No mGPU in Vulkan unless you're on DX12?

[GoogalyMoogaly]

So based on this article:
http://hexus.net/tech/news/software/103633-vulkan-multi-gpu-support-will-require-windows-10/

it seems that Vulkan won't support multi-gpu on Windows versions older than 10. Apparently Linux will get multi-gpu support though.

My initial reaction was that it will be an issue, but the more I think about it the more I wonder if it actually will be. It seems less and less games are supporting multi-gpu these days anyway so will this make much difference?
Or were we hoping that DX12 and Vulkan would make multi-gpu relevant/viable again?


(apologies if this is old news)

Edit: Just realised I put "DX12" in the title, shoulda been "Windows 10", could a mod change this please?

 

[Rroff]

Yeah WDDM on 7, not sure about 8, is quite restrictive - its one of the reasons desktop/borderless modes don't tend to work great with FreeSync and require a workaround with G-Sync which can take advantage of its FPGA to fake it up.

 

[Dave2150]

Yeah WDDM on 7, not sure about 8, is quite restrictive - its one of the reasons desktop/borderless modes don't tend to work great with FreeSync and require a workaround with G-Sync which can take advantage of its FPGA to fake it up.

Borderless works fine with Freesync on W10

 

[Phixsator]

When i heard of this my first thought was: "huh someone got paid off". If that is true or not i of course don't know but it is disappointing. I only see 2 companies benefiting from this and that is Microsoft and nVidia.

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

When i heard of this my first thought was: "huh someone got paid off". If that is true or not i of course don't know but it is disappointing. I only see 2 companies benefiting from this and that is Microsoft and nVidia.

How do nVidia benefit from this?

 

[Brazo]

Fortunately there are no vulcan only games so we don't need to worry!

 

[nashathedog]

Fortunately there are no vulcan only games so we don't need to worry!

At least none that need mgu to run well.

 

[Phixsator]

How do nVidia benefit from this?

They have been closing down on the whole mGPU business of theirs since the launch of Pascal and its been clear that they would have you buy one of their bigger and more expensive gpu's rather than 2 smaller ones like people use to do a lot back in the 400 series and 500 series days even poor people like myself , why else block sli support on the 1060?. I can only imagen that the margins on the biggers cards are much better. Im not saying however that they are the reason for this lack of mGPU support in vulcan, only that they stand to benefit by the look of things. Then there is of course AMD who has much better potential performance in vulkan versus dx11, if we use doom as an example and that includes good frame times and pacing, making them more neck and neck with nvidia. Would not look that great if 2 RX 480s own a 1080 or at least tie it in new games while costing less(going by MSRP). So if that is not an option then it is one less thing to think about from team green's side.

 

[pete910]

https://www.khronos.org/blog/vulkan-multi-gpu-support-not-just-for-windows-10

 

[TNA]

People should just upgrade to Windows 10 already, I think it still can be done for free

 

[Rroff]

When MS put in a proper way to manages updates/restarts without having to mess about with GPE, reg tweaks, disabling services and/or connection metering I might.

 

[TNA]

When MS put in a proper way to manages updates/restarts without having to mess about with GPE, reg tweaks, disabling services and/or connection metering I might.

Not had an issues drivers updating for GPU myself. I just install classic start menu, using that uninstall all the apps bar a few like calculator. Disable cortana and other undesirable things and then happily use it until next format

 

[Rroff]

Forced driver updates have caused me a small number of issues - not too bad - but for instance one Intel driver has a high DPC latency issue but Win 10 would keep trying to push it over the slightly older one that was fine.

The problem is the automatic OS updates and restarts.