EVE Information Portal

I didn't notice a difference so I guess that's good.

Ah, right. I guess that makes sense if you can run it using Cinder since a OpenGL port would probably be more expensive.

Do you know if one is on the cards though? It would certainly make a Linux easier. I guess that CCP isn't planning EVE for consoles though so, there isn't the benefit of being able to port to other platforms more easily so, DirectX makes more sense than for some things. There must be OpenGL developers at CCP though since I guess the DUST514 engine must be GL.

Mantel is impressive because its a low level API, all middle men are cut out and the game will interact directly with the GPU,and will only work on cards designed around it, its how consoles have done it for ages and they could do it because they were using the same GPU per console. PC's are such a mess in comparison.

Mantel is open source, anyone can use it and change it as needed. Nvidia can't use it on their current cards because they don't physically support it, and unless Nvidia does something drastic they won't support it for 2~ years. Making new chips take time.


What makes AMD's actions brilliant is that they somehow convinced Microsoft to use mantel instead of directx, and because of them cooperating with Sony they will also have Mantel support. Everyone will try to use Mantel because both the consoles use it and its coming to PC as well, making cross platform games much easier to make well. Nvidias more expensive cards will seem slower in comparisons to AMD's cheaper ones, and guess which one people will buy?

Thanks for the link Savira, of course its high level as well as low level, how stupid of me.

PC's are such a mess because, unlike all the other hardware in PCs, graphics cards (well, AMD/NVidia's which, considering the performance gap are the only ones that matter) have always been closed with the basic specs not released publicly, supported only by closed source drivers (and open source ones on Linux that have been trying to reverse engineer the closed ones or otherwise figure out how to interact with the cards).

This is in contrast to CPUs, where you have the basic instruction set so, you can write code to run on the CPU. Both AMD and Intel have introduced new instructions (MMX, SSE, 3DNow, x86_64) that are supported by some CPUs and, to take advantage, you need to compile for those CPUs but, because they are open, you can do that when needed. If you don't care about getting every last ounce of performance, you compile your code once without using the extra instructions that only some CPUs support and release one bit of code for everything. This allows applications that care to get extra performance by using the hardware directly in the most efficient manner but, doesn't tie anyone into a proprietary set of drivers. Hopefully Mantle will work something like this. If so, it could be a huge boon to game developers in the long run because they can create a much faster game by interacting with cards directly instead of going via an API that is neither optimal for their game or the hardware. It could also be a huge boon to Linux graphics support because hopefully card manufacturers will be comfortable releasing open source drivers for it because it won't mean them releasing their own optimized OpenGL implementations.

I guess that to be successful, Mantle needs to be attractive to game developers. It will also have to deliver performance improvements in games that support it. If it does both of these, gamers will want it so, NVidia will have to work with it. If it can deliver these performance improvements without copious amounts of work for developers to use it, then it should be attractive to many developers so, it's basically down to the performance improvements.

Intel have always released open source drivers for their graphics cards so, they are likely to play ball with Mantle for their cards simply because in the long run, it could make drivers easier for them. They have effectively exposed the interface for their cards already and, they do so because they are a chip-maker, not a software/graphics company who isn't interested in investing money making their own proprietary software graphics API implementations - they just want to make the chips.

It's unfortunate that something like Mantle couldn't have come about by cooperation between NVidia and AMD as well as game developers since, ultimately I think it is in all of their interests but, fear of disclosing anything about how their GPUs work has put off NVidia and AMD from cooperating at all and, it couldn't be done unless they were both fully onboard. While not ideal, hopefully AMD's leverage in the console market will help them push it on NVidia anyway for the benefit of all.

Yes, if DX11 is not supported for any reason then we fall back to DX9.

As a Linux user, I´m actually looking forward to the new DX11 look. If the experience with the Trinity expansion is any indication, Wine will have a working inplementation 3 days after EVE goes DX 11 exclusive . In the meantime I can run in DX9 mode and test periodically. I run with bleeding edge Wine with a couple of patches (mainly the awesomium patch for the certificate store ). From the Wine changelogs I can see work is being done, though a lot is just placeholders for the actual routines to be implemented later. Most improvements to Wine are done on an on-demand basis, or to scratch the devs own itches, so once theres a critical mass we will see Wine supporting DX11 calls. This will be good news for the fruity folks too, as Cider will probably be ready shortly after.

More like OpenGL , all platform including mobile support OpenGL, thay can use it on Playstation 4, Xbox One, Wi u

This mantle stuff could get interesting, and I am now very glad that I have not yet upgraded my video card ^^.

I wonder what CCP will do if mantle really takes off. Eve has been an Nvidia/physx house, and CCP will be working with AMD/mantle in the near future for Dust514 on the PS4... I really really really hope that Mantle turns out to be awesome sauce AND Nvidia can jump on the bandwagon. I like both manufacturers, and currently have cards from both AMD and Nvidia...

Just thinking about Linux and Nvidia.

A while ago, Nvidia stopped their driver support for Linux completely (was not much there even before that) so we to put all our hopes in the reverse engineering folks now.

Question I have is: With the upcomming Steam-Box and it's Linux based OS, does that not put pressure on Nvidia to either join Mantle efforts or put their efforts into drivers for Linux in order to stay the preferred hardware for Valve as it seems to be the case at the moment? (Depending on the success of the Box of course.)

Either way, I am happy that I own AMD at the moment (did not upgrade to Nvidia yet), while Nvidia might have the most ecologic (frames per watt) cards, the prospect of Mantle looks promising enough for me to keep my hardware for now and see what happens. I really do hope that many major developers adapt and bring out the full potential of it.