Rise of The Tomb Raider DX12

[Splinterdog]

There's a lot of talk about DX12 being sluggish in this game vs DX11, so I ran the in-game benchmark and found the DX12 performance to be nearly 20fps better than DX11.
Not sure if this is a measure of how well the game runs in DX12, but for me it seems to perform according to the benchmark IE about 20fps better. The only other DX12 games I have are the Forza racing games (7, Apex and Horizon) but it's bit hard to compare since you can't switch to DX11 for those.

 

[BroBQ]

Yep, I gain about 15fps in directx 12 with this game.

 

[Frag_Maniac]

How much difference in performance you get between Dx11 and Dx12 depends on the game and the GPU. The more recent titles and latest AMD GPUs are going to yield best case scenario. I however on my 7970 with fewer ACE units don't see much difference.

 

[GoldenX]

Both DX12 and Vulkan are a god send for weak CPU users, I remember trying Battlefield 1 in an A4-4000 (a single module FX based APU), DX11 got 15FPS, DX12 got 40.
You won't see a huge difference with an i7 and a 1080ti, but on cheaper hardware, it helps a lot.

 

[cadaveca]

How much difference in performance you get between Dx11 and Dx12 depends on the game and the GPU. The more recent titles and latest AMD GPUs are going to yield best case scenario. I however on my 7970 with fewer ACE units don't see much difference.

No. It depends more on the CPU. That is why the OP sees such a large increase... they've got a AMD FX-8350.

Both DX12 and Vulkan are a god send for weak CPU users, I remember trying Battlefield 1 in an A4-4000 (a single module FX based APU), DX11 got 15FPS, DX12 got 40.
You won't see a huge difference with an i7 and a 1080ti, but on cheaper hardware, it helps a lot.

Exactly.

There's a lot of talk about DX12 being sluggish in this game vs DX11, so I ran the in-game benchmark and found the DX12 performance to be nearly 20fps better than DX11.
Not sure if this is a measure of how well the game runs in DX12, but for me it seems to perform according to the benchmark IE about 20fps better. The only other DX12 games I have are the Forza racing games (7, Apex and Horizon) but it's bit hard to compare since you can't switch to DX11 for those.
View attachment 96051

Your CPU is rather weak compared to more recent releases, so you should see a good benefit from a lot of titles that offer DX12.

 

[Keullo-e]

It runs slightly better on my PC with DX12 than DX11. i5-7600K @ 4.7GHz, 16GB @ 2666MHz, GTX 980 @ 1500/2000.

 

[Frag_Maniac]

No. It depends more on the CPU. That is why the OP sees such a large increase... they've got a AMD FX-8350.

Sounds like you're unaware of what ACE units are on an AMD GPU and what they do. They're necessary for proper Dx12 support, and the older AMD GPUs are very anemic when it comes to ACE.

 

[R-T-B]

Sounds like you're unaware of what ACE units are on an AMD GPU and what they do. They're necessary for proper Dx12 support, and the older AMD GPUs are very anemic when it comes to ACE.

And DX12 lowers overhead where, exactly?

CPU.

 

[cadaveca]

Sounds like you're unaware of what ACE units are on an AMD GPU and what they do. They're necessary for proper Dx12 support, and the older AMD GPUs are very anemic when it comes to ACE.

Well, to be honest, you are correct that different GPUs will see different gains, but again, as RTB posted, it's the CPU overhead that is changed by DX12. You have a very well-balanced system, so you should not see much in the way of gains really, but those that have an under-powered CPU for their GPU will see far better gains with the same card you have now. BTW, I do still have a 7970, and did do some DX12 testing with it just like the OP a couple of weeks ago, investigating this exact thing.


BTW, ACE = Asynchronous Compute Engine. I actually am pretty aware of what they are, and what they do, and why an "ACE" is important.

Anyway, the OP has an RX580; it's not an older GPU. So yeah, your comment does have some merit, but does not apply to the OP's results really. That's why I responded in the way I did.. I looked at the OP's system config and based my coment on his experience with his specific hardware

As to why I say what I do, rather than just say stuff, let's go to those that make the cards, and see what they say about what DX12 offers, and how it can boost performance...

Here's what AMD says about DX12:

DirectX 12 takes your game to a whole new level. By tapping into all the cores of your multicore CPU simultaneously, DirectX 12 boosts the amount of work that can be sent to the graphics card – and gets it done in less time. Plus, DirectX 12 allows your GPU to run multiple tasks at once, so you save rendering time, reduce latency, and get more frames per second. Two revolutionary features in DirectX 12 are driving these innovations: multi-threaded command buffer recording and asynchronous shaders.

https://www.amd.com/en/technologies/directx12

Nvidia says:

In addition to new and more realistic visual effects, DirectX 12 promises to improve performance through a number of API changes, software features, and hardware features. Of these improvements, draw call optimisations are likely to have the most immediate impact, relieving CPU bottlenecks in open world games, and in large-scale strategy titles.

https://www.geforce.co.uk/whats-new/articles/geforce-gtx-is-game-ready-for-windows-10-and-directx-12

 

[Vya Domus]

And DX12 lowers overhead where, exactly?

CPU.

What is baffling though is why there is a regression in performance on higher end CPUs.

 

[Frag_Maniac]

Well, to be honest, you are correct that different GPUs will see different gains, but again, as RTB posted, it's the CPU overhead that is changed by DX12.

I feel it's kind of misleading to use the worst case scenario to measure gains. Are we really talking about gains there, or just what a common sense rig can do verses a poorly built one? It's the same as saying Ryzen is way better than Bulldozer, or that AMD makes better use of Dx12 than Nvidia, without noting that AMD is still struggling to keep up with Nvidia in actual performance.

The bottom line is, components already achieving great performance have a lower ceiling for things like OCing and Dx12.

 

[Splinterdog]

That explains a lot, so thanks. I've had the FX8320 for three or four years now and only recently switched from a GTX970 to an RX580 and if my memory serves me correctly, DX12 performance on the 970 wasn't as good as now.
I must have missed ACE when I was looking to change the GPU, so this comes as an extra bonus and the game with the most noticeable improvement is Forza Horizon 3, which is a DX12 game.

 

[Vya Domus]

ACE is not causing lower CPU overhead.

ACE gives GPUs the capability to switch contex without a big performance penalty. It's useful when you want to do compute shaders at the same time as graphics. This is why for example Doom sees a bigger uplift on Vulkan on AMD cards , that's a game that makes extensive use of GPU accelerated particles.

In this case though the performance improvement comes pretty much exclusively from the multithreaded draw calls.

 

[Frag_Maniac]

That explains a lot, so thanks. I've had the FX8320 for three or four years now and only recently switched from a GTX970 to an RX580 and if my memory serves me correctly, DX12 performance on the 970 wasn't as good as now.
I must have missed ACE when I was looking to change the GPU, so this comes as an extra bonus and the game with the most noticeable improvement is Forza Horizon 3, which is a DX12 game.

Yeah but the 970 has less than half the VRAM of the 580 too. You're always going to notice more FPS from Dx11 to Dx12 on a AMD GPU because they use more compute power specifically designed for Dx12, but their higher end models still can't keep up with Nvidia's ones.

Also, despite the 970 and 580 being close in release price, they are not close in launch date. As time goes on things like high VRAM capacity and more processing power become more common and more affordable, so you really can't compare the two apples to apples. The current Nvidia GPU to compare to the 580 on price and performance is the 1060 6GB.

Personally I'll take less improvement on Dx for way more performance to begin with. If you don't look at it in that regard, it's very misleading. It's the GPUs with better performance to begin with that are going to have less gain, just like factory overclocked GPUs have less headroom for user overclocking.

 

[lyndonguitar]

theres no difference on my 8700k and 1080. however I prefer DX11 since it is smoother when playing on Steam Link. DX12 has slight stutters