Microsoft Patents Resource-Based Ray Tracing, Promises Less Strain on GPU VRAM

[AleksandarK]

Microsoft has filed for a new and even potentially groundbreaking patent that could transform the way ray tracing graphics are processed, especially when video memory (VRAM) is scarce. The patent proposes a technique to minimize the memory footprint of ray tracing graphics, tackling the escalating concerns about the growing memory demands for ray tracing and path tracing. The innovation outlined in Microsoft's patent employs a dynamic level of detail (LOD) approach to adaptively modify the quality of ray tracing effects based on accessible resources. The patent portrays the ray tracing pipeline as an acceleration structure that can be streamlined using this LOD system. The cornerstone of this optimization is a residency map that aligns with a bounding volume hierarchy of objects. The graphics processing system can then utilize this map to ascertain the suitable quality level for objects at any given moment. This methodology enables a more reasonable allocation of resources, guaranteeing that the most crucial objects receive the highest quality rendering. At the same time, less important elements can be rendered at lower quality to conserve memory.

Microsoft's patent could have far-reaching ramifications for the design and performance of upcoming GPUs. By implementing this novel LOD system, GPUs with more modest VRAM capacities, such as those with 8 GB, could provide ray tracing performance on par with higher-end models boasting larger memory buffers, given enough compute capacity. This advancement could pave the way for more budget-friendly GPUs that still deliver adequate ray tracing capabilities, making the technology more accessible. Moreover, the adaptive nature of the LOD system could contribute to a more reliable performance across diverse scenarios, as the GPU would be capable of adjusting to the available resources in real time. Microsoft's patent could emerge as a game-changer in the realm of GPU design and performance, and we are now waiting to see if any real-world implementations appear.



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[Chomiq]

So glad that it's patented, now it will be widely used by everyone.

/s

 

[tpuuser256]

nothing nvidia hasn't developed

 

[Dristun]

I feel like VRAM is not the biggest of concerns when it comes to ray tracing performance lol. Good for consoles, I suppose.

 

[Onasi]

I feel like VRAM is not the biggest of concerns when it comes to ray tracing performance lol. Good for consoles, I suppose.

I mean, if the largest supplier of PC GPUs decides to keep on equipping budget and mid-range cards with 8 to 12 gigs of VRAM it eventually will be. Not today, but if it keeps happening… And yes, I also feel dirty by referring to 600 goddamn dollars GPUs like 4070 and 4070S as “mid-range”, but that’s the current insane market for ya.

 

[Vayra86]

nothing nvidia hasn't developed

Too bad green doesn't like sharing.

MS thrives on it, this is progress.
Much like their attempt to make upscale more universal, this is the kind of industry traction I would have expected when Huang announced his 'muh 10 gigarayz' at SIGGRAPH prior to Turing.

We both owe it, and don't owe it to Nvidia that RT is still niche. It could have been a lot more at this point, but hey, then you can't sell 3 generations worth of heavily subpar 'RT capable' GPUs can you?

This is Gsync all over again.

 

[Recus]

So RT games will require less VRAM while AMD pushing 17 GB VRAM for rasterization games.

 

[AnarchoPrimitiv]

So RT games will require less VRAM while AMD pushing 17 GB VRAM for rasterization games.

What? Are you actually making fun of a company for giving MORE of something? Is that really what you're doing?

 

[R-T-B]

nothing nvidia hasn't developed

If this were true, it'd be grounds to invalidate this patent. Evidence?

Patents are supposed to only be issued to original works.

 

[john_]

So glad that it's patented, that wouldn't allow Nvidia to promote it's own version with a different name and compatibility only on next gen RTX cards.

There, I fixed it for you and without needing an "/s" in the end.

 

[Denver]

I'm not sure it's a good idea to have a dynamic cache constantly writing to the SSD during gameplay.

 

[ZoneDymo]

So RT games will require less VRAM while AMD pushing 17 GB VRAM for rasterization games.

you have to explain this comment because it makes no sense to me.

 

[Vya Domus]

I feel like VRAM is not the biggest of concerns when it comes to ray tracing performance

It may be for a certain GPU manufacturer that really doesn't like to put a lot of VRAM on their products.

 

[stimpy88]

So it reduces visual fidelity the less VRAM you have... Hardly groundbreaking, and not really a solution to nGreedia not putting enough VRAM on their cards in the first place, all this this will do is help nGreedia carry on that profit-boosting tactic for another few years.

In fairness though, this might help the XBox.

16Gb is the new minimum going forward, but I will put a year's pay that nGreedia will not increase VRAM with Blackwell, only in the top card, possibly.

 

[ZoneDymo]

So it reduces visual fidelity the less VRAM you have... Hardly groundbreaking, and not really a solution to nGreedia not putting enough VRAM on their cards in the first place, all this this will do is help nGreedia carry on that profit-boosting tactic for another few years.

In fairness though, this might help the XBox.

16Gb is the new minimum going forward, but I will put a year's pay that nGreedia will not increase VRAM with Blackwell, only in the top card, possibly.

Well the idea is kinda like variable rate shading, which I think so far hasnt been really successful.... but basically stuff that is barely visible anyway will have lower quality RT.

What I do fear with this to some extend is that it will go against what makes RT so cool, like a friend was streaming Control and I noticed that the orb shaped corner from a ingame flightcase was reflecting the character in it.
That was just really cool to see, so I hope this form of culling for performance will really only affect "distant" things so this sorta fun RT stuff remains intact.

 

[kapone32]

Well since Sony did not share it's version of Direct Storage, I guess MS is protecting itself and you know this will be a part of Win 12 to try to entice us to jump to that OS. If they make an Xbox variant with that it would also compete well with whatever Sony brings next.

 

[john_]

In fairness though, this might help the XBox.

Probably this is where it is going to be used. XBOX. On PCs there is no need.

I'm not sure it's a good idea to have a dynamic cache constantly writing to the SSD during gameplay.

I think the news post doesn't talk about SSD usage. Just ways to limit the VRAM requirements, meaning find ways to retain a good enough image quality while needing much less data for every frame.
If it does talk about storage usage, it wouldn't make any sense in PCs with available system RAM to use the ssd. In PCs using the SSD is just stupid. Except if the data needing to be saved there is huge, like dozens of GBs which sounds ridiculous. In PCs the logical option would be to use the system RAM or at least create, if needed, a RAM disk and use that.

 

[nguyen]

Do MS even send out game devs to help out their 1st party gaming studio? their techs are getting adopted ever so slowly. I guess MS Gaming division is only interested in buying out gaming studio because all they have is the money, not brain.

 

[Denver]

Probably this is where it is going to be used. XBOX. On PCs there is no need.

I think the news post doesn't talk about SSD usage. Just ways to limit the VRAM requirements, meaning find ways to retain a good enough image quality while needing much less data for every frame.
If it does talk about storage usage, it wouldn't make any sense in PCs with available system RAM to use the ssd. In PCs using the SSD is just stupid. Except if the data needing to be saved there is huge, like dozens of GBs which sounds ridiculous. In PCs the logical option would be to use the system RAM or at least create, if needed, a RAM disk and use that.

Have you read the patent? From what I understand, it suggests reducing VRAM requirements by creating a dynamic data pool using a combination of NAND flash memory(SSDs)and system DRAM, and indicating different levels of data access priority. Maybe someone with more expertise in the field might provide a more detailed explanation..

 

[john_]

Have you read the patent? From what I understand, it suggests reducing VRAM requirements by creating a dynamic data pool using a combination of NAND flash memory(SSDs)and system DRAM, and indicating different levels of data access priority. Maybe someone with more expertise in the field might provide a more detailed explanation..

Only the first post about this patent. From that what I understand is that they are trying to reduce the amount of data needed for every frame, not find alternative, to VRAM, storage. I don't see it as something like swap on disk. If the patent also describes optimized ways of using alternative storage for some data, on XBOX with it's fixed memory capacity, an SSD is the only option. On PCs it should be the last option, because PCs usually have plenty of system RAM that makes much more sense than bypassing it and going directly to use the SSD.

 

[Noyand]

Have you read the patent? From what I understand, it suggests reducing VRAM requirements by creating a dynamic data pool using a combination of NAND flash memory(SSDs)and system DRAM, and indicating different levels of data access priority. Maybe someone with more expertise in the field might provide a more detailed explanation..

From what I read, the plan isn't just to lower the impact on the VRAM, but on every type of memory used for rendering. The patent wording seems to imply that Ram and NAND are already involved in the current Ray tracing implementation, and this new tech is going to reduce the memory strain as a whole

As noted earlier, increasingly as part of video games and other such applications the acceleration structures for ray tracing are explicitly edited or regenerated by the software to reflect the current set of potentially visible geometry. Such acceleration structures are now competing for storage (both persistent (e.g., flash memory) and non-persistent (e.g., RAM)) with other data, such as geometry and texture data. This growth in the share of the memory by the acceleration structures has resulted in systems with significantly large memory requirements. Moreover, the bandwidth required to fetch the large amount of data for acceleration structures has also proportionally gotten bigger

 

[Chomiq]

Too bad green doesn't like sharing.

MS thrives on it, this is progress.

That's why the game files you get from gamepass are in encrypted folders inaccessible to administrator level user. Because MS is all about sharing.

 

[Vayra86]

That's why the game files you get from gamepass are in encrypted folders inaccessible to administrator level user. Because MS is all about sharing.

I never said its a good idea to sub to GamePass though.

Marked differences here. Whenever my/our interests align with what MS wants, I'll speak highly of their efforts, because this company has proven that it will try its best to make it work then, and tends to succeed (in the end). I mean, DirectX is of a similar nature. They need that API to keep windows afloat for gaming. We need it to game. At the end of the day we DO have a practically free OS (yes, idiots pay the full price of admission, but 3-5 bucks gets you a builder's license, simple as that) of a pretty high quality that runs everything and does everything without crashing left and right. Similar things apply to data security. I trust my data at MS/its cloud more than I do any other cloud provider. Why? Because MS floats on trust. If it loses trust, it can kiss the enterprise goodbye faster than we can blink.

Now compare to GamePass: you're diving headfirst into the black box of manipulative practices to keep you subbed to a service. Of course it employs every trick in the filthy book of dark patterns and commerce to keep you attached. This is why you shouldn't even touch this shit with a ten foot pole. Its the same bullshit as social media. Services that have ONE goal: keep you online and logging in. Everything else is secondary. We've known this principle since World of Warcraft and we know it screws with our heads. Just don't.

 

[apoklyps3]

nothing nvidia hasn't developed

RT is around for some time.
nvidia surely didn't invent it. it has brought it to games in some form

 

[Chomiq]

Now compare to GamePass: you're diving headfirst into the black box of manipulative practices to keep you subbed to a service. Of course it employs every trick in the filthy book of dark patterns and commerce to keep you attached. This is why you shouldn't even touch this shit with a ten foot pole. Its the same bullshit as social media. Services that have ONE goal: keep you online and logging in. Everything else is secondary. We've known this principle since World of Warcraft and we know it screws with our heads. Just don't.

This also applies to games purchased in MS store, not only gamepass.

If they would be so focused on sharing they would have released this as an open standard.