Blazing Fast NVMEs and Direct Storage API for PCs *spawn*

well nvidia just announced hardware on their new cards to enhance data transfers

 

It might still be below PS5, given its 22GB/s best case scenario. Plus, wouldn't this require new motherboard chipsets? Or a BIOS update? How does it know to send the data to the GPU?

 

I want to know more about DirectStorage and how it's implemented. Curious if it requires other hardware like a compatible chipset or something.

 

Nvidia's RTX IO has integration with Microsoft DirectStorage to accelerate loading into the GPU.

Here's the Nvidia RTX IO slide:

 

I just said the same thing on the PS5 thread haha.

 

as far as I'm aware it doesn't. It just keeps the data compressed and is then uncompressed at the gpu instead of at the cpu as it used to be

 

Same questions as I had as well. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. Though maybe eastman has it right, where the software is modified, so it loads the data compressed to the GPU and then does processing there. I think that would require direct support by the program as it alters the typical data flow.

 

In that case the chart they showed doesn't make sense as it shows the data going directly to the GPU. Another artistic impression?

 

Shows nice [hype] graphic chart, yet no demo of it in action... typical Jen.

 

I mean look at the picture. You have a bandwidth bar and then what looks like cpu processors. So HDD are super slow and use only .1 of a core ssds are about 5 times faster and use .2 . A gen 4 ssd requires 2 full cores. If you compress it to the max it would take 24 cpu cores. But using nvidia's tech it uses only .5

i'm going to assume the core portions it uses is to send the data to the right place. So it sores the data coming in and sends it to either main memory or graphics memory depending on what is required and that is all the cpu is doing. All data gets passed on compressed where Nvidia can either read read it comrpessed or decompress it to be used ,

 

Why does that image have a box labelled "NIC"? WTF does networking have to do with this?

 

I'm pretty sure Nvidia is relying heavily on Microsoft's DX DirectStorage solution and board manufacturers to make this possible (successful). And I also believe PC game developers will have to code for such solution... that it isn't as free or automatic as Jen presents it.

 

@Shortbread DIrectStorage is an API, so software support is a must. In terms of bypassing the cpu to access the pcie lanes for the SSD, that's where I'm wondering if it'll require chipset support.

 

I assume the "NIC" should be more like the Storage Interface Controller, like Northbridge or SouthBridge that connects to the PCI-Express layer?

 

Here's some good news: RTX IO will be supported by ALL RTX GPUs:

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/news/rtx-io-gpu-accelerated-storage-technology/

 

I knew that. I was just reiterating it's need, that's it.

 

I'm not an expert here but IIRC PCIe devices should be able to do P2P DMA as most devices act as masters. One such example is NVMe over Fabrics (directly DMA from networking devices to an SSD).

 

So I guess this means either we should expect very different IO performance between the two architectures or the aforementioned on-GPU decompression meant just general GPU compute without dedicated hardware, meaning the IO performance on either new console will still be a generational leap over the RTX30.

 

Why do you say this?

 

a

also MS confirmed that a new update of Windows 10 is going to add those features soon

• Today, Microsoft announced they're bringing a part of this revolutionary Architecture to Windows gaming PC's.
• DirectStorage will massively reduce load times for games, allowing PC games to more effectively use high-speed storage solutions.
• If you have a speedy SSD and a game supports DirectStorage, load and wait times will be much shorter.