Ashes of Singularity and DX12, PC Per details some stuff regarding FCAT testing

[zMeul]

source: http://www.pcper.com/reviews/General-Tech/PC-Gaming-Shakeup-Ashes-Singularity-DX12-and-Microsoft-Store

 

you migh now by now the dispute between Guru3D's FCAT testing and Extreme Tech, if not here's a TL;DR version

Guru3D publishes FCAT results from their Ashes benchmark: http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/ashes_of_singularity_directx_12_benchmark_ii_review,10.html - it doens't look goot for AMD's HW

Extreme Tech calls them out: http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/223654-instrument-error-amd-fcat-and-ashes-of-the-singularity short of calling them nVidia shills

Guru3D responds: http://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages/ashes-of-singularity-directx-12-benchmark-ii-review,12.html defending their findings

 

fast forward to PC Per's article ... the truth isn't that cut and dry

Quote

Microsoft is pushing DX12 games (and maybe not just those sold in the app store) to render through a standardized pipeline that uses the Windows compositing engine. In fact, from what I can tell, any game that is sold through the Windows App Store will be required to do so. Rendering through the Windows compositing engine is very similar to running in the borderless windowed mode that we have today (in that tearing is impossible but uncapped frame rates are also difficult to deal with). Microsoft has several reasons for this, most of which involve support for the various overlays and integrations that the company would like to integrate with Windows games. MS wants to have an Action bar, a recording bar, on-screen keyboard support for running games on tablets and 2-in-1s and more, all of which require overlay support and pushing games through the Windows compositing engine will allow them to do that in a standardized way.

 

Down the road, it appears that Microsoft thinks that running all games through the compositing engine will allow for unique features and additions to PC games, including multi-plane overlays. Multi-plane overlays allow two different render screens, one with the 3D game and another with the UI, for example, to be rendered at different resolutions or even updated at different rates, merging together through the Windows engine. Pushing games through the MS Windows engine will also help to improve on power efficiency, a trait that is more important as PCs mobile into the realm of mobile devices. It is laudable that MS wants to improve the PC gaming experience and bring some unique features from the Xbox to the PC – we just have questions on how it will be done and if they will be sacrificing some of what makes the PC, "the PC" to get it done

 

what does it all mean?

well .. it looks like MS has a trojan horse, it's called  Windows Compositing Engine and it's part of WDDM2.0

their goal? to standardize the experience of DX12 gaming to similar levels of that of XBox One - sounds scary? it is!

the scariest part is that neither nVidia nor AMD dare to oppose them

Quote

No one wants to go against the wishes of Microsoft and no one wants to speak for them, but I have reached out to many people in the industry to try to figure out what’s going on. (Everyone wanted to remain anonymous in these discussions, FYI.)

 

One person told me that the reason NVIDIA’s results show a standard horizontal tearing behavior when Vsync is turned off in the game options is that it enumerates a DirectX feature called FlipEx, which refers to exclusive fullscreen. It is part of DX12 but was introduced prior to it; you can find background reading on it in Microsoft’s API documentation. Based on this person’s information though, the AMD drivers do not enumerate support for that capability in DirectX 12. If it did, the behavior of the AMD hardware would match that of the NVIDIA hardware with Ashes of the Singularity.

 

Another viewpoint suggests a different direction. This person suggests that AMD’s driver is behaving as Microsoft has laid out DX12 to work in general, not just for universal apps, and that NVIDIA is implementing a workaround of sorts, to get Vsync off status to function as it has in the past, claiming exclusive fullscreen status in DX12.

 

this is beyond fucked up and more than ever .. oh man I wish Vulkan to succeed 

 

---

 

you know the funny thing? AMD hired Scott Wasson, formerly of The Tech Report, specifically to deal with FCAT .. guess AMD has to fire him now 

 

---

 

some update on the matter, via PCPer: http://www.pcper.com/news/Graphics-Cards/AMD-Add-DirectFlip-DX12-Indicates-FreeSync-Incompatible-UWP-Games

the quotes are taken from a AMA with Robert Hallock on reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/48e8rl/radeon_technologies_group_qa_is_happening_here_on/

Quote

Asked by user CataclysmZA: Can you comment on the recent developments regarding Ashes of the Singularity and DirectX 12 in PC Perspective and Extremetech's tests? Will changes in AMD's driver to include FlipEx support fix the framerate issues and allow high-refresh monitor owners to enjoy their hardware fully? http://www.pcper.com/reviews/General-Tech/PC-Gaming-Shakeup-Ashes-Singularity-DX12-and-Microsoft-Store

 

Answer from Robert: We will add DirectFlip support shortly.

 

and the big one:

Quote

Asked by user CataclysmZA: Can you comment on how FreeSync is affected by the way games sold through the Windows Store run in borderless windowed mode?

 

Answer from Robert: This article discusses the issue thoroughly. Quote: "games sold through Steam, Origin [and] anywhere else will have the ability to behave with DX12 as they do today with DX11."

take what you will, but it appears FreeSync won't work with games sold via Windows Store that use explicit borderless window mode

Edited March 3, 2016 by zMeul

[Prysin]

so we are perhaps at the werge of losing one of the best benchmarking tools of this century?

damn....

[Senzelian]

5 minutes ago, zMeul said:

their goal? to standardize the experience of DX12 gaming to similar levels of that of XBox One - sounds scary?

No.
I'll wait and see what happens.

[zMeul]

3 minutes ago, Senzelian said:

I'll wait and see what happens.

that's what everyone said when Windows Insider builds had keyloggers in them, "let's wait for the retail version, then we talk"

and we ended up with much more than a keylogger bundled with W10 

[Senzelian]

Just now, zMeul said:

that's what everyone said when Windows Insider builds had keyloggers in them, "let's wait for the retail version then ..."

and we ended up with much more than a keylogger bundled with W10 

Yeah, but I don't care about that.
I'm happy to show all my data on my PC to Microsoft if they want to, cause I don't have any secrets. All of my important data is saved on C:\Head\Brain\

[samcool55]

This confuses me...

 

Vsync is on because it's part of the Windows Compositing Engine, which is part of the Windows Store.

So, if you don't release your games in the windows store, what's the issue here?

 

No forced on Vsync, problem solved, no?

 

Also that FlipEx crap sounds like complete BS.

I use my good old friend google, and i ended up on a page about a feature called Direct3D 9Ex Flip Mode, a boring function in DX9, yes 9, and exclusive on W7.

Also it got replaced in Dx10.1 and it was documented very poorly and was really only designed to optimize video playback, not games.

 

And i didn't even check other stuff, god knows how much more crap is in the articles.

 

For me, Guru3D made a mistake by benchmarking a game with Vsync on which is like the worst idea ever. So i am on Extreme Tech side. 

[zMeul]

6 minutes ago, samcool55 said:

This confuses me...

 

Vsync is on because it's part of the Windows Compositing Engine, which is part of the Windows Store.

it's not part of Windows' Store, it's part of WDDM2.0

Windows' Store just uses it

 

Quote

For me, Guru3D made a mistake by benchmarking a game with Vsync on which is like the worst idea ever. So i am on Extreme Tech side.

and you haven't read the PC Per article at all ... there's no way to turn VSync off on AMD's hardware

[samcool55]

5 minutes ago, zMeul said:

it's not part of Windows' Store, it's part of WDDM2.0

Windows' Store just uses it

Well yes if you want your stuff in the store it has to meet the WDDM2.0 requirements, i can't think of any other reason why you should meet those requirements if you aren't going to put it in the store. I'm just thinking about games now, there are maybe situations why you would want to meet WDDM2.0 requirements apart form the store, but for gamers and game devs, i can't think of any reason.

 

And i'm making a bit of a mess about WDDM2.0 and the store, but if i have it right, your software has to comply to the WDDM2.0 requirements if you want MS to do something with it, and some of these rules are about the Windows Compositing Engine, and you have to meet the requirements of WDDM2.0, and also the Windows Compositing Engine, if you want stuff in the Windows store.

 

No idea if that's right, so confusing...

[zMeul]

8 minutes ago, samcool55 said:

And i'm making a bit of a mess about WDDM2.0 and the store, but if i have it right, your software has to comply to the WDDM2.0 requirements if you want MS to do something with it, and some of these rules are about the Windows Compositing Engine, and you have to meet the requirements of WDDM2.0, and also the Windows Compositing Engine, if you want stuff in the Windows store.

read this part:

Quote

AMD’s driver is behaving as Microsoft has laid out DX12 to work in general, not just for universal apps, and that NVIDIA is implementing a workaround of sorts, to get Vsync off status to function as it has in the past, claiming exclusive fullscreen status in DX12

MS wants DX12 games to work like their Store apps, with VSync forced ON

[samcool55]

26 minutes ago, zMeul said:

read this part:

MS wants DX12 games to work like their Store apps, with VSync forced ON

Well firstly the AMD drivers DON'T behave as microsoft has laid out, AMD cards exceed the 60fps mark easily, which wouldn't be possible if Vsync was on. Which is completely the opposite of what Guru3D states.

 

So i have no idea why Vsync is on with Guru3D. but it just isn't forced on. You can turn it off with no issues at all.

 

Also with multi-gpu the games goes without problem over the 60fps mark. And i found in the Guru3D AMD stated that they don't have DirectFlip DX12 support, which is odd.

DirectFlip is something from DX11.1 and supported by W8 and up. So i don't understand why they suddenly have to support it, it's old and as it looks like, never needed in all those years. But suddenly they have to support it, quite weird tbh...

 

Also, another odd thing about all this, DirectFlip is designed to smooth out video playback and other programs (games for example probably).

And it will also ensure smooth transitions... That W7 aero stuff and whatever. Which doesn't make sense, if you want to give us a nice experience, turn it off! It's a fancy thing, not a necessity. I can't think of a single person that would stop using windows if the effects are disabled. And all of that is because it tries to reach a smooth experience with the least amount of memory bandwith... Tbh i don't understand that.

 

Another goal of it is to make the user enjoy an extended battery life of a mobile device... Which is like a big WTF for me. It's like that nvidia thing that limits the framerate to extend the battery life, but pushing it to everyone, even desktop users that don't even have a damn battery in their system!

 

I'm not suprised AMD doesn't support it. It all sounds like a piece of marketing that delivers NOTHING. Apart from crap we don't want.

[zMeul]

Just now, samcool55 said:

Well firstly the AMD drivers DON'T behave as microsoft has laid out, AMD cards exceed the 60fps mark easily, which wouldn't be possible if Vsync was on. Which is completely the opposite of what Guru3D states.

 

So i have no idea why Vsync is on with Guru3D. but it just isn't forced on. You can turn it off with no issues at all.

I strongly suggest you read the bloody article

 

AMD's cards exceed 60FPS in the rendering pipeline but those frames are dropped from the output queue after the GPU had rendered it

Quote

This process of rendering at an unthrottled rate but tossing out any frames that are rendered unnecessarily is how Ashes of the Singularity can self-report frame rates higher than 60Hz (or the maximum refresh of your screen) even though what is being shown on the screen is actually only running at 60 FPS.

 

[Sharkyx1]

1 hour ago, zMeul said:

what does it all mean?

well .. it looks like MS has a trojan horse, it's called  Windows Compositing Engine and it's part of WDDM2.0

their goal? to standardize the experience of DX12 gaming to similar levels of that of XBox One - sounds scary? it is!

the scariest part is that neither nVidia nor AMD dare to oppose them

 

this is beyond fucked up and more than ever .. oh man I wish Vulkan to succeed 

How did you come to this conclusion?

 

PcPer specifically talks about MS adding new ways to overlay info on the screen and treat them as separate entities 

 

What does any of this have to do with Vsync besides the fact that the Xbox One also has some form of vsync sometimes?

[zMeul]

2 minutes ago, Sharkyx1 said:

How did you come to this conclusion?

 

PcPer specifically talks about MS adding new ways to overlay info on the screen and treat them as separate entities 

 

What does any of this have to do with Vsync besides the fact that the Xbox One also has some form of vsync sometimes?

someone else who didn't read the article ....

Quote

AMD’s driver is behaving as Microsoft has laid out DX12 to work in general, not just for universal apps, and that NVIDIA is implementing a workaround of sorts, to get Vsync off status to function as it has in the past, claiming exclusive fullscreen status in DX12

is it more clear now?

[Sharkyx1]

3 minutes ago, zMeul said:

someone else who didn't read the article ....

is it more clear now?

Where is the connection to Xbox One?

 

I read that AMD is vsync on 100% and that Nvidia doesn't have that same issue/

that is not how XO operates.

Xbox has 3 vsync operation modes

Adaptive (Sync at 30 or 60, tear below)

Intelligent Adaptive (only tear in the top 1/3 of the image)

Full (vsync always enabled)

[samcool55]

24 minutes ago, zMeul said:

I strongly suggest you read the bloody article

 

AMD's cards exceed 60FPS in the rendering pipeline but those frames are dropped from the output queue after the GPU had rendered it

 

Couple of things i don't understand then.

The card exceeds 60fps, Vsync is OFF, and according to Nvidia AMD does not support that DirectFlip thing, but somehow AMD cards do do what MS wants it to do?

 

And if AMD did support that DirectFlip thing, it would act like Nvidia cards do, which is not how MS wanted it? I'm just really confused now.

 

As far as i can make sense out of it, what the AMD card does is how it should be according to MS, 60FPS with Vsync no matter what.

But somehow that's not correct according to nvidia? And Nvidia cards do support something but causes it to work not as how ms wanted it?

 

I'm starting to think Nvidia is lying and it's actually them not supporting DirectFlip and AMD actually does...

But Guru3D states that amd told them they indeed do not support it, but that would make sense if they are saying that because they had to because Nvidia told them to and Guru3D was also the first one that came out with this...

 

Anyway, i can't see why this would be bad for AMD, if Nvidia can do whatever they want, amd can too. And if MS wants it to be as they want, they will both have to accept that.

So however this will turn out, Nvidia will follow AMD, or AMD will follow Nvidia, there is no way it will stay like it is now. Things will change, but nobody knows how.

[zMeul]

10 minutes ago, Sharkyx1 said:

Where is the connection to Xbox One?

didn't XB1 jumped to DX12 already?

[deviant88]

if youre a developer please dont use windows store thanks...

[Sharkyx1]

1 minute ago, zMeul said:

didn't XB1 jumped to DX12 already?

XO has a custom api similar to DX12 as of 27/08/2014, when 4A Games made mention of it in an interview with Digital Foundry not sure what the current situation is though, I can't imagine why they would want to use actual DX12 though. but i can't believe they used DX11 on the xbox on launch. Maybe they did that because they thought it would be easier to develop for.

[Sharkyx1]

3 minutes ago, deviant88 said:

if youre a developer please dont use windows store thanks...

They did already say they were going to address issues with vsync the other day. outside of that, i don't really see the issue with having another storefront. I'd rather get rid of as many middle men as possible, so if i buy an EA game, i'd rather valve didn't take a cut and so on.

[deviant88]

Just now, Sharkyx1 said:

They did already say they were going to address issues with vsync the other day. outside of that, i don't really see the issue with having another storefront.

If its just another its fine but if i cant buy the same game on steam standalone only store exclusive then we have a problem.Im not connecting my pc with email user account just to use the store and ill never buy anything in store its uninstalled and deleted from my pc, couldnt anyway.

[zMeul]

9 minutes ago, Sharkyx1 said:

XO has a custom api similar to DX12 as of 27/08/2014, when 4A Games made mention of it in an interview with Digital Foundry not sure what the current situation is though, I can't imagine why they would want to use actual DX12 though. but i can't believe they used DX11 on the xbox on launch. Maybe they did that because they thought it would be easier to develop for.

they will jump to DX12: http://www.xboxoneuk.com/xbox-one/news/micrsoft-arent-confident-dx12-will-improve-xbox-graphics/

also: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2014-directx-12-revealed-coming-to-xbox-one

 

at launch, XB1 had DX11.x API - it's not compatible with Windows' DX11, it's more of a sub-set of DX12

[Sharkyx1]

Just now, deviant88 said:

If its just another its fine but if i cant buy the same game on steam standalone only store exclusive then we have a problem.Im not connecting my pc with email user account just to use the store and ill never buy anything in store its uninstalled and deleted from my pc, couldnt anyway.

That's totally your right, if one doesn't want to buy from a certain store they shouldn't. I think since MS is publishing the games, they have the same right to decide where to release the game. I'm not on W10 yet, and i don't really plan to, i probably will before the 12 months is up though. I might buy Quantum Break, and i'll probably play Killer Instinct.

 

2 minutes ago, zMeul said:

they will jump to DX12: http://www.xboxoneuk.com/xbox-one/news/micrsoft-arent-confident-dx12-will-improve-xbox-graphics/

I feel like part of this has to do with the marketing strength that DX12 carries, saying XB1 is getting DX12 will excite some people. it will make some people think it has an advantage over PS4 when that console has had a low level API since day 1. I wonder if DX12 is actually any better than the low level driver that MS was using in late 2014.

[zMeul]

Just now, Sharkyx1 said:

I feel like part of this has to do with the marketing strength that DX12 carries, saying XB1 is getting DX12 will excite some people. it will make some people think it has an advantage over PS4 when that console has had a low level API since day 1. I wonder if DX12 is actually any better than the low level driver that MS was using in late 2014.

it won't .. but XBox fanboys still claim it will make XB1 great

[Belgarathian]

I can see why MS would want to do this, and it makes sense. There should be a work around for uncapped FPS when required though, and I wouldn't think it would take that much effort for MS to implement.

[Sharkyx1]

23 minutes ago, Belgarathian said:

I can see why MS would want to do this, and it makes sense. There should be a work around for uncapped FPS when required though, and I wouldn't think it would take that much effort for MS to implement.

Well nvidia has already found one, so there's that

 

According to PCPer Intel also has a solution.