AMD Mantle Developer Private Beta Begins

51 Comments

View All Comments

• TheJian - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link

  OpenGL already has had this for a few years. People just didn't know it was in there or how to use it.

• grndzro7 - Friday, May 2, 2014 - link

  Really then why did NV have to come up with their new OGL extensions?
  To get Mantle like performance in OGL. AMD has already added the new OGL extensions to their drivers.

• Gizmosis350k - Friday, May 2, 2014 - link

  OpenGL was at first INCREDIBLY slow and unwieldy so, I don't blame 'em

• formulav8 - Friday, May 2, 2014 - link

  If it was the other way around you would be saying how lovely NVidia and Mantle is.

• Vayra - Thursday, June 5, 2014 - link

  You're completely wrong there. Nvidia's DX11 optimizations work with the Shader Cache, not with a draw call reduction, which is what Mantle does and what DX12 will also do.
  
  Nice troll though.

• WaltC - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link

  You are right, of course...;) AMD is relishing setting a fire under Microsoft's rear in order to nudge the company back on track with D3d development. Had Microsoft not been so lackluster in its continuing support of D3d (since D3d 10, really) AMD would not have had to do this at all. I am sure that given a choice, AMD would rather not spend its own money to step into Microsoft's position, here--but they felt they had little choice, obviously, except to go ahead with Mantle. Comments that AMD was trying to "beat Microsoft to the punch" make no sense at all, because Mantle is not a D3d replacement (it only supports AMD gpus.) Mantle has nothing to do whatever with D3d development--which is entirely up to Microsoft.

• Ortanon - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link

  This is an extremely short-sighted way to look at this. And obviously Mantle is a D3D replacement lol, what are you even on about?
  
  Let's please keep in mind that DX11 is almost five years old. This is not a scenario where AMD woke a sleeping DirectX Dragon, this is a scenario where Microsoft has already been laser-focused on legitimizing their place in the mobile space with Windows 8 and Phone 8, and now DX12. This was happening whether AMD did a single thing or not.
  
  I really wouldn't be surprised if Mantle wasn't actually based on DX12 in at least some loose or conceptual manner. That honestly makes more sense than the idea that AMD designed its own graphics API for its own hardware and ended up with the results that we're seeing today. The results are more indicative of a design that's more generalized as opposed to a design that's proprietary.
  
  So far, it's virtually Mantle's sole effect that graphics become less CPU-bound. DirectX would obviously do that. Obviously. But AMD's own software on AMD's own hardware? Wouldn't Mantle take more advantage of that sort of integration? Either AMD is really stupid, or the design of Mantle echos designs seen elsewhere, either in OpenGL developments or in DirectX developments, probably the latter as I'm guessing some kind of DX beta code for mobile/Xbox One was floating around somewhere.

• Wreckage - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link

  Microsoft has been working on DX12 for over 4 years. The latest OpenGL spec was announced prior to the Mantle announcement. AMD simply copied what was coming and rushed a beta on the market

• Medallish - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link

  Nah, based on comments from people involved with Mantle, DX12 is almost certainly spawned from Mantle, there's no way AMD could have had something ready faster than MS could. Most likely MS has been involved with Mantle when AMD started work on it, and DX12 will simply be Mantle + MS & NV extensions.

• B3an - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link

  You're talking out of your ass.