In March 2020, Microsoft made some announcements on a new DirectX12 version, which was later dubbed DirectX 12 Ultimate and somewhat bundled with the Windows 10 May 2020 Update. In this guide, we intend to examine this new DirectX build, describe its outstanding qualities, and explain how users may find it useful.
What Is DirectX 12 Ultimate?
DirectX 12 Ultimate is the newest DirectX version based on the regular DirectX 12 framework. The new DirectX version collects a wide range of features and implements them under one banner while standardizing things for PC gaming and Xbox consoles simultaneously.
What Are the Main Features of DirectX 12 Ultimate?
We will now move on to review the important features that define DirectX 12 Ultimate.
DirectX Raytracing 1.1:
In computer graphics, ray tracing is the term used for any rendering technique that works to generate an image by tracing the path of light as pixels and then simulating the effects of its encounters with virtual objects. Ray tracing is an exciting new concept in graphics for video games. Microsoft developed its own ray tracing function and called it DirectX Raytracing.
DirectX Raytracing – even as an incremental update to already existing tech – goes a long way to improve the overall look of games. The concept of making light in a game appear or behave the same way it does in the real world is a good thing in almost all cases.
With the new feature, gamers get to see more realistic reflections and refraction. In games, a shaft of sunlight also becomes more photo-realistic. Similarly, shadows get an upgrade with greater visual depth. You can search Google for a video that shows ray tracing in action in a game like Minecraft. You will be amazed at the changes.
Furthermore, DirectX 12 Ultimate is designed to make ray tracing more efficient. Microsoft also plans to implement functions that provide game developers with more control over ray tracing, which means they will not always have to leave things to the system to decide.
Variable rate shading:
To be fair, a variable rate shading function already existed in the regular DirectX 12. Variable rate shading is the function through which a computer figures out the correct or appropriate pixel coloring, brightness, and contrast. The process to determine the right values for those properties is typically expensive (in terms of computation), but variable rate shading makes things a whole lot easier.
Since the variable rate shading feature shades the important areas or parts of a gaming screen at full resolution, the less important objects are forced to use less GPU power for shading. Consider a scene in a game where you are driving a car or participating in a race. There, you probably need to see the car that is in front of you in full detail because it is important, but you may not care much for trees or fences whipping in the surroundings.
Game developers can develop algorithms that identify the pixels that players do not see or the pixels that change without any recourse to any rule or frequency, so the rate at which such pixels get rendered can be reduced using VRS. For example, if you have black pixels in a shadow and then reduce the shading rate for the pixels, they will look no different on your screen.
Therefore, by reducing the shading rate of numerous pixels per frame (especially those players can do without), developers get to reduce the pressure on GPUs – and this translates into a boost in the rendering of objects and the overall performance.
The described process should deliver scene effects that gamers are unlikely to notice, but computers will appreciate the changes because their jobs become a lot easier (as they will be able to perform tasks more efficiently). In general, the enhancements and improvements in question tend to deliver better visuals and improve the gaming experience.
Mesh shaders:
The mesh shader function is somewhat similar to variable rate shading in that it helps computers to perform tasks faster and work more efficiently. With mesh shaders, game developers get to create highly detailed worlds without them having to overload CPUs with the volume of processes that would otherwise be needed for such operations.
Mesh shaders can be configured to determine what needs to appear in a scene, how much detail it requires, the level of detail (LOD) that it needs, and so on. For example, primary objects will have finer detail – and this means they will end up with more triangles in their make-up.
In case you are wondering what triangles mean here, we have to tell you that triangles correspond to the base unit of 3D graphics – at least, things are that way in computer graphics.
Similarly, objects that exist farther away from the main scene will be drawn with fewer triangles since they require less detail in the first place. In general, everything you see on your screen corresponds to a set of tiny triangles, which have been clustered together to create a figure or object that your eyes recognize.
You may want to search for Nvidia’s Asteroids Mesh Shaders Demo on Google and watch the video to understand the processes we just described. That video shows several objects with ten different levels of detail. Some objects will be right in front of you, while others (low-level asteroids, for example) will stay far off in the distance.
Well, the improvement in question comes in handy in a scene where there are many random objects, such as the asteroid belt in the Nvidia video that we mentioned. To round up, we can say that due to mesh shaders, graphics cards will become much more capable of maintaining higher frame rates without having to sacrifice noticeable details – because fewer triangles will be drawn at any given time.
Sampler feedback:
Sampler feedback is the last function from DirectX 12 Ultimate that we are going to discuss. We have already described several new features. Some of them were introduced to improve already existing tech, and they do a lot to make games render their scenes better (or more efficiently). It is more or less the same thing with sampler feedback.
For one, Nvidia has already declared that objects – especially those that do not change from frame to frame – can be shaded more efficiently and the calculated information from previous frames can be reused as the objects’ colors.
In theory, sampler feedback is a framework that should improve the game loading process for textures. By textures, we are referring to the surface details on video game objects. In case you are yet to figure it out, the idea behind sampler feedback lies in this: a machine gets to make more intelligent decisions regarding texturing when it renders larger, more detailed textures – and it does this while using less video memory.
When the sampler feedback setup succeeds, gamers are expected to experience fewer issues like stuttering. Of course, since we have already established that sampler feedback also helps to use GPU more efficiently, we must mention that it will help to boost frame rates – and this is almost always a good thing, as you may have come to realize when dealing with games.
What Does DirectX 12 Ultimate Mean for PC Gaming?
DirectX 12 Ultimate is a good thing for PC gaming because significantly more users than before get to use the newest and most intuitive graphics technologies, such as real-time ray tracing, which may have been inaccessible to them before.
For one, the real-time ray tracing feature, which is mostly a function in NVIDIA graphics cards, does a lot of good to improve visual quality – since it simulates light’s physical behavior to provide realistic lighting.
DirectX 12 Ultimate more or less ensures that such features are utilized to improve the gaming experience on computers.
Besides NVIDIA graphics cards, AMD cards – especially those based on RDNA2 – will support DirectX 12 Ultimate. The same thing goes for Xbox Series X.
What Does DirectX 12 Ultimate Do in Windows 10?
The features in DirectX 12 Ultimate help computers execute image display and video rendering operations faster and more efficiently, so the DirectX upgrade will make games more visually stunning. We do not expect users to notice significant improvements in the regular graphical operations that have nothing to do with games, though.
Moreover, Microsoft did not give Windows carte blanche to use DirectX 12 Ultimate features. It is still up to game developers to decide whether to implement the new functions in their titles. For example, mesh shading – one of the features we described earlier – has been around since 2018, but it has not seen much use in games.
We can only hope that game developers become encouraged to take advantage of such top-level features since they have become part of DirectX 12 Ultimate. To be fair, your hardware also has to support DX 12 functions or be compatible with the framework in question for things to run smoothly.
Well, you might end up seeing DirectX 12 Ultimate stickers on new devices – if their manufacturers decide to advertise DX12 to customers that way. On gaming consoles like the Xbox, the Series X logo will represent DirectX 12 Ultimate. Well, in any case, if you see the DirectX 12 Ultimate logo or Xbox Series X logo on a device, you will know that the machine provides support for the new graphics API.
“Should I Upgrade to DirectX 12 Ultimate?”
If you want DirectX 12 Ultimate, then you will have to download and install Windows updates.
Nvidia has already released a driver that provides support for Microsoft’s DirectX 12 Ultimate and the newest GPU scheduling feature introduced in the Windows 10 May 2020 Update.
Microsoft also released a developer’s preview of DirectX 12 Ultimate with Windows 10 Version 2004 (the major Windows 10 release in May 2020). This Windows version is hardly new and is already running on many PCs. So, if your computer has downloaded and installed this Windows build, then your machine already has DirectX 12 Ultimate.
If your device is yet to run the May 2020 Windows 10 Update, however, then you can make a decision on whether you need the DirectX upgrade. We always advise users to get and run Windows updates (as soon as they become available) because the upsides to keeping your computer updated simply outweigh the potential downsides resulting from the early downloading and installation of updates.
In any case, you are unlikely to suffer problems after upgrading to DirectX12 Ultimate, so you have nothing to lose by allowing your computer to get the newest gaming framework functions.
If you play games on your PC, then you stand to benefit from the upgrade – if you have a modern graphics card that supports the features and improvements embedded into DirectX 12 Ultimate.
Nevertheless, even if your machine lacks a graphics card compatible with or good enough for DX12 Ultimate, the games that support DirectX 12 Ultimate will still run normally on your PC. You just will not see or experience the visual improvements that gamers with GPUs that support DX12 Ultimate will.
Microsoft has already declared that gamers will see no adverse effects on hardware incapable of providing support for DirectX 12 Ultimate. We have to take their word for it.
TIP:
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