DirectX® 12 Technology | AMD

With the new DirectX® 12 API from Microsoft®, you get blazingly fast performance, higher frames per second, and reduced latency – using the hardware you own now.​

The DirectX 12 difference

DirectX 12 takes your game to a whole new level. By tapping into all the cores of your multicore CPU simultaneously, DirectX 12 boosts the amount of work that can be sent to the graphics card – and gets it done in less time. Plus, DirectX 12 allows your GPU to run multiple tasks at once, so you save rendering time, reduce latency, and get more frames per second. Two revolutionary features in DirectX 12 are driving these innovations: multi-threaded command buffer recording and asynchronous shaders.

Running on all cylinders

Multi-threaded command buffer recording opens up a wide communication lane between your AMD processor or APU and your AMD Radeon™ GPU – so more than one CPU core can talk to the GPU at a time.

With DirectX® 11, most of the graphics work was loaded onto one core.

Chart for illustrative purposes only.

​Much like going from a two-lane country road to an eight-lane superhighway, multi-threaded command buffer recording in DirectX ​​12 spreads work across cores and lets more traffic from a processor reach the graphics card in a shorter amount of time.

Chart for illustrative purposes only.​

Riding the superhighway

Asynchronous (or async) shaders operate like a highway – eliminating traffic lights and scheduling issues and making it possible for the GPU to execute multiple tasks at the same time. Small tasks merge into gaps in the traffic of existing tasks – so you get more work done in the same amount of time.

​Full-throttle for mind-blowing performance

A recent addition to the 3DMark® Benchmark Suite evaluates your PC’s ability to smoothly handle rising draw calls – which is when the CPU asks the GPU to draw something on the screen – using DirectX 12 at 4K resolution. AMD significantly outperformed the competitor’s comparably priced graphics cards. GPUs capable of handling more draw calls, like AMD Radeon™ graphics, can make quick work of more on-screen visual detail.

 

System Configuration: Core i7-4960X, Asus X79 Sabertooth, 16GB DDR3-1866, Windows 10® 10 Technical Preview 2 (Build 10041), AMD Catalyst™ driver 15.20.1012, ForceWare 349.90. DirectX® 12 multi-threaded. 3840x2160 resolution.

​Rev up your gaming engine

Our relationships with game developers are key to giving you the high-octane gaming experience you deserve. The two games that have been publicly announced in support of DirectX 12 – Ashes of the Singularity™ by Oxide Games and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided™ by Square Enix – are optimized exclusively for AMD hardware.

 

​DirectX 12-Ready AMD Components

Once you’ve installed Windows® 10 Technical Preview Build 10041 (or later) and obtained the latest driver from Windows Update, these AMD components are DirectX® 12-ready:

• AMD Radeon™ R9 Series graphics
• AMD Radeon™ R7 Series graphics
• AMD Radeon™ R5 240 graphics
• AMD Radeon™ HD 8000 Series graphics for OEM systems (HD 8570 and up)
• AMD Radeon™ HD 8000M Series graphics for notebooks
• AMD Radeon™ HD 7000 Series graphics (HD 7730 and up)
• AMD Radeon™ HD 7000M Series graphics for notebooks (HD 7730M and up)
• AMD A4/A6/A8/A10-7000 Series APUs (codenamed “Kaveri”)
• AMD A6/A8/A10 PRO-7000 Series APUs (codenamed “Kaveri”)
• AMD E1/A4/A10 Micro-6000 Series APUs (codenamed “Mullins”)
• AMD E1/E2/A4/A6/A8-6000 Series APUs (codenamed “Beema”)