ATI Radeon GPU Accelerates Internet Explorer 9

[god_43]

At this week's MIX10 conference held by Microsoft, Dean Hachamovitch, Internet Explorer General Manager, delivered a keynote introducing the Internet Explorer 9 platform preview. Specifically, he discussed powerful visual technology - such as DirectX and Direct2D - that, when powered by AMD technology, enables a visual experience capable of taking the browser to another level. Here are a couple things about the harmony between hardware and software for you to be aware of with IE9:

http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.ph...=945&Itemid=47

[Helmore]

The title is a bit misleading, all GPUs will accelerate IE9, they just have to support Direct2D (and maybe WDDM 1.1, but not sure on that). At least as far as I know.

EDIT: This is old news though, this has been known since November 2009.

[god_43]

its the title from the article, i do not usually change them. yes it has been known, but the article provides more info.

[ElSel10]

What? So Nvidia cards won't get acceleration?!

[god_43]

no they will, the article just focuses on ati it seems.

[zalbard]

Weird title, indeed.
I think Opera is going to use something similar soon, too, or do they already?
Not sure about Firefox...

[BeepBeep2]

Well Microsoft and AMD have become mutual partners since Window 7 development, I'm not suprised to see them touting AMD GPU's in a tech "demo" thingy. <---Thats my giddy 14 year old side right there XD

[faster3200]

This is kind of cool, but I would much prefer they work on standards compliance first. I am assuming they are doing this to help with vector rendering.

[takamishanoku]

This is already out (GPU acceleration) with the latest Firefox alpha but disabled by default. You can try it out but i'm sure it would be buggy at the moment.

And yes ATI and Nvidia would all work, this has been known for a while now.

[god_43]

Weird title, indeed.
I think Opera is going to use something similar soon, too, or do they already?
Not sure about Firefox...

lol as the old saying goes "don't kill the messenger."

[Helmore]

It's meant to make things like this possible: http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/Pe...s/Default.html
That's a demo written in current web standards (SVG and CSS mainly), not something proprietary. The rendering on the GPU allows them to get vastly better performance in handling images, vector based content and much more. Mozilla already demoed their version of what MS is doing with the developer preview, you can find more about Firefox's implementation over here:http://www.basschouten.com/blog1.php...ring-a-browser
More information from IE9's implementation can also be found here:http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/200...evelopers.aspx and some more information on how IE9 is developing can be found here:http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/default.aspx

All you need, to get this hardware acceleration in IE9, is a DX10 or higher graphics card and your system need to be running Windows 7 or Vista (with the latest updates).

[Firestrider]

Can these be done automatically on all web pages or does the developer have to specifically code for GPU acceleration?

Can the same thing be done in OpenGL with say Chrome or FF?

[Helmore]

No, the web designer does not have to do anything to his site to make this work. The only thing that the web developer has to check would be performance on a non hardware accelerated browser, at least until all browsers are hardware accelerated.
As for doing something like this in OpenGL, it might be possible but it will be a lot harder to implement. Firefox has made their version of hardware accelerated web rendering by using the Direct2D API as well.

[phantomferrari]

Weird title, indeed.
I think Opera is going to use something similar soon, too, or do they already?
Not sure about Firefox...

opera doesnt do it now. as i write this im using the latest version of opera. they did just completely redo their java engine though. its quite nice. hmm, from your comment i assume youre using chrome because you werent sure whether or not opera or firefox has implemented gpu acceleration yet. i also assume chrome because no self respecting nerd/computer junkie would be caught dead using ie right now

[zalbard]

opera doesnt do it now. as i write this im using the latest version of opera. they did just completely redo their java engine though. its quite nice. hmm, from your comment i assume youre using chrome because you werent sure whether or not opera or firefox has implemented gpu acceleration yet. i also assume chrome because no self respecting nerd/computer junkie would be caught dead using ie right now

Nah, I am using Firefox.
I wasn't sure when hardware acceleration would be used in FF, I am not following alfa releases. I know there is none in final builds at the moment.

[Aerwidh]

It's meant to make things like this possible: http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/Pe...s/Default.html

Interesting little thing

[kl0012]

Interesting little thing

Here is a comparision:
http://anandtech.com/tradeshows/showdoc.aspx?i=3771&p=3

Also it is interesting that in IE 7.0 I get 64fps

[Mechromancer]

AMD's Fusion APUs (CPU+GPU) will make love to this browser in 2011. GPU tech is essential to GOOD computing from now on. Intel better change their philosophy about high performance graphics because requirements will only get heavier.

[god_43]

AMD's Fusion APUs (CPU+GPU) will make love to this browser in 2011. GPU tech is essential to GOOD computing from now on. Intel better change their philosophy about high performance graphics because requirements will only get heavier.

maybe, but it wont become popular until intel follows, or until intel does not own 80%+ of the market.

[dartaz]

And yes ATI and Nvidia would all work, this has been known for a while now.

I think Intel GPU should also work

[kl0012]

I think Intel GPU should also work

Definitely it will. There is nothing in internet context which needs top perf. graphics. (At least until someone will create html5 version of Crysis).

[mursaat]

Oh another the next big thing they want to sell!

[Chumbucket843]

http://blogs.amd.com/developer/2010/...etting-better/

Today Microsoft unveiled a new build of IE9, Platform Preview 3 (PP3), with even more goodness thrown in. I’m personally excited about this release – not only does it include all the features of prior IE9 previews, but also adds additional HTML5 support including:

- <audio> and GPU accelerated <video> tags. These were shown off at MIX10, but are now available in PP3. <video> supports H.264 and is accelerated on the GPU, meaning that it can take advantage of the Universal Video Decoder (UVD) on ATI Radeon™ hardware. The UVD component helps reduce CPU usage, which in turn contributes to reducing the overall power usage of the hardware performing the decode.

- Support for the <canvas> tag! IE9 PP3 now supports canvas, and like other rendering tasks in IE9, is hardware accelerated on the GPU.

iirc this is direct2d accelerated so it should run on nvidia cards too.

[naokaji]

maybe, but it wont become popular until intel follows, or until intel does not own 80%+ of the market.

Things like this are what can help AMD gain more marketshare though, can't hurt them to have MS talking about their products and not mentioning the competing products even if they also do / will support it.
just my 2 cents.

[Metroid]

"ATI Radeon GPU Accelerates Internet Explorer 9"

Come on, next time will be "ATI Radeon GPU Accelerates MSN"