RADV Vulkan Driver Support For Multiple Devices

[M@yeulC]

mesa has support for the vendor-neutral dispatch that nvidia proposed a while back.

Also, vulkan uses a shared vendor-neutral icd loader library, mesa/vulkan ships ICDs for each driver that's built/supported, so hopefully we don't get into the vendor-specific loader mess again.with vulkan

Thank you, I wasn't sure anymore. I indeed recall reading something like this in the past.

[schmidtbag]

If you're not using Crossfire/SLI for games then you don't need it at all. A lot, if not most GPGPU software doesn't require one giant GPU. Keep in mind, many GPGPU programs are designed to work with server farms, where CF/SLI are physically impossible between computers anyway (like some CAD rendering programs, for example). Many of the ones that don't do that can just run multiple instances with different config files targeting separate GPUs (like many grid computing programs).

It's definitely pretty awesome to see multi-GPU support come back. AMD hasn't had any realistically usable support for that in years. As for software that doesn't use it, part of me wonders if maybe the implementation of this could maybe work around that and force both GPUs to work anyway. I used to do Crossfire and at least in Windows I managed to have a very smooth experience with it; I could force games to work with it that otherwise didn't support it. Some games were nearly unplayable, but with a few CCC tweaks, they could run fantastic. I didn't install any special 3rd party software, I just used the features the drivers came with and everything worked fine. Sure, some configurations maybe only gave me an extra 15FPS, but that was better than nothing. The problem is people don't feel like spending the time and effort making it work. Multi-GPU (nvidia or AMD) has a bad rap because people are either lazy or incompetent, or expect it to magically double their performance without lifting a finger.

[Xicronic]

Don't for get for the people that capture or streaming. Or even multiple screens (though in this case a graphic card is enough.. usually).
In theory If this is implemented right, even wine can use this (of course their Vulkan implementation has to be done then).

AKA not the average Linux gamer... of course there are fringe use cases for them, but most people don't stream or use multiple monitors, both of which can be done on one card anyway, without driver hell. SLI was a buggy mess on Windows, I can only imagine the added complications of translating from DX -> OGL.

[Veerappan]

I wonder if the current driver infrastructure could support multi-vendor "multiadapter"?

I don't know about vulkan, but IIRC OpenGL uses libGL, which is shipped by different vendors, and (pre)loads the right one. Or maybe with an interface layer, nVidia was talking about it some years ago, I don't recall how it went.

So, here, do we have a "libVK" or similar shipped with Mesa, another one with nVidia proprietary, etc; or does it uses another implementation?

mesa has support for the vendor-neutral dispatch that nvidia proposed a while back.

Also, vulkan uses a shared vendor-neutral icd loader library, mesa/vulkan ships ICDs for each driver that's built/supported, so hopefully we don't get into the vendor-specific loader mess again.with vulkan

[M@yeulC]

I wonder if the current driver infrastructure could support multi-vendor "multiadapter"?

I don't know about vulkan, but IIRC OpenGL uses libGL, which is shipped by different vendors, and (pre)loads the right one. Or maybe with an interface layer, nVidia was talking about it some years ago, I don't recall how it went.

So, here, do we have a "libVK" or similar shipped with Mesa, another one with nVidia proprietary, etc; or does it uses another implementation?

[dimko]

SLI/Crossfire is pretty useless to the average Linux gamer, but I imagine this might be useful in upcoming VR titles.

As next commenter in line said, SLI/Crossfire is useless when comes to linux, unless not used for games.

[Sethox]

SLI/Crossfire is pretty useless to the average Linux gamer, but I imagine this might be useful in upcoming VR titles.

Don't for get for the people that capture or streaming. Or even multiple screens (though in this case a graphic card is enough.. usually).
In theory If this is implemented right, even wine can use this (of course their Vulkan implementation has to be done then).

[computerquip]

boltronics do any games even support using multiple GPUs when not on crossfire/SLi?

Not using Vulkan, no.

[Las_]

boltronics do any games even support using multiple GPUs when not on crossfire/SLi?

[Xicronic]

SLI/Crossfire is pretty useless to the average Linux gamer, but I imagine this might be useful in upcoming VR titles.