DirectX 12 Available for NVIDIA GeForce 400 and 500

Recently, NVIDIA sneaked out and enabled the DirectX 12 on the graphics cards that are based on Fermi. This includes the GeForce 400 and GeForce 500 models, including the latest GeForce 384.76 drivers. Many people have been upset with NVIDIA’s decision of not bringing the DX12 to the Fermi GPUs in the past. For this reason, we should congratulate the company for finally taking this step.

Fans Are Happy to Hear About It

Naturally, the DX12 capability is a different thing than the DX12 optimization. The Direct 3D 12 is working on the Fermi GPUs for the 384.76 on, but that doesn’t mean it is also optimized. Moreover, many people doubt that NVIDIA is going to waste some resources on the legacy support for DX12.

Test Results

Some people at WCCF Tech have been testing the new graphics cards on a Sandy Bridge system with a Core i7 CPU, 8 GB RAM and a 512 GB SSD, plus the GeForce 384.76. So what were the results?

First, they tested the 3DMark TimeSpy, which is one of the most demanding apps you can run on such an old card. It uses a lot of memory, and so the GTX 580 scored 786 points, which is a sub-par result. They also tested the FireStrike (DX11), where the oldie scored 4806 points, which is decent given the age of the card.

Then, they set out to have a performance comparison between the DirextX12 and the DirectX 11. They used a Battlefield 1 game in order to test the two of them. The GTX 580 model had an impressive result, offering a playable 38 FPS. The graphics were good as well. Meanwhile, with the DX12, the FPS reached a maximum of 34 FPS and no major improvement in what concerns the quality.