Did Directx12 make KSP faster?

[problemecium]

WRONG, i put force-d4d12

now i have KSP in 3D, my RAM is now under 10megabit, i can dock several ships of +2500parts at +150fps with my oldschool 10 years old laptop!

also i made an asteroids field to test a bit the limits, but it's ok, so i installed it on my phone and smartwatch:

i also use finite element analysis in real time to have the whole part deformed instead of just a pivot point and connected the cloud layers to the irl weather-forecast-center!

https://youtu.be/yVdXy7t9oJs?t=37s

I tried this and my computer literally exploded. Buy me a new one.

[code99]

Re Dx11 vs OpenGL

It depends entirely on your machine. OpenGL causes FPS hits for some and graphical issues for others (some of which can be fixed in the graphics driver software). Dx11 has better graphics with no tweaking but has significant performance issues with crewed vessels for some. Both reduce RAM usage.

My rig has an i7 and a GTX 660. OpenGL has no performance issues and displays shadows. I have to use the driver to get anti-aliasing. Dx11 is prettier but halves my frame rate when I have several crew members on a vessel.

Well, i just tried dx11 and the game crashed at 3.5 GB mark ... I guess ill stick with OpenGL since when i use that i never go over 3.1GB with all my mods installed. Infact, i played for several hours straight yestarday and it never got past 3.1 GB ... only thing missing are shadows and the occasional stutter ...

Running on:

Intel I7 4790

Sapphire Radeon R9 290 OC Tri-X Vapor-X 4GB GDDR5 (quite a mouthful)

16 GB DDR3 1600 MHz HyperX Savage

Asus Maximus Ranger VII motherboard

Edited August 13, 2015 by code99

[Skalou]

I tried this and my computer literally exploded. Buy me a new one.

Really? natural selection! but ok, i have one ready for you, but you will need to send me the shipping cost on my western union account in caribbean first.

Edited August 13, 2015 by Skalou

[Streetwind]

I tried DX11 today, on a whim. Very impressed with the RAM savings (3.0 went down to 2.1). Very unimpressed with the performance - the space center is fine, but building inside the VAB or controlling spacecraft stutters like I'm doing 15 FPS or less, despite the videocard and CPU being nowhere near maxed.

This is a showstopper - I can't consider DX11 mode playable like this. If DX12 ever does come around for Unity/KSP, it needs to match DX9 framerate performance before I start caring about any of its other features.

[code99]

I tried DX11 today, on a whim. Very impressed with the RAM savings (3.0 went down to 2.1). Very unimpressed with the performance - the space center is fine, but building inside the VAB or controlling spacecraft stutters like I'm doing 15 FPS or less, despite the videocard and CPU being nowhere near maxed.

This is a showstopper - I can't consider DX11 mode playable like this. If DX12 ever does come around for Unity/KSP, it needs to match DX9 framerate performance before I start caring about any of its other features.

Huh, thats weird, for me dx11 had the opposite effect, my ram went up to the point the game crashed at startup. Altho, keep in mind I'm comparing it to OpenGl, not dx9 as dx9 for me does the same thing, crashes when loading all the mods i've got installed

[Captain Sierra]

I tried DX11 today, on a whim. Very impressed with the RAM savings (3.0 went down to 2.1). Very unimpressed with the performance - the space center is fine, but building inside the VAB or controlling spacecraft stutters like I'm doing 15 FPS or less, despite the videocard and CPU being nowhere near maxed.

This is a showstopper - I can't consider DX11 mode playable like this. If DX12 ever does come around for Unity/KSP, it needs to match DX9 framerate performance before I start caring about any of its other features.

Very strange. I cant say I can replicate. DX11 runs absolutely swimmingly for me.

[Streetwind]

That probably has to do with different system configurations. My hardware is different from yours, and the drivers to run that hardware are also different. Maybe there are even OS differences.

This is why consistency is such a big factor for implementing an API, bigger even than new killer features. PCs are an extremely fragmented lot, there's literally millions of possible configurations. The DX11 implementation on this Unity version is clearly not consistent across that population.

This is also something I'm looking at Unity 5 for. Version 4, despite its many updates, is fundamentally an older design. Version 5 is almost a full rewrite, based on much newer technologies. I would hope that the native DX11 implementation in it is working better. In fact, since I have a very powerful CPU and rarely ever run into physics bottlenecks with the ship sizes I commonly build, a well working DX11 implementation would be my number 1 wish feature - before even the improved physics engine.

[sarbian]

Physics will no longer be limited to one core. However, one physics object can only run in one thread. Spacecraft are physics objects. So one single rocket will still run on one single core.

Spacecraft are not one object. There is as much object as there is parts.

And for the DX11 problems : the KSP shaders are not written/tested for DX11 and the game default target is not DX11. If the dev change that it should work fine.

[Streetwind]

Spacecraft are not one object. There is as much object as there is parts.

Are you sure? I've seen it repeatedly stated, IIRC even by Maxmaps, that a singular rocket is going to run on a singular thread. Specifically said so that people temper their expectations for this whole multithreaded physics business.

I mean, when in doubt you definitely know more about Unity than I do, but I can only go off of what I heard.

[xtoro]

There's a misunderstanding here about objects/thread. Replace "object" with "ship". Basically, it'll be one group of objects per thread. Objects that are not connected to other objects in the same space can be run separate threads. Same with two groups of objects(ships) will be run on different threads. That is, unless they approach each other and get close enough to within a set threshold and are about to interact with each other. At this point, both ships would end up on a single thread so that the physical interactions can be calculated.

[Streetwind]

Ah yes. That's about what I heard too, and yours is a much better way of putting it than I ever could. Thanks!

I suppose we'll only find out for sure when we get the Unity 5 build, but this is the expectation I will be holding until then.