Graphics DirectStorage: SSDs are more than just a game
Your gaming PCs need to adapt to the evolving landscape of PC gaming. Gamers have begun to consider solid-state drives (SSDs) that support Microsoft DirectStorage for today and especially tomorrow. SSDs are an essential component of the system hardware required to run the latest games, and their status as hardware that improves player experiences is growing.
One of the most crucial pieces of hardware that affects gaming, the CPU performs a lot of heavy lifting and frequently becomes the bottleneck in open-world games. For the devoted gamer, this means that SSDs can avoid communicating with the CPU thanks to DirectStorage.
In their constant quest for fluid experiences and all-encompassing, open-world gameplay, players encounter boundary conditions and detest the dreaded “Loading…” screen. Gamers have discovered numerous ways to get around heavily loaded PCs in order to ease their frustration.
For example, they know to disable ray tracing (and so compromise on image fidelity) when a game starts to slow. They launch a second PC to handle their video feed and any other tasks that overload their central processing units (CPUs) in order to stream simultaneously. These solutions aren’t always sufficient.
The game now alters
While specifying a more energy-efficient, recent generation CPU is helpful, your SSD is now more important than ever. SSDs are now more than simply a way for gamers to have slightly faster game loads. They are now a necessary component of a powerful PC.
The storage device can now operate without using the CPU at all by utilising the graphics processing unit (GPU) of the computer. NVIDIA GPUDirect Storage, Microsoft DirectStorage, and other technologies enable this idea. Let’s just refer to it as DirectStorage for the sake of simplicity.
The technological advance has been fueled by the rapid expansion of gameplay, particularly in open-world games. For high-performance play, the game and CPU can no longer rely on a limited set of common graphics and forms. The player can now fly, drive, and ride through countless different scenarios and screens.
It’s a workout for a standard gaming PC, but if one is constructed with a DirectStorage-supporting, optimised SSD in the future, it should be manageable. DirectStorage is already required by the newest AAA titles, which are high-profile, high-budget games like Forspoken, and Diablo IV has committed to include DirectStorage in upcoming game patches. The same will apply to any other significant game. Building your gaming PC with DirectStorage in mind will improve its performance.
A labyrinth of data cannot astound
In essence, DirectStorage sends graphical data straight to the GPU, avoiding the CPU. Graphics data is typically sent by the majority of modern PCs to the PCIe bus, then to the CPU, DRAM, CPU again, PCIe bus again, and finally to the GPU. However, a direct approach is feasible and a considerably better solution for open-world games and any other graphics-intensive applications.
Graphics data is sent directly to the GPU via the PCIe bus by DirectStorage, bypassing the data labyrinths found in other systems. That’s all; there are no detours or extra steps. The advantages are astounding: reduced latency, increased system bandwidth, and decreased CPU demands. DirectStorage preserves greater resolution while significantly lowering lag, load times, and system crashes.
DirectStorage application programming interfaces (APIs) are being used by more game developers to create visually stunning, immersive, and entertaining games. We therefore anticipate that the need for NVMe SSDs among gamers will only grow.
Take the lead in the game
But even if an SSD advertises NVMe, it won’t work with any SSD. The smallest delay or inefficiency is amplified by modern clock rates, hence skilled engineering is essential for NVMe SSDs. We’ve been doing just that at Micron for decades.
The greatest user experience is Micron’s top priority for every class of SSDs we manufacture. PC OEMs, game developers, and gamers can get considerable improvements in input/output operations per second (IOPS) for sequential read/write operations with our NVMe SSDs that enable DirectStorage. These improvements result in enhanced interactions with the DirectStorage API and intelligent saturation of the PCIe Gen4 interface. We are now optimising all of our PC SSDs for DirectStorage because of this.
Play with the system
PC gaming and other high-end graphics applications are evolving at a rapid and unstoppable pace. PC manufacturers, producers of gaming and graphics applications, and consumers themselves are all optimising every component of PCs for overall system performance.
The CPU, GPU, and connection speed are obviously crucial. However, DirectStorage support and SSD performance optimisations are also available now. In today’s world of open-world gaming and high-end visuals, they are indispensable for gaming PCs. Our NVMe SSDs at Micron are the result of generations of technological developments, decades of experience, and industry-leading capabilities. Gaming is more than just a game to us.
