-calls-for-multi-vendor-support

Quote:

Jorjen Katsman of Nixxes, the firm porting Thief to the PC, mentioned a reduction in API overhead from 40% with DirectX 11 to around 8% with Mantle. He added that it's "not unrealistic that you'd get 20% additional GPU performance" with Mantle.

This is just the beginning guys!

 

[Hilux SSRG]

Not much was really said and AMD is just playing marketing games to keep people talking about Mantle and its endless world hunger cures. And Nvidia is touting its CUDA update in a try to stem Mantle talk.

Has AMD put out the SDK for Mantle yet?

 

[Easy Rhino]

There is gonna be a lot of butt hurt people when Mantel turns out to be pixie dust.

this seems a lot like that "unlimited detail technology' snakeoil. promising grand changes to the world of graphics but never ever delivers... sell your AMD stock now.

 

[TheMailMan78]

this seems a lot like that "unlimited detail technology' snakeoil. promising grand changes to the world of graphics but never ever delivers... sell your AMD stock now.

The last time RuskiSnajper had a thread like this it was the "MEGA RAGE" thread and how iD software was gonna change the world with the tech5 engine........we all saw how that turned out.

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/showthread.php?t=150325

 

[TheGuruStud]

The last time RuskiSnajper had a thread like this it was the "MEGA RAGE" thread and how iD software was gonna change the world with the tech5 engine........we all saw how that turned out.

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/showthread.php?t=150325

The game wasn't very good lol. When was the last time iD made a great game?

At least mantle is something new. An OK game with a bleh engine isn't exciting.

 

[Nordic]

this seems a lot like that "unlimited detail technology' snakeoil. promising grand changes to the world of graphics but never ever delivers... sell your AMD stock now.

I remember that unlimited detail technology. The difference between mantle and UDT is that AMD can't hide if it does not pan out.

 

[MxPhenom 216]

I remember that unlimited detail technology. The difference between mantle and UDT is that AMD can't hide if it does not pan out.

Difference between UDT and anything is the fact, that GPUs today are not exactly made to process graphics the way UDT wants. They can do it technically, but performance would be balls.