directstorage DirectStorage Benchmark Shows Massive Transfer Speed Improvements, Performance Compared: AMD vs Intel vs NVIDIA

[BiG StroOnZ]

Summary

Microsoft's DirectStorage API promises to bring PCs ultra-fast load times akin to what Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 console users have experienced for two years. As the first game supporting DirectStorage prepares to launch, a benchmark shows real performance gains on retail hardware. Compusemble has developed an appropriate benchmark, whereas PC Games Hardware used it to uncover some interesting findings. PCGH decided to find out which of the latest GPUs — AMD's Radeon RX 7900 XT, Intel's Arc A770, or Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4080 — is better for asset decompression. They took Compusemble's benchmark and ran it on the graphics cards and on Intel's Core i9-12900K CPU.

 

 

 

 

Quotes

Quote

The site ran Microsoft's publicly available Avocado-loading DirectStorage demo on a SATA SSD, a PCIe 3.0 NVMe SSD, and a PCIe 4.0 NVMe. It also compared decompression speeds between three GPUs and a CPU --an AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, an Intel Arc A770, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080, and a 5.2GHz Intel i9-12900K.

 

The chart displays the transfer rate of each hardware configuration in GB/s, showing the mean result out of five tests. The first thing that strikes the eye is that all GPUs handle decompression at least 2.4 times better than the Core i9-12900K processor. Meanwhile, Intel's Arc A770 is noticeably better than AMD's Radeon RX 7900 XT and Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4080 regarding GPU asset decompression. In the best-case scenario, the A770 can transfer/decompress assets at a rate of 16.8 GB/s, whereas the RX 7900 XT comes third with a 14.6 GB/s rate (13% behind the leader). 

 

Whether an AMD, Intel, or Nvidia GPU is used, actual loading times are reduced by an order of magnitude — from 5 seconds to 0.5 seconds, according to PCGH.

 

Screenshots from the demo demonstrate the difference between CPU and GPU decompression. Some show a few gigabytes of assets taking between one and a half seconds and five seconds to load, with between 30 percent and 100 percent CPU utilization. Others show the same assets loading in around half a second with less than five percent CPU utilization, indicating the GPU has taken over the job.

 

 

My thoughts

These are intriguing findings for sure. I'm very surprised that the Arc GPU takes the win here. These are definitely reassuring results for all the GPUs though. However, as TechSpot mentions, "loading a bunch of avocados isn't the same as loading a 3D game environment." Therefore, on January 24th when Square Enix's Forspoken launches; you will be able to try DirectStorage in a real-world environment. At GDC 2022, Square Enix said that DirectStorage allows Forspoken to load new scenes and environments in less than two seconds on an NVMe SSD, several seconds on a SATA SSD, and about 30 secs on an HDD. Therefore, while the slowest result is 13% behind the fastest, all the results are for the most part, acceptable enough to substantially improve one's gaming experience. I'm excited to see the real world performance of DirectStorage come January, and I'm sure we will see plenty of reviews/benchmarks on it. It could be a huge game changer for PC Gaming, especially if more games begin to implement it.

 

Sources

https://www.pcgameshardware.de/DirectX-12-Software-255525/Specials/Direct-Storage-Games-Windows-11-Benchmarks-1411071/

https://www.techspot.com/news/97257-directstorage-benchmark-shows-massive-transfer-speed-improvements.html

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/directstorage-performance-amd-intel-nvidia

[Radium_Angel]

36 minutes ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

about 30 secs on an HDD

Gaming on a HDD? What is this heresy?

36 minutes ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

I'm very surprised that the Arc GPU takes the win here

I feel that if/when Intel (EDIT: Speeling) polishes up their drivers, they are going to be a serious GPU option. That they got this far on what is essentially their first outing in a well-established field, is mighty impressive.

[BiG StroOnZ]

10 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Gaming on a HDD? What is this heresy?

 

Well don't forget that many people use HDD bulk storage as a Gaming Drive, with the OS/Programs on the SSD. While SSD prices have come down considerably over the years, many people still use HDDs for Gaming Drives. I for one would opt for all SSD storage at this point, but for many, this is not yet an option.

 

16 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

I feel that if/when Intel (EDIT: Speeling) polishes up their drivers, they are going to be a serious GPU option. That they got this far on what is essentially their first outing in a well-established field, is mighty impressive.

 

I agree with that definitely. The hardware they have in the Arc GPUs is highly capable. It's absolutely the drivers that's holding them back. Really, all they need to do is optimize their DX11 and prior performance; as their DX12/Vulkan performance is quite favorable. Then work on the Control Panel UI and crashes/bugs. As more people buy the Intel GPUs and Intel begins to gather data, they will eventually be able to continually release fixes and updates. This will eventually bring them at least to AMD's level of driver competence. They do have the budget to bring them to NVIDIA's level. Although, people have complained about their iGPU drivers over the years, so that might be a stretch. 

[Radium_Angel]

1 minute ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

Well don't forget that many people use HDD bulk storage as a Gaming Drive, with the OS/Programs on the SSD. While SSD prices have come down considerably over the years, many people still use HDDs for Gaming Drives. I for one would opt for all SSD storage at this point, but for many, this is not yet an option.

I was aiming for "+1 Funny" on my comment...should have added a smiley. Oh well, live and learn.

[BiG StroOnZ]

4 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

I was aiming for "+1 Funny" on my comment...should have added a smiley. Oh well, live and learn.

 

Yeah I figured that much, the smiley was not necessary, I'm just in an analytical mood. 

[Radium_Angel]

Just now, BiG StroOnZ said:

 

Yeah I figured that much, the smiley was not necessary, I'm just in a analytical mood. 

All good. Back on topic, I was really stunned at how well Intel's Arc GPUs are. Yeah they suffer from driver issues (as all 1st gen cards do) but I was half expecting the GPUs to be GT 1030 level of performance.

They are getting good with their drivers, they'll force (I hope I hope I hope) nVidia to come back down to reality with their pricing

[BiG StroOnZ]

11 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

All good. Back on topic, I was really stunned at how well Intel's Arc GPUs are. Yeah they suffer from driver issues (as all 1st gen cards do) but I was half expecting the GPUs to be GT 1030 level of performance.

 

They are getting good with their drivers, they'll force (I hope I hope I hope) nVidia to come back down to reality with their pricing

 

Yeah, I've had my fair share of espresso today. 

 

But, they did a bang up job for their first real dGPU showing, IMO. I wasn't quite expecting their performance to be that bad, but I knew there was going to be driver complications. I think they came close to their level of performance goals/milestones. I feel though that the media hyped up performance a bit, so when they didn't quite meet that mark, people at first were disappointed. 

 

I notice consistently they keep releasing driver updates. So I'm hoping they get much better with drivers. It's good to hear that they are getting better. However, I'm not sure they will force NVIDIA to drop prices anytime soon; as they suggested in many reports over the past couple of months that they have no intention of competing in the high end. They could however become a great option under $500 though. Which is where the majority of gamers are shopping. If they can compete with AMD/NVIDIA in the low to midrange market, they could dictate pricing there. Which then might give them confidence in trying their hand at producing a much faster halo tier dGPU.

[Radium_Angel]

2 minutes ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

as they suggested in many reports over the past couple of months that they have no intention of competing in the high end

Yeah I had read that. I wonder if they have a non-compete clause agreement with nvidia/AMD, or if they are simply focused on CPUs more. But the low-mid range market? Bring it on!

[BiG StroOnZ]

14 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Yeah I had read that. I wonder if they have a non-compete clause agreement with nvidia/AMD, or if they are simply focused on CPUs more. But the low-mid range market? Bring it on!

 

From what I know, a "non-compete agreement" generally only applies to an employer and a worker. But don't quote me on that.

 

I definitely think they are focused on CPUs, as it's their bread and butter to their business. However, I think they know NVIDIA is the juggernaut in this space and they've seen AMD falter before; thus, they probably don't want to be seen an AMD but as an NVIDIA. AMD over the years has remained competitive, but they don't have the brand power in the dGPU space that NVIDIA does. Intel probably wants to do the same with their GPUs (as is with their CPUs). So, they probably figure they can slowly work their way up the chain, rather than try to go big and take a huge gamble. Which sometimes AMD does, falls short, and disappoints the market/community. With the low-mid range market, they can kind of mind their own business, make nice, affordable GPUs with great performance. And then, when they start making GPUs that cost less than NVIDIA GPUs but compete with higher tier NVIDIA GPUs (that cost more), then they know they will have winners on their hands. I think this is Intel's main objective. Get to the point where their GPU costs less than an NVIDIA one, but is faster.

 

Regardless, I agree, bring it on! This is what we need.

 

Now all we need is for NVIDIA to figure out how to get an x86/X86-64 license to start producing CPUs (I don't even think that's possible without acquisition though or for a price that NVIDIA would undoubtedly not be interested in).

[Radium_Angel]

2 minutes ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

x86/X86-64 license to start producing CPUs

Where's the "+1 Frightening" mod when you need it.

Is VIA or Cyrix for sale? 

[BiG StroOnZ]

7 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Where's the "+1 Frightening" mod when you need it.

 

 

7 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Is VIA or Cyrix for sale?

 

It looks like they've already been "acquired" or rather gave a sublicense to a Chinese company called Zhaoxin:

 

Quote

In 2013, VIA entered into an agreement with the Shanghai Municipal Government to create a fabless semiconductor company called Zhaoxin.^[9] The joint venture is producing x86 compatible CPUs for the Chinese market.^[10]

 

In November 2021, Intel recruited some of the employees of the Centaur Technology division from VIA, a deal worth $125 million, and effectively acquiring the talent and knowhow of the x86 division.^[11][12] VIA retained the x86 licence and associated patents, and its Zhaoxin CPU joint-venture continues.^[13]

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VIA_Technologies

[Bitter]

Off topic, Nvidia won't bother with x86. ARM is what they're going to persue if they ever enter the consumer space for CPU's, possibly a SOC with CPU and GPU for mobile devices since that's a huge market. Maybe laptop/desktop if Windows for ARM ever really can take off. Likely as an OEM supplier initially, I don't see ARM really taking off in the user built market for a while longer, it's all hinged on OS compatibility and the ability to run old x86 applications at acceptance performance and with less power use.

 

Back on topic, go go Intel! I hope they can continue to rapidly scale performance between silicon and drivers! DirectStorage certainly is very appealing, being able to seamlessly and quickly load in assets instead of having to hold it all in RAM or have loading screens is going to be really great for immersion on lower end hardware with more limited memory, ie consoles!

[Quackers101]

ah so they have done some tests with it now.

also if we are moving towards only using HDD and NVME, I do wish for more NVME support.

Like we have seen on LTT, nvme PCIe cards up to 4 on 1 card. So long there is no 4090 in the build.

so space issues, heat, price and able to use all the nvme as wanted.

 

to previous issues with installing nvme, either to splitting the pcie lanes, having supported nvme slots or space in the slot, heatsinks, screws etc.

 

from the release of 1.1

https://linustechtips.com/topic/1461036-directx-12-direct-storage-11-is-coming-this-year-to-take-your-ssds/#comment-15606234

Edited January 13, 2023 by Quackers101

[ewitte]

3 hours ago, Radium_Angel said:

I feel that if/when Intel (EDIT: Speeling) polishes up their drivers, they are going to be a serious GPU option. That they got this far on what is essentially their first outing in a well-established field, is mighty impressive.

I've also seen reviews where Intel, while slower in general, loses much less performance when enabling raytracing.

[ewitte]

3 hours ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

Well don't forget that many people use HDD bulk storage as a Gaming Drive, with the OS/Programs on the SSD. While SSD prices have come down considerably over the years, many people still use HDDs for Gaming Drives. I for one would opt for all SSD storage at this point, but for many, this is not yet an option.

I have about 7.84TB in NVME SSD space, which would be hard for most to swallow.  Also, I have 6TB and two 8TB HDDs (in a mirror).

[TetraSky]

Interesting. 

I'm stuck on PCIe 3.0 x4 speed with my board, so it's nice to see that there isn't that massive of a difference in speed between 3.0 and 4.0

[suicidalfranco]

5 hours ago, Radium_Angel said:

Gaming on a HDD? What is this heresy?

Still have and play GW2 on hard drive

[StDragon]

I take issue with the DirectStorage diagram as shown above. The CPU is used to call the gaming assets to load in memory, so that's an extra step. The GPU can't read the file system.

 

The only difference between how it's done today and with DirectStorage is where the assets are decompressed and the format it's in. In the case of DirectStorage, gaming assets are compressed with GDeflate where the GPU can deflate in hardware.

[Quackers101]

1 hour ago, StDragon said:

The only difference between how it's done today and with DirectStorage is where the assets are decompressed and the format it's in. In the case of DirectStorage, gaming assets are compressed with GDeflate where the GPU can deflate in hardware.

GDeflate or Brotli-G (cpu gpu)

Also whatever intel does and if they combine what they have done before, between intel CPU and GPU, if boosting some performance there.

Quote

Intel is teasing some of the performance benefits of using the new approach

 

“As shown, DirectStorage 1.1, with the Intel-optimized software stack, provides a 2.7x improvement over a non-GPU accelerated path for the above workload running on a 16-core CPU,”

https://www.pcmag.com/news/amd-intel-nvidia-support-directstorage-11-to-reduce-game-load-times

but man, going through intel for any useful info is just as much of a pain and when its just about drivers too... sh*ts garbage as f*** with so many rabbit holes.

Edited January 14, 2023 by Quackers101

[Godlygamer23]

8 hours ago, Radium_Angel said:

Gaming on a HDD? What is this heresy?

I still use hard drives for many games. I'm slowly switching over to SSDs, but hard drives are definitely still used.

[StDragon]

10 minutes ago, Godlygamer23 said:

I still use hard drives for many games. I'm slowly switching over to SSDs, but hard drives are definitely still used.

And you still can, but not for titles that require DirectStorage. The good news is if your titles are through Steam (which most PC gamers people do nowadays), via their Storage Manager you can create a separate volume on just one SSD and place the game that requires DS. Doesn't have to be a large capacity unless the game title calls for it.

[Godlygamer23]

11 hours ago, StDragon said:

And you still can, but not for titles that require DirectStorage. The good news is if your titles are through Steam (which most PC gamers people do nowadays), via their Storage Manager you can create a separate volume on just one SSD and place the game that requires DS. Doesn't have to be a large capacity unless the game title calls for it.

And it makes sense that some games would require DirectStorage, considering that PS5 and Xbox Series X games are available on PC now. At this point, games will only become bigger, with even bigger and more complex worlds, so the need to stream that data in faster without latency becomes extremely important, especially if you're able to take the load off of the CPU to handle that task. 

 

And I was already aware of those features on Steam. Creating a separate folder on different drives for Steam games is not a new feature by any means. It's been there for a while, just refined. 

 

UPDATE: 

Per Microsoft's dev blog, DirectStorage will NOT require an SSD. It will still work with hard drives, just not as well. But games that use DirectStorage will not inherently require an NVMe SSD to be used, or even an SSD at all.

Quote

Storage Device: DirectStorage enabled games will work on all devices (. You’ll need an NVMe SSD, where the bandwidth capabilities are much higher and the storage media itself is faster, to see the significant improvements of DirectStorage. We highly recommend ensuring your game files are saved to an NVMe to get the best gaming experience.

@StDragon

Edited January 14, 2023 by Godlygamer23
Added additional information about DirectStorage

[porina]

10 hours ago, ewitte said:

I have about 7.84TB in NVME SSD space, which would be hard for most to swallow.  Also, I have 6TB and two 8TB HDDs (in a mirror).

Ooh, similar here. As I retired "spare" systems I put the SSDs in my main and have just over 7TB. No spinners though, they go to NAS. However in my case only 2.5TB is NVMe, the rest is SATA. Half debating retiring the SATA ones and replacing with NVMe, mainly because I want to consolidate smaller SSDs.

 

Personally I don't see SSD cost as a major barrier. The cost of a 1TB SSD is ball park comparable to that of a major new game release, and would still be workable as long as you don't try to install an entire Steam library when you don't play 90% of the games.

 

8 hours ago, TetraSky said:

Interesting. 

I'm stuck on PCIe 3.0 x4 speed with my board, so it's nice to see that there isn't that massive of a difference in speed between 3.0 and 4.0

I was looking at NVMe pricing yesterday. It reminded me again that lower price 4.0 drives are hardly any faster than 3.0 ones. If you want a drive that comes close to 4.0 limits, it was ball park 50% more expensive. If the results on OP are representative of what we might experience in real games I think any NVMe is a great option. Their 3.0 results are at least 83% of the 4.0 speeds. Systems still on SATA SSDs would be in a transition state or could look to add NVMe later.

 

6 hours ago, StDragon said:

I take issue with the DirectStorage diagram as shown above. The CPU is used to call the gaming assets to load in memory, so that's an extra step. The GPU can't read the file system.

Physically the data has to travel through the CPU since that's where all the storage, RAM and GPU are connected. CPU has to coordinate but that is a much lesser load than actually doing something with that data.

[Doobeedoo]

Neat, can we finally have games use this it will simply feel order of magnitudes better just with this.

Devs better not slack. 

[igormp]

5 hours ago, porina said:

Physically the data has to travel through the CPU since that's where all the storage, RAM and GPU are connected.

The whole idea of PCIe P2P DMA is exactly that NO data goes through the CPU. After the CPU does the first call, the data only goes through the PCIe bus itself between the NVMe and GPU, same happens with other existing implementations, such as NVMe <-> NIC or NIC <-> GPU.

Unless the NVMe is connected through the chipset, then yeah it'll have to go through the CPU lanes before reaching the GPU.