AMD unveils 'Mantle' API to optimize GPU performance - Debute with BF4

[zarx]

ethomaz said:

I don't know if you guys see a big downside in this new API...

To be close to the hardware you need to eliminate all the abstraction level used to deal with different types of hardware... so this API will be limited to one unique kind of hardware (GCN).

So forget nVidia or any other GPU hardware.... low-level API can't deal with different hardware... that's kill the purpose of a low-level API. If you start to add abstraction level to support more hardware you will go back to DirectX/OpenGL.

The API is open but it can deal with only one hardware to maintain this low-level access.

For each similar hardware a new API will need to be created i you want this advantage... so for each Family in nVidia GPU will need to have it own API... same for AMD... each family a new API.

While that DirectX and OpenGL support every family of GPU from any company since... well... forever.

PS. This API will be dead when AMD moved to a new architecture in the future.

You really think they will take it that far? I was kinda thinking something a bit more portable than that, sure it was designed to expose all the latest features of GCN but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's as low level as a console API. I guess I imagined something like a striped down OpenGL without all the legacy support and general bloat that constrains OpenGL, and a feature-set that exposes all the latest features in GCN as well as presumable support for hUMA. Most of the improvements layed out in the slides seem to be about removing CPU side overhead. I guess they do mention lots of low-level optimizations which would could mean hardware specific tweaks.

It would be kinda a shame to buy a new AMD card in 5 years and suddenly old games look and run worse than a much weaker older card because Mantle isn't supported anymore. I wonder when they will release more info on it, are there any whitepapers available yet?