GeForce + Radeon: Previewing DirectX 12 Multi-Adapter with Ashes of the Singularity
by Ryan Smith on October 26, 2015 10:00 AM ESTAshes GPU Performance: Single & Mixed 2012 GPUs
While Ashes’ mutli-GPU support sees solid performance gains with current-generation high-end GPUs, we wanted to see if those gains would extend to older DirectX 12 GPUs. To that end we’ve put the GeForce GTX 680 and the Radeon HD 7970 through a similar test, running the Ashes’ benchmark at 2560x1440 with Medium image quality and no MSAA.
First off, unlike our high-end GPUs there’s a distinct performance difference between our AMD and NVIDIA cards. The Radeon HD 7970 performs 22% better here, just averaging 30fps to the GTX 680’s 24.5fps. So right off the bat we’re entering an AFR setup with a moderately unbalanced set of cards.
Once we do turn on AFR, two very different things happen. The GTX 680 + HD 7970 setup is an outright performance regression, with performance 40% from the single GTX 680 Ti. On the other hand the HD 7970 + GTX 680 setup sees an unexpectedly good performance gain from AFR, picking up a further 55% to 46.4fps.
As this test is a smaller number of combinations it’s not clear where the bottlenecks are, but it’s none the less very interesting how we get such widely different results depending on which card is in the lead. In the GTX 680 + HD 7970 setup, either the GTX 680 is a bad leader or the HD 7970 is a bad follower, and this leads to this setup spinning its proverbial wheels. Otherwise letting the HD 7970 lead and GTX 680 follow sees a bigger performance gain than we would have expected for a moderately unbalanced setup with a pair of cards that were never known for their efficient PCIe data transfers. So long as you let the HD 7970 lead, at least in this case you could absolutely get away with a mixed GPU pairing of older GPUs.
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Badelhas - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
Great article but... This is all very nice and everything but what I really miss is a PC game with a graphics breakthrough, like Crysis when it was lauched back on 2007. None of the games I saw in meantime had that WOW factor. I blame consoles.tipoo - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
Star Citizen maybe? Pretty good at bringing top systems to their knees. Though yeah, nothing is the singular leader like Crysis in 2007 was, but that's also a product of every engine getting up to a good level.Nfarce - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
My thoughts exactly. The jump from games like HL2 and BF2 to Crysis was like a whole new world. Unfortunately it was such a big hit on performance only the most deep pockets could afford to play that game at full capability. I wasn't able to do it until 2009 when building a new rig, and even then wasn't able to get 60fps at 1080p.Marc HFR - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
Hello,In AFR, isn't the (small) difference between AMD and NVIDIA on the rendering annoying ?
PVG - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
Most interesting would be to see results with new+old GPUs. As in, "Should I keep my old card in tandem with my new one?"extide - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
With AFR, no. If they do a different type of split where each card gets a different set of work to do, and one card gets more than the other, then yes.Refuge - Tuesday, October 27, 2015 - link
I was under the impression that it had to be DX12 compatible to work.That cuts out 90% of the older GPU's out there.
DanNeely - Tuesday, October 27, 2015 - link
Most of the make it faster stuff in DX12 will work on DX11 capable hardware; the stuff that needs new hardware is relatively incidental. AMD intends to support all GCN cards, NVidia as far back as the 4xx family (excluding any low end rebadges). I'm not sure how far along they are with extending support back that far yet.Refuge - Tuesday, October 27, 2015 - link
These new Multi-GPU modes will require full DX12 compliant cards though correct?And thank you for the info, I was unaware of how far back support was going. I'm pleasantly surprised :D
rascalion - Monday, October 26, 2015 - link
I'm excited to see how this technology plays out in the laptop space with small dGPU + iGPU working together.