Usually, new graphics engines reduce the speed and performance of your computer.
Of course, they also make gaming graphics look way better.
But the next DirectX12 release could actually improve performance while reducing the power consumption of your PC.
That’s right: according to a new tech demo, DirectX12 could significantly speed up your PC. Here’s what we know about DirectX12 thus far:
-The recent tech demo drew 50,000 asteroids on the screen of a Surface 3 Pro tablet
-The tablet was initially running in DirectX11 mode. Halfway through, it switches to DX12.
-When the demo switches to DX12 mode, CPU usage instantly drops, which in turn reduces overall power consumption by 50%
-At the same time, DX12 increases the framerate. The demo ran at 19fps in DX11 mode and that number rose to 33fps in D12 mode – a 60% increase in framerates.
-In other words, DX12 increases framerates by 60% while reducing power consumption by 50%
That’s a significant accomplishment. And it all comes down to the way in which CPU cycles are used. New graphics systems like AMD’s Mantle, Apple’s Metal, and OpenGL NG all reduce CPU overhead. In fact, that’s the main purpose of DirectX12 and Direct3D12.
What does “reducing CPU overhead” mean? It means that developers can write graphics code designed to run directly from the GPU instead of relying on the CPU. Since today’s modern GPUs have better thermal capacity (they can more easily cool themselves), they’re better suited to handling intense tasks.
What does this mean for you? Better gaming performance and cheaper costs
Ultimately, all of these new graphic systems are exciting news for us, the average computer users.
It means that next year’s mobile devices will be able to run some pretty impressive graphics and gaming performance should be even better.
Moreover, you should be able to save about $30 per year in electricity costs. Reducing CPU power consumption by 50% adds up to a lot of cost savings by the end of the year.
If you’ve ever looked for an easy and free way to improve gaming performance on your PC, then all you need to do is install DirectX12 when it comes out.
Don’t expect it to boost Xbox One performance
One thing DirectX12 won’t do, however, is improve performance on the Xbox One. The Xbox One has a fixed graphic unit and that graphic unit simply doesn’t have the power to run Xbox One games at modern framerates or resolutions, which is why it’s unlikely Xbox One users will ever experience 60fps and 1080p gaming.
When is DirectX12 coming out?
A preview version of DirectX12 is expected to be released later this year. The full consumer release, however, won’t arrive until holiday 2015.
So we’ve got a while to wait. But if these early tech demos are any indication, we’re in for quite a treat when DirectX 12 finally comes out.
