The Khronos Group, an open consortium of leading hardware and software companies creating advanced acceleration standards, announced today the release of the Vulkan 1.1 and SPIR-V 1.3 specifications. Version 1.1 expands Vulkan’s core functionality with developer-requested features, such as subgroup operations, while integrating a wide range of proven extensions from Vulkan 1.0. Khronos will also release full Vulkan 1.1 conformance tests into open source and AMD, Arm, Imagination, Intel Corporation, NVIDIA and Qualcomm have implemented conformant Vulkan 1.1 drivers.
Tom Olson, distinguished engineer at Arm, and Vulkan Working Group chair, said:
“With enhanced developer tools, rigorous conformance testing and the public Vulkan Ecosystem Forum, Khronos is delivering on its goal to develop a complete and vibrant Vulkan ecosystem. Vulkan 1.1 is a response to prioritized industry requests and shows our commitment to delivering a functional roadmap driven by developer needs.”
Vulkan 1.1 promises to drive increased industry momentum for this new-generation, cross-platform standard for explicit control over GPU acceleration. Vulkan now ships natively on almost all GPU-enabled platforms, including Windows 7, 8.X, 10, Android 7.0+ and Linux, plus Khronos recently announced open source tools to enable Vulkan 1.0 applications to be ported to macOS and iOS. Vulkan has widespread support in leading games engines including Unreal, Unity, Source 2 from Valve, id Tech, CroTeam’s Serious Engine, CryEngine, and Xenko. Vulkan is being used in over 30 cutting-edge games on diverse desktop and mobile platforms, including Doom, Quake, Roblox, The Talos Principle, Dota 2, and is the exclusive API used in AAA titles such as Wolfenstein II and Doom VFR.
New functionality in Vulkan 1.1 includes Subgroup Operations that enable highly-efficient sharing and manipulation of data between multiple tasks running in parallel on a GPU. Vulkan 1.1 also enables applications to perform rendering and display operations using resources that they cannot access or copy – for secure playback and display of protected multimedia content.
In addition, a wide range of Vulkan 1.0 extensions have been integrated, bringing significant proven functionality into core Vulkan 1.1, including: simultaneous rendering of multiple image views, use of multiple GPUs in a single system, and cross-process API interoperability for advanced rendering and compositing operations often used in demanding applications such as Virtual Reality. These core functionalities also include advanced compute with 16-bit memory access, and support for HLSL memory layouts, and display, processing and compositing of video streams, through direct sampling of YCbCr color formatted textures produced by many video codecs.
Integral to the release of Vulkan 1.1 is the new SPIR-V 1.3 specification that expands the capabilities of the Vulkan shader intermediate representation to support subgroup operations and enable enhanced compiler optimizations. The SPIR-V tools ecosystem continues to gain significant momentum with front-end compilers for both GLSL and HLSL, and to expand low-level tooling support from the open source SPIRV-Tools project.
David Neto, shader compiler team lead at Google and SPIR working group chair, added:
“We are excited to see the progress developers have made with the SPIR-V standardized IR. Developers are using the shader language of their choice and a variety of open source compilers to ship their games and applications. The Vulkan tools and ecosystem is evolving rapidly.”
Andrej Zdravkovic, corporate vice president of software, AMD, said:
“AMD is very excited about the release of the Vulkan 1.1 specifications. This new iteration of the industry standard builds on its strong foundations and expands its reach by making the API more accessible to developers. New Vulkan 1.1 features such as subgroup access in compute shaders enable console-like optimizations that will empower developers to exert more control on the GPU than ever before. Vulkan also enriches its connectivity with other APIs by supporting interop operations, and finally enables first-class support for multi-GPU and VR systems. AMD believes that this major upgrade to the API will delight the existing Vulkan community and continue to broaden the user base.”
Dwight Diercks, senior vice president of software engineering, NVIDIA, added:
“Vulkan is vital to NVIDIA’s business as it enables developers to get the best from our GPUs across a wide range of platforms. Our Vulkan 1.1 drivers, with full subgroup functionality, are available for Windows, Linux, and Android on the day of the specification launch. We will continue to take a leadership role within Khronos to ensure Vulkan evolves to meet the needs of developers and the wider industry.”
Vincent Hindriksen, managing director of StreamHPC, concluded:
“Vulkan 1.1 and SPIR-V 1.3 are another step in providing better support for compute, as it adds subgroups, 16-bit numbers and a restricted form of pointers. Adding this to the strong industry support for Vulkan and the recently launched portability project, this allows more types of compute-kernels to be run on more platforms.”
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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As long as it’s not Direct X 12, it’s good.
i reported your comment, people like you are a disgrace to microsoft brand and don’t deserve their love and passion, literally everyone knows that dx12 is far superior in every aspect compared to vulkan
“i reported your comment”
LMFAO
This went far for no reason lol.
We ‘thankfully’ have Sp4ctr0 Spencer to redress the balance. ?
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Nothing wrong with DX 12 when the developer does a good job.
As long as they don’t ditch DX 11 in the process, fair enough.
na 11 needs to be gone we don’t need it to live as long as directx 9
Most modern GPU’s support 12 and vulkan if anything i’d like to just see every game use vulkan
say thanks to ngreedia corp with their software emulated scheduller crap
“Look at me, I’m so edgy”.
“Look at me, i’m a microsoft shill”
Nvidia:
“Vulkan is vital to NVIDIA’s business as it enables developers to get the best from our GPUs”.
Translation of PR-speak:
Our marketing guys love Vulkan because it lets us divert media attention away from how well or otherwise DirectX 12 has worked with some of our GPUs.
“DX12 and Vulkan have been strongly influenced by AMD’s Mantle”
AMD ruining gaming.
“Ruining”…you are not serious right?!
Developers want sell their games. So in last few years they use DX12 for Xbox version but on PC use DX11. Reason was very simple – money. About 75% of PC gamers can’t use DX12 – source: Steam Survey
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Developers will use DX11 at least 5 or more years on PC (maybe more). As long as Windows 7 will be popular in China (biggest PC game market)
Hopefully devs can circunvent around Microsoft $ht ransonware, be it with Vulkan or good ol Dx11
85% of PC gamers use Nvidia GPU – graphics cards which are faster in DX11 than on DX12/Vulkan
There are no reason to use API which will be slower in 85% of your customers. DX11 is good enough for PC. As long as most PC gamers will use old systems and hardware without good support of DX12/Vulkan there is no reason to use new API
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There is no chance for DX12/Vulkan games on PC. Even both MS and EA give up and new games use DX11 on PC. There are no single future game in DX12/Vulkan in 2018
I tought Dx12 would bring huge gains in the FPS department right? Guess not. It’s not like DX12 bring any graphic improvement or fps gain at all so why bother?
“I tought Dx12 would bring huge gains in the FPS department right? ”
Nvidia hardware doesn’t support full DX12/Vulkan – this is hardware designed for DX11. Only AMD support full DX12/Vulkan
How is that feel, when Nintendo is kicking the as* of Microsoft?
Or maybe it’s the other way around, DX12 doesn’t support Nvidia. more reason to scrap that crap.
stop being such a shrill, Vulkan winning is a win for all of us.
Face it, Vulkan’s dead on Windows. Two or three commercial releases since launch is pathetic. Where it’s succeeding is on Linux and Android. Feral’s Vulkan ports are getting better with each release and there’s supposed to be a bunch of Vulkan powered Android games at GDC.
I think every game that supported vulkan was actually a good performer unlike 12, i really don’t care which a game uses i just want them to use them.
Well, as was reported a few days ago, Microsoft’s UWP platform has already been cracked so…
By ransomware i’m talking about Win 10 as well since there is no reason these games cannot exist outside win 10.
It’s a dirty trick from Microsoft dating back many years. Halo 2 was perhaps the most notorious example whereby folk were forced to upgrade to the latest Windows in order to play. Microsoft needlessly made Windows Vista a mandatory requirement but then some bright spark from the PC modding scene got it to work on Windows XP… where it also performed better.
I bet these shills aren’t even aware of MS’s infamous EEE strategy, that they still use to this day.
So you hope devs circumvent one Microsoft product (DX12) to use another (DX11), lol.
Dx11 is available on Win 7 (the PC i’m on), Win 8 and Win 10, so yes, they should use the better product
Or you now, 4 generations of DX11 GPUs don’t support DX12, so try pushing games to more people.
“Developers want sell their games”
Indeed. It’s why Xbox-exclusives from third-party publishers are typically only timed-exclusives nowadays. It’s also why Microsoft itself has abandoned Xbox exclusivity too by releasing their games in superior form on PC. Not that most PC gamers give a damn about what Microsoft have to offer on their hideous Windows 10 Store with its UWP nonsense despite the games typically looking and running so much better than they do on your awful Xbone X console.
It’s a shame for Xbox fanboys like yourself that your beloved idol no longer gives you genuine exclusives when the consoles from Sony and Nintendo have them. It’s also a shame for you as an Xbot that PC has more exclusives than the total number of all games released for any current console.
Do enjoy your 30fps at ‘true 4K’ with a gamepad in DX12 though! ?
XB1X can get 60fps, lite mode in Final Fantasy XV …….While looking at the floor. LMAO
Yep! According to Digital Foundry that game, despite having received a Xbone X patch, typically runs at 30-40fps in lite mode with visible juddering and screen-tearing along with the limited quality graphics settings. Even the ‘high’ mode comes with dynamic resolution scaling and it still can’t maintain 30fps. Oh dear!
That’s fine, at least the mid range RX480/580/GTX 1060 GPUs are getting 60fps+, can’t say the same for XB1X and PS4Pro.
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Radeon™ Software Adrenalin Edition 18.2.3 with Vulkan®1.1 Support:
https://support.amd.com/en-us/kb-articles/Pages/Radeon-Software-Adrenalin-Edition-18.2.3-with-Vulkan-1.1-Support-Release-Notes.aspx
they need to make more games with vulkan