Quick test: Futuremark 3DMark v2.3.3663 Vulkan API Overhead Benchmarks
Futuremark just released 3DMark v2.3.3663 with support for Vulkan in their API overhead test, we ran some quick tests to see what is happeing.
This means you can now compare the API performance of Vulkan, DirectX 12, and DirectX 11 with one easy-to-use test. Vulkan is a new graphics API that provides high-efficiency, low-level access to modern GPUs in a wide variety of devices from PCs to smartphones. APIs like Vulkan and DirectX 12 make better use of multi-core CPUs to streamline code execution and eliminate software bottlenecks, particularly for draw calls. Games typically make thousands of draw calls per frame, but each one creates performance-limiting overhead for the CPU. Vulkan and DirectX 12 reduce that overhead, which means more objects, textures and effects can be drawn to the screen. The 3DMark API Overhead feature test measures API performance by making a steadily increasing number of draw calls. The result of the test is the number of draw calls per second achieved by each API before the frame rate drops below 30 FPS. The Vulkan test replaces the Mantle test found in previous versions. Now I did chart up some results, see below:
The purpose of the test is to compare the relative performance of different APIs on a single system. The API Overhead feature test is not a general-purpose GPU benchmark, and it should not be used to compare graphics cards from different vendors. It more for you to see how much faster or slower DX12 is compared to Vulkan. You'll notice that the AMD Radeon card scores are way off. Again, this is not a graphics GPU test, but a test that shows your system API renderer performance in relation towards your setup. I have no clue about the AMD results as they are, I did run them three times and even re-installed drivers and re-seated the cards into another slot. I also have to mention that in the past we stepped away from the API test as the results back then also showed a lot of platform inconsistency.
You will notice that Core i7 5960X is clocked at 4.3 GHz. The Ryzen 7 1700 is clocked at 4.1 GHz, it is the highest frequency we can obtain stable. Not bad really, the 1200 USD Intel processor is faster, especially combined with quad-channel and a 200 MHz x8 cores advantage. That 329 USD Ryzen 7 is holding up nicely.
Now I also ran the Ryzen Platform with the Fury X to be certain there isn't a bug on the X99 platform causing this behaviour:
So moving the Radeon Fury X towards a completely different system did not change the performance bracket at all. There might be a bug in the current AMD drivers, Futuremark still has some fixing to do or it just is what it is.
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I wasn't aware using MGPU made a difference, but appears to with DX12.
http://www.3dmark.com/compare/aot/200305/aot/200302


Also noticed the scores aren't comparable to old versions of the test, either that or the overhead in DX12 has gotten much higher and DX11 much lower.
October 2015

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for me,
DX12 was consistently hitting just over 17,000,000 draw-calls per second. (most 17,220,483)
Vulcan was consistently hitting just under 16,000,000 draw-calls per second. (most 15,985,491)
some other observations, the CPU use in DX12 MT was to within 1% across all 6 cores 12 threads, hitting 81% total cumulative CPU use and creating 12 equally shaped peeks , Vulcan MT the deviation in CPU use across 6 cores 12 threads was 15%, ranging from 76% to 91% CPU load, with an 84% cumulative total CPU load, creating 4 sets of shaped CPU usage peaks.
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Irrelevant since all of the games are dx11 and will be that way for the foreseeable future. That's why I made the switch to nvidia a few years ago.