Does enabling GPU Hardware Scheduling in Windows 11 help or hurt performance in games? Or does it vary by game?

[Space Lynx]

I googled it, and I can't seem to find any actual benchmarks with it turned on vs turned off... and I just noticed my most recent AMD drivers have it in the description they added GPU Hardware Scheduling, it used to be available for Windows 10, but they made it a Win 11 exclusive for some reason.

Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling - DirectX Developer Blog

Introduction to Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling. Modernizing the GPU scheduler at the heart of the Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM).

devblogs.microsoft.com

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 23.12.1 WHQL Released

AMD today released the latest version of AMD Software Adrenalin Edition. Version 23.12.1 WHQL comes with optimization for "Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora," and "The Finals." The AMD Software UI has undergone a redesign for its Home and Gaming tabs, which make it easier to enable HYPR-RX profiles...

www.techpowerup.com

in the second link you can see they added gpu hardware scheduling.

 

[Dr. Dro]

It's supposed to be transparent. It's a WDDM feature and its focus is not performance but rather enabling the graphics driver to do a few things with lower latency by allowing it to control certain timing features and manage its own memory instead of Windows itself.

For example, DLSS frame generation requires HAGS to be enabled. AMD's fluid motion frames/FSR 3.0 equivalent likely benefits to some degree from this being enabled as well.

As for performance, benchmarking is largely anecdotal and within margin of error, tests on previous generation Nvidia Ampere GPUs show -5 to +5% depending on the game. Unfortunately not much data on the AMD side as they never supported this well, one experimental driver for RDNA 1 back in 2021 and nothing else until now.

New Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling driver is coming?

27.20.14537.1001 apparently have it, thru windows 10 beta channel. This + SAM (for Polaris+) would bring huge improvements for low% FPS

forums.guru3d.com

 

[Chomiq]

Tested: Nvidia GPU Hardware Scheduling with AMD and Intel CPUs

Putting new Nvidia drivers to the test

www.tomshardware.com

I expect the same from AMD.

GN test:

Windows 10 Hardware-Accelerated GPU Scheduling Benchmarks (Frametimes, FPS) | GamersNexus

stub Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling is a feature new to Microsoft’s May 2020 update, Windows 10 version 2004, and has now been supported by both NVIDIA and AMD via driver updates. This feature is not to be confused with DirectX 12 Ultimate, which was delivered in the same Windows update...

gamersnexus.net

 

[Space Lynx]

Is it something I have to turn on manually, or will these new AMD drivers auto enable it if I do a clean install of Windows 11?

 

[sLowEnd]

Some people seem to experience stutters with HAGS turned on. YMMV

 

[Space Lynx]

Some people seem to experience stutters with HAGS turned on. YMMV

Damn, all this shit is so annoying, so many settings, I can't stand it, half the time I want to go back to consoles, but then I remember consoles also have like 40 settings in-game now, sigh. I miss the pick up and play PS2 days on a nice tube tv, everything was so simple.

 

[Dr. Dro]

Some people seem to experience stutters with HAGS turned on. YMMV

Some people have stuttering or performance regressions with Resizable BAR (SAM) for example. It's not necessarily the norm.

Is it something I have to turn on manually, or will these new AMD drivers auto enable it if I do a clean install of Windows 11?

Should be on by default on supported hardware otherwise a toggle on Windows graphics settings (requires a reboot)

 

[Space Lynx]

I'm going to do a clean install of Windows 11 this weekend and give it a go. Thanks. I think my x3d cpu may benefit from going to Win 11 too, I am going run a few demanding games that don't max out my monitor refresh rate. Save game. Reload save on the win 11 setup and see if I get any bumps in performance from the OS jump. just out of curiosity really, I will report back

Really wish this site had a !remind in x days feature and I get a notification not to forget this post...

 

[Chomiq]

I'm going to do a clean install of Windows 11 this weekend and give it a go. Thanks. I think my x3d cpu may benefit from going to Win 11 too, I am going run a few demanding games that don't max out my monitor refresh rate. Save game. Reload save on the win 11 setup and see if I get any bumps in performance from the OS jump. just out of curiosity really, I will report back

Really wish this site had a !remind in x days feature and I get a notification not to forget this post...

In before shader compilation stutter.

And why exactly do you need to clean install W11? HAGS is a toggle in settings.

 

[Space Lynx]

In before shader compilation stutter.

And why exactly do you need to clean install W11? HAGS is a toggle in settings.

cause I'm on Win 10 atm, and this feature is Win 11 lol

 

[Chomiq]

cause I'm on Win 10 atm, and this feature is Win 11 lol

No it isn't?

 

[Space Lynx]

No it isn't?

someone in this same thread previous said it is... i looked in win 10 settings just now and i dont see a toggle for it. im on win 10 home, so maybe that makes a difference? win 10 pro i'd see the setting?

 

[Chomiq]

someone in this same thread previous said it is... i looked in win 10 settings just now and i dont see a toggle for it. im on win 10 home, so maybe that makes a difference? win 10 pro i'd see the setting?

Win 10 Pro

It isn't there it isn't recognized as supported by hardware:

Based on r/amd input:

It only seemed to work when i tried the beta driver on windows 11 a couple days back in my experience hags caused more issues, more crashing and instability, hags seem to only work on windows 11 from what ive seen

I wouldn't bother with it.

HAGS is a Windows feature introduced in W10, if it isn't showing as supported when it should then AMD messed up something in the driver.

 

[Space Lynx]

thanks... yeah mine doesn't show it... either a limitation of Windows 10 Home not being Pro... my hardware should qualify for it... latest drivers installed and it says supports it... so confused...

 

[Chomiq]

thanks... yeah mine doesn't show it... either a limitation of Windows 10 Home not being Pro... my hardware should qualify for it... latest drivers installed and it says supports it... so confused...

From GN article that I linked before:

Enabling hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling requires Windows 10 2004, a supported GPU, and the latest drivers for that GPU (NVIDIA version 451.48, AMD version 20.5.1 Beta). With those requirements satisfied, a switch labelled “Hardware-accelerated GPU Scheduling” should appear in the Windows 10 “Graphics Settings” menu, off by default.

So AMD already had it but they opted to disable it at some point.

 

[Dr. Dro]

thanks... yeah mine doesn't show it... either a limitation of Windows 10 Home not being Pro... my hardware should qualify for it... latest drivers installed and it says supports it... so confused...

Windows edition has nothing to do with it. AMD's driver doesn't support HAGS on Windows 10 or on anything older than RDNA 3 (seems RX 7600 is also not supported).

From GN article that I linked before:

AMD had removed HAGS from their drivers until now.

 

[Chomiq]

Windows edition has nothing to do with it. AMD's driver doesn't support HAGS on Windows 10

There's no mention of this in their release notes.

 

[Space Lynx]

so it probably will work if I move to Windows 11 then, AMD seems to have disabled it on Win 10 even with these new drivers that support it. shame the driver notes don't say this, would have saved me some time.

 

[Dr. Dro]

There's no mention of this in their release notes.

Only people who have it working are using Navi 31/32 on Win11, it seems. My friend with a 6900XT on 10 can't enable it

 

[Chomiq]

Only people who have it working are using Navi 31/32 on Win11, it seems. My friend with a 6900XT on 10 can't enable it

Well then if they haven't stated that they aren't supporting it on W10 then...

 

[Space Lynx]

yeah I will do a clean install of 11 then, I want to see if Hardware Unboxed win 10 vs 11 makes a performance difference on x3d chips anyway. they show it does but that article is like 2 years old now, so i want to see for myself if win 11 nets me gains in fps. so this is just another reason for me to go to 11 right now

 

[INSTG8R]

Not on my Win10 Pro and RDNA3 but then I was pretty sure already it was just Win11 because "reasons"

 

[Waldorf]

i have HW scheduling enable on pro and the non pro of win 10 (Nv gpu/driver), so NOT a win (11 only) issue

@Space Lynx since i had changed the cpu, i wanted to see if there was a diff in perf,
but had turned off hwacgs a few month ago (didnt remember), and saw a noticeable drop.
my 2080S was getting bm results up to 5% off, compared to running it enabled.
no noticeable impact on games that i could tell, then again, not running AAA @8K/200Hz...

 

[INSTG8R]

i have HW scheduling enable on pro and the non pro of win 10 (Nv gpu/driver), so NOT a win (11 only) issue

This not an NV issue it’s had HAGS for quite some time on both OS‘s…AMD has tested it with ONE driver probably over a year ago now. This is their second driver to include it and it is only available on Win11…

 

[Waldorf]

lol, true.
not sure but i guess it was too late for me to read this properly,
overlooked he had a 7900