{"id":4688,"date":"2020-07-01T15:54:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-01T15:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aviancetechnologies.com\/blog\/blog\/hardware-accelerated-gpu-scheduling-is-a-fundamental-windows-change\/"},"modified":"2020-07-01T15:54:00","modified_gmt":"2020-07-01T15:54:00","slug":"hardware-accelerated-gpu-scheduling-is-a-fundamental-windows-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aviancetechnologies.com\/blog\/hardware-accelerated-gpu-scheduling-is-a-fundamental-windows-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling is a ‘fundamental’ Windows change"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0
\n[responsivevoice_button rate=”1\u2033 pitch=”1.2\u2033 volume=”0.8\u2033 voice=”US English Female” buttontext=”Story in Audio”]<\/p>\n

Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling is a ‘fundamental’ Windows change<\/h2>\n

<\/p>\n

\n

Over the past week, both Nvidia and AMD<\/a> released fresh graphics cards drivers that unlocked \u201chardware-accelerated GPU scheduling,\u201d a new feature introduced in the Windows 10 May 2020 Update. Now, Microsoft has revealed<\/a> what that setting does, and it turns out that the innocuous-sounding, opt-in feature actually represents a fundamental redesign in how the Windows Display Driver Model works. You probably won\u2019t see any significant performance changes from activating it now, however.<\/p>\n

Historically, the GPU scheduler for the Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) relied on \u201ca high-priority thread running on the CPU that coordinates, prioritizes, and schedules the work submitted by various applications,\u201d explains Steve Pronovost, the lead and architect for the Windows Graphics Kernel. That introduces inherent latency, however, as the CPU registers user inputs a frame before the GPU renders it. The new hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling feature hands most GPU scheduling tasks to a dedicated GPU-based scheduling processor instead, letting your graphics card manage its own memory, though \u201cWindows continues to control prioritization and decide which applications have priority among contexts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe new GPU scheduler is a significant and fundamental change to the driver model,\u201d Pronovost says. \u201cChanging the scheduler is akin to rebuilding the foundation of a house while still living in it. To ensure a smooth transition we are introducing the new scheduler as an early-adopter, opt-in feature.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"windows<\/a> Brad Chacos\/IDG<\/small>
\n

You’ll need the Windows 10 May 2020 Update (version 2004) to activate hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling.<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

You\u2019ll need four things to activate hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling. First, you\u2019ll need a relatively recent GPU that includes the hardware required to manage task scheduling. You\u2019ll also need drivers released by your graphics card\u2019s maker that support WDDM version 2.7. (The Nvidia and AMD drivers linked above enable the feature, though Radeon support is limited to Radeon RX 5600- and 5700-series GPUs.)<\/p>\n

On the Windows front, you\u2019ll need the Windows 10 May 2020 Update, also known as version 2004. It\u2019s currently being rolled out, but slowly to ensure hardware compatibility, so if you don\u2019t see it after making sure Windows is fully up to date (Start > Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update<\/em>) you may have to wait for it to become available for your PC.<\/p>\n

Once all those pieces are in place, you can activate hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling by heading to Start > Settings > System > Display > Graphics Settings<\/em> and flipping on the feature. It\u2019ll only appear if you meet all the other requirements.<\/p>\n

\"windows<\/a> Microsoft<\/small><\/figure>\n

Performance changes<\/h2>\n

Don\u2019t expect this \u201cfundamental change\u201d to fundamentally change the performance of your visual applications or games right now, however. \u201cUsers should not notice any significant changes,\u201d Provonost says. \u201cAlthough the new scheduler reduces the overhead of GPU scheduling, most applications have been designed to hide scheduling costs through buffering.\u201d<\/p>\n

That holds true in testing conducted by Tom\u2019s Hardware<\/a>, which benchmarked several games on Nvidia\u2019s new driver with hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling enabled and called the difference \u201cmostly much ado about nothing.\u201d Some games lost a few frames with the feature enabled, and some gained a few frames, but it was essentially a wash across the board when it came to gaming performance.<\/p>\n