AMD’s Mantle benchmarked: The biggest innovation in gaming since DirectX 9

[Desmond]

AMD’s Mantle is the first new consumer graphics API to launch in over a decade and its potential impact on the gaming and CPU markets is enormous. Last week, we covered AMD’s performance claims for Mantle – today, we’re diving in with our own test results. We’ve benchmarked Mantle on a range of graphics cards and CPUs, from Kabini at the low-end to the Intel Core i7-4770K.

One question many of you raised last week was whether or not Mantle would improve GPU-limited scenarios. Many of you pointed to this comment by Dave Baumann, as proof that AMD could offer significant GPU performance improvements as well. AMD’s official whitepapers distributed to reviewers implied that the GPU optimization opportunities for Mantle were more limited. So which is it?
Mantle’s GPU optimizations

We spoke to the chief architect of Mantle, Guennadi Riguer, who told us that the GPU-specific improvements from porting a game to Mantle are typically 3-5%, as AMD has previously stated. A developer who aggressively optimizes code for Mantle may see better gains of 15-20% in extreme corner cases. The implication is that moderate optimization will yield gains of 7-12%.

*www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Mantle-640x358.jpg

CPU optimizations, in contrast, are low-hanging fruit. After years of working with the relatively limited multi-threading options available on DX11, it’s easy to offer users a stepladder to fix this particular problem. According to Riguer, the amount of GPU performance gain we see from Mantle will depend on whether console developers focus on it when they port titles. (Both the Xbox One and PS4 have Mantle-enabled, GCN-based GPUs). It will depend on whether any other APIs in the game code are bottlenecks in their own right.

*www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/MultiThreadedPerf1-640x315.png

We’ve speculated before that it might be easier for console developers to bring projects to Mantle than to port them to the PC version of DX11, but Riguer didn’t give us much detail on whether or not this is true. Mantle is apparently “arguably” close to console development environments (in Riguer’s own words), but the architect stopped short of declaring that this gave AMD a major advantage. Even if Mantle isn’t related to the Xbox One or PS4 APIs, developers working on those consoles will still have a much better understanding of what the GCN architecture can and cannot do. That knowledge should make it easier to port games optimally, even for Direct3D.

Source (with benchmarks) : AMD’s Mantle benchmarked: The biggest innovation in gaming since DirectX 9 | ExtremeTech

 

[kg11sgbg]

That's AMD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Future is truly FUSION.

 

[snap]

there was a good link posted here somewhere which showed some of the advantages and disadvantages of a low level api, sadly don't remember where

 

[Desmond]

It is basically a CPU optimized API as opposed to GPU.

 

[TheSloth]

I did not understand any technical statement in main post.
@DeSmOnD dAvId: could you elaborate bit more about what you meant by "CPU optimized API as opposed to GPU".

 

[Desmond]

What I meant was that it is mainly used to give games a boost on weaker CPUs than GPUs. Read the article for more details.

 

[TheSloth]

@DeSmOnD dAvId: Thank you

 

[tkin]

Mantle won't be that low level as AMD is apparently telling us, in windows environment almost nothing gets the kind of low level access console games usually get, and nothing can bypass the HAL(I think, as that can potentially crash the entire OS, the reason why the entire sound stack were removed to software in vista onwards), what mantle will do is optimize some calls, making them slightly faster, around 10% as best.

 

[sam_738844]

There is a broad support, compatibility and acceptability factor tied with mantle. I sincerely hope it would prove better than Glide as for 3dfx.

 

[Desmond]

If EA has adopted it for Battlefield 4, I think more companies could adopt it.

 

[sam_738844]

If EA has adopted it for Battlefield 4, I think more companies could adopt it.

similarly we can write our own version of mantle.

 

[flyingcow]

i heard that enabling mantle on BF4 increases FPS but decreases the quality...true?

 

[tkin]

i heard that enabling mantle on BF4 increases FPS but decreases the quality...true?

Nope, but performance increase is ~10% as best, if we had console level access we could have seen 50% boost or more.

 

[flyingcow]

Nope, but performance increase is ~10% as best, if we had console level access we could have seen 50% boost or more.

i saw it here(around 5min mark) i wanted to check the images myself but i am unable to open the link in the desc...

the link keeps loading

 

[Desmond]

Here are the screenshots :

D3D

*www.techoftomorrow.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/D3D1.jpg

Mantle

*www.techoftomorrow.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Mantle2.jpg

 

[sam_738844]

i heard that enabling mantle on BF4 increases FPS but decreases the quality...true?

yes its true, and its a DICE bug tied with Mantle, not entirely a Mantle issue.

 

[flyingcow]

Here are the screenshots :
D3D
Mantle

oh thanks dude, i still cant open the link

yes its true, and its a DICE bug tied with Mantle, not entirely a Mantle issue.

yeah..no issue with he other game right? was it heart of the storm or something?