What you need to know
- NVIDIA and MediaTek have joined hands to bring Ray Tracing and DLSS to ARM-based systems.
- The RTXDI, NRD, and RTXMU SDKs for Arm with Linux and Chromium are now available, while RTXGI and DLSS will be coming soon.
- Wolfenstein: Youngblood is the first RTX PC game to be shown on an Arm-based device.
Back in April, NVIDIA and MediaTek collaborated to bring RTX graphics to Arm-based systems, including Chromebooks. NVIDIA today showed off two technical demos that paired its GeForce RTX technologies with an Arm-based MediaTek processor at the Game Developers Conference (GDC). The move will not only provide additional platforms to game developers, but also make NVIDIA RTX technologies a lot more affordable for consumers.
One of the demos includes Bethesda Softworks' Wolfenstein: Youngblood with real-time ray traced reflections and Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) on a MediaTek Kompanio 1200 Arm-based platform coupled with NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3060 GPU. The company also demonstrated how its RTX technologies can enhance The Bistro with a ray-traced urban scene in France, running on an Arm-based system.
NVIDIA managed to bring its GeForce RTX technologies to Arm devices by porting several RTX SDKs, including Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS), RTX Direct Illumination (RTXDI), NVIDIA Optix AI-Acceleration Denoiser (NRD), RTX Memory Utility (RTXMU), and RTX Global Illumination (RTXGI).
PC Tseng, general manager of MediaTek's intelligent multimedia business unit, said in a statement:
RTX is the most ground-breaking technology to come to PC gaming in the last two decades. MediaTek and NVIDIA are laying the foundation for a new category of Arm-based high-performance PCs.
Although NVIDIA's blog post doesn't specifically mention Chromebooks, we expect the MediaTek Kompanio 1200 platform to be used in several upcoming gaming-focused Chrome OS devices. Going by the name, it looks like the chip is based on the 6nm Dimensity 1200, which powers some of the best Android phones in the premium mid-range segment. NVIDIA says the RTXDI, NRD, and RTXMU SDKs for Arm with Linux and Chromium are now available to game developers. It is also working on rolling out RTXGI and DLSS SDKs "soon."
