DX12 CPU Performance Leaked, Way Faster Than DX11 - Threading Model Resembles AMD's Mantle

An exciting DX12 leak just fabricated its way to the web. The leak showcases the CPU performance and threading model of DX12 compared to DX11.
Ever since Microsoft announced DirectX 12 back in March of this year both game developers and gamers have been broken-hearted to encounter what this new API can do for them. Thankfully this leak gives united states of america a very good idea of what to expect.
NVIDIA Maxwell DX12

DirectX otherwise known as Direct3D is Microsoft's proprietary application programming interface for 3D graphics, specifically games. DX12 is going to be Microsoft'south beginning 3D graphics programming API to explore a depression level, close to the metal programming arroyo. The new API promises to be significantly faster and more than efficient than the company's latest API, DX11.

DX12'south Threading Model Resembles that of AMD's API, Curtain

We've seen a focused and renewed invigoration in the low-level API loonshit which was first ignited past AMD's Pall API in 2022. We've seen many other low level APIs announced afterwards in 2022. Including Microsoft'due south DX12, OpenGL NG by Khronos and Metal by Apple.
Graphics hardware grew ever more than complex and advanced. The arroyo to programming today'southward hardware had to be improved to continue up with the operation and efficiency demands of today. Which is is why nosotros're seeing this massive push for low level APIs across the industry.

The leaked DX12 slides serve to underline this co-evolution of hardware and software. GPUs have become significantly faster and CPUs evolved into condign much wider. This meant that to continue upwards with today'southward GPUs nosotros have to leverage all of the CPU's potential rather than throw everything on a single cadre and hope information technology works out. This is exactly what AMD has done with Curtain and exactly what Microsoft is working towards with DX12.
DirectX 11, DX11 CPU Threading Model DirectX 12, DX12 CPU Threading Model Nosotros can conspicuously come across in a higher place the benefits of distributing the load across several threads. In DX12 the user-mode driver has go multi-thread aware as opposed to how it was limited to a single CPU core/thread earlier in DX11.

Microsoft hasn't simply improved their threading model, they've too significantly reduced the overhead on the workloads that remained unmarried threaded by necessity and completely removed the kernel-mode driver from the equation. The end effect is CPU overhead reduction in DX12 by half compared to DX11. Which ways Microsoft has essentially doubled CPU performance across four threads while running DX12 compared to DX11. I would expect an fifty-fifty better performance improvement across additional CPU cores.

Obviously in-game operation won't only double just past switching from DX11 to DX12. Performance in CPU limited scenarios will definitely come across a great improvement. But in GPU express scenarios the performance improvement will be more subtle.
Spreading the load across multiple cores equally well every bit removing some of the inefficiencies will effect in better functioning across all games undoubtedly. However the degree of the improvement will also depend on how well the game code is optimized for multi-core CPUs. To put it in other words DX12 simply can't solve a problem that exists within the game itself but it does the chore that it'due south supposed to, and brilliantly so.

According to Richard Huddy, AMD's Gaming Scientist, the company has taken Mantle to both Microsoft and the Khronos group to help them realize and work in any of Mantle's benefits that they may wish to implement in their own next generation APIs. So it doesn't come up as a surprise to see DX12 have on a Mantle-like class.

Mantle and DX11 CPU Threading Models compared. All in all DX12 is shaping up nicely. Currently AMD's Curtain has surpassed the adoption charge per unit of DX11, DX10 and even DX9 then DX12 will have to put on quite a show to outshine that. Details are still a fleck murky on whether Microsoft will actually bring DX12 to Win7 or not. I sure hope they do , not many people will be willing to upgrade to Windows 10 just for DX12, myself included. Undoubtedly Windows 7 back up is going to exist a detrimental factor in the success of DX12.