Async Compute Praised by Several Devs; Was Key to Hitting Performance Target in DOOM on Consoles

Several high profile developers praised Async Compute, including id Software's Tiago Sousa who said that it was key to hitting the performance target on consoles with DOOM.

[Mostafeto]

Well, DOOM runs pretty well on consoles so I guess they are good at what they do

[Frisky]

Finally. Someone gets it right on consoles.

[KaiPow]

Hopefully more devs can put this tech to good use. It certainly showed its potential with DOOM.

[Chris_Wray]

There's been stories on how useful it is and the other side of the argument as well. It's early days with it anyway, we'll see how useful it is as more and more use is got out of it.

[OoglyBoogly]

Sucks for Nvidia. My money is on the fact that Nvidia will come out with "SyncWorks" or some shit once DX12 gets more popular and AMD starts pulling away since they have proper async support. Gotta hold the technology back somehow so their newer (and older) cards that don't properly support async don't start showing their incompatibilities too soon!

Remember these words..."SyncWorks". ..it'll happen.

Edit: Please, if you disagree I'd ask that you explain why as nothing I've said is either false (i.e. Nvidia's async support) or unlikely to happen based on previous company actions (i.e. something like SyncWorks). If you disagree simply because I paint the truth about Nvidia and you don't like it then you can at least admit that as well. Thank you!

[meche334]

Pascal has proper async now

[Dabigsiebowski]

Pascal doesn't have full async support. You can clearly see that in the 1080 vs 480 DX12 AoS benchmarks.

[OoglyBoogly]

No it doesn't. It still can't do compute and graphics simultaneously. It does them separately, they've just advised a way to make switching between the two faster in the pipeline. It just no longer hurts performance like it could with their previous GPU's but it doesn't improve performance either like it can with AMD GPU's.

Here's a good video that shows the difference:

https://www.youtube.com/wat...

Nvidia is using "PreEmption" while AMD can use true asynchronization.

So in the case of this article and what is being talked about with DOOM Nvidia would, in fact, not benefit from this.

[Alexious]

@OoglyBoogly - Actually, the GTX 1080 and 1070 both get a significant boost in Ashes of the Singularity under DX12.

Sure, Async Compute won't yield the same performance boost of AMD, but it should now get a boost nonetheless - albeit a small one.

[TheCommentator]

Nvidia still has no hardware to run Async Compute, it emulates the performance of ACEs through software. The only GPU that supports both FL12.0(AMD) and FL12.1(Nvidia) is inside the XB1.

[OoglyBoogly]

@Alexious

http://wccftech.com/nvidia-...

You sure? It seems like performance with the 1080 in AoTS remains widely unchanged from DX11 to DX12 which is about right considering the type of async it now has.

[kevnb]

I wonder how much of this is being influenced by amd money? I guess only time will tell, Ill just hold on to my 970 and see what happens in the next few years.
On pc amd cards got a nice boost in dx12 so far, but the thing is amd overhead is way behind nvidia in dx11. Im not surprised nvidias gains are smaller so far.
I still remember when Microsoft was blatantly getting everyone to claim pc gaming was dying, now with a new ceo they are up to the same tricks but this time they are in bed with amd. I wouldnt be surprised if microsoft buys amd in the next few years.

[OoglyBoogly]

Read my comment above. Yes AMD is doing better in DX12 partially due to the lack of overhead but a lot of it is still AMD's use and ability of true async computing. Something that Nvidia still can't do (yes even with the latest 10xx series).

So unless Nvidia somehow convince$ developer$ to not use proper asynchronization or comes out with some "SyncWorks" that dumbs it down Nvidia will in fact be at a disadvantage. I would say that when it comes to DX12 it's fairly safe to believe the hype around AMD as, so far, they seem to be the only ones that truly fully support it as it's meant to be supported.

[thisgamer503]

The problem is there are barely any games that are fully supporting DX12 and async compute. Until that time, Nvidia has the upper hand with devs using current development practices. Slowly all the AAA will start utilizing async compute properly. Unfortunately for AMD, by the time that happens Nvidia will probably have full async compute support while AMD paved the way.

[1nsomniac]

Forgive me if I'm wrong, because i did only play the beta of DOOM. Are we now under the impression it looks good on consoles. I seem to remember we were flooded with articles & comments about how terrible it looked...

The beta at least had the worst screen tearing I've seen this generation. Was this fixed in the final release?

[NotEvenMyFinalForm]

the game looks beautiful and runs 60fps on consoles.

https://www.youtube.com/wat...

[Alexious]

Yeah, it looks pretty good. At 4K@Ultra on PC, though...

[OoglyBoogly]

Grass is green.

Edit: People on this site are dumb.

[1nsomniac]

I'm under the impression that for its time DOOM 3 looked far better. DOOM 3 used real-time lighting & needed a beast of a PC to run. I remember downloading the leaked developer build & having to buy a new Radeon 9700 to play it properly.

This new DOOM looks like it should be running at 60fps without any excuses.

I was really looking forward to the reboot but the screen tear was unbearable though.

[ShadowKnight]

Great job ID! Lets see how this engine runs on RPG and open world games.

[Alexious]

You meand idTech? Not sure we'll see it in RPG or open world games. Dishonored 2 isn't quite open world (and Void is a modified idTech anyway), and it's unlikely that Bethesda Studios will use it for their future RPGs since they rely on their own engine which is mod-friendly.

[TwoForce]

Nice job, Id Software !

[iTechHeads]

I'm glad games are finally staring to use this. I remember hearing so much about this around the PS4 launch.

[Yetter]

it really is just like every other generation of consoles. Give the devs a couple of years and they really start to tap into the power of these machines. DOOM looks and runs amazing on XB1 and I'm assuming PS4. Well done id.