AMD Mantle Developer Private Beta Begins
by Ryan Smith on May 1, 2014 8:00 AM EST
Word comes from AMD this morning that the private beta for the Mantle developer program has begun. Up until now the Mantle SDK (not to be confused with the drivers) has been in alpha development, with AMD granting access to only a handful of very close developers (EA/DICE, Nixxes, etc). The commencement of the private beta in turn marks the first time that the Mantle SDK has been made widely available to developers since it was announced at AMD’s 2013 Developer Summit back in November.
At this point AMD tells us that they have 40 developers pre-registered – AMD has been taking registrations for the past six months since the summit – and that they’re still taking additional developers. The beta, though much wider than the earlier alpha, is still a private beta, so developers still need to register with AMD for access. AMD tells us that “There are no objective criteria for being selected, as we are interested in talking to developers of all shapes and sizes. Past development experience is encouraged, however.”
Meanwhile AMD’s Mantle developer portal is up and running. Instructions for joining the developer beta can be found on the page, however all further access is password restricted.
Source: AMD
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Ortanon - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
I have a bad feeling about Mantle. It's had a pretty lackluster outing, and DirectX 12 is targeting it directly. Even if it doesn't reach Mantle levels of efficiency, at worst it'll be almost-Mantle-level plus it'll BE DirectX. This really won't end well.Goty - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
Won't it? Who's to say that AMD's Mantle push isn't at least in part responsible for some of the feature targets of DX12?Wreckage - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
More like Mantle was rushed to market to beat DX12 and OpenGL that have already planned these features. NVIDIA has been able to beat Mantle using similar features that are already in DX11.VulgarDisplay - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
This is the most completely false statement I have ever read. Mantle is offers a massive increase in minimum framerate as well as frame delivery smoothness that DX11 can absolutely not achieve on AMD or Nvidia cards. Anyone who has played BF4 with Mantle can attest to that. In my testing on the worst part of Siege of Shanghai I get 120fps (capped with r9 290) with Mantle, and 58fps on a gtx780, and 59 fps with the r9 290 in dx11. This is entirely due to the MASSIVE cpu bottleneck in DX11.Wreckage - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
NVIDIA's latest driver makes use of code already in DX11 to reduce overhead.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-driver-update-direct3d-optimization,26381.html
No need for a separate proprietary vendor locked API
Alexvrb - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
I just read that link, Wreckage, and it doesn't really support your statements. That looks an awful lot like a combination of broad driver improvements plus game-specific optimizations. Both teams already do that sort of work on a regular basis. Both DX and Mantle performance can improve over time with new drivers. Also, this is in that same article:"To its credit, Nvidia did clarify that its new driver has a higher average frame rate, but still has more slow frames than Mantle"
This is what Vulgar was talking about. Also keep in mind Nvidia wasn't using a low-end or older CPU. Mantle isn't perfect but it is pushing MS to release a low-level DX in the next year or two. In the meantime, games utilizing Mantle can get substantial boosts in framerate, especially if you have a slower CPU. I'm all for anything that will increase PC gaming userbase, and being able to play games with cheaper hardware helps enable that. Speaking of which, Mantle is very helpful for GCN-equipped APUs.
3DVagabond - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
He's not going to acknowledge anything you say. It doesn't fit in with his agenda, which is to downplay and disparage AMD vs. nVidia at all opportunities. Accuracy of his statements or the facts are irrelevant.Alexey291 - Saturday, May 3, 2014 - link
He does have 1 point though. There is NOTHING good about a vendor locked API. But its not like NV doesn't have any of those :)The rest - yeah he seems to have a very clear agenda in mind.
at80eighty - Thursday, May 1, 2014 - link
it truly is a shame youre allowed to still post on this site since your VC&G threadshitting daysGizmosis350k - Friday, May 2, 2014 - link
That is a rude thing to say sir