General Should Apple give up on Metal and go to Vulkan?

[Michael Goff]

Vulkan is pretty much out now, waiting for drivers from manufacturers. It comes from a group that Apple works, or at least worked, with. We all know what Metal is, and how is compares (sometimes favorably, sometimes not) to the current OpenGL. If Apple moved to Metal because Vulkan was too slow, then the wait is over and we can get Vulkan next year.

Another benefit it they won't be alone working on something.

What do you guys think?

 

[thed0g]

They will stick with what they invented, that's also why they ditched perfectly working OpenGL.

 

[kapp2]

OpenGl, iOS runned smooth with that

 

[XTheLancerX]

I don't care what they do just make iOS 9 smoother than iOS 8 like what they advertised.

I personally think Metal is a load of crap now, it made EVERYTHING WORSE.

As long as they do something different, I don't care. Just cut the crap.

 

[Act3]

OpenGL been around for over 20 years, many years of optimizing and tweaking, hopefully Metal will be there someday.

 

[Michael Goff]

OpenGL been around for over 20 years, many years of optimizing and tweaking, hopefully Metal will be there someday.

But should something as important as that be foist upon us in beta form?

 

[Zirel]

OpenGL been around for over 20 years, many years of optimizing and tweaking, hopefully Metal will be there someday.

Metal is already better than OpenGL, and OpenGL is just a specification, and unoptimized POS as that, that's why developers prefer DirectX.

 

[Jayson A]

Metal is already better than OpenGL, and OpenGL is just a specification, and unoptimized POS as that, that's why developers prefer DirectX.

Please explain how metal is better than OpenGL. I haven't seen a single bit of evidence that metal is better than OpenGL except for marketing mumbo jumbo.

 

[Act3]

But should something as important as that be foist upon us in beta form?

nope not at all, only when it is ready. And even then, metal and directx are single platform, Vulkan probably be much better choice being it is cross platform like OpenGL.

 

[Zirel]

Please explain how metal is better than OpenGL. I haven't seen a single bit of evidence that metal is better than OpenGL except for marketing mumbo jumbo.

Because it has less CPU overhead.

Don't like it? Don't use it.

 

[Jayson A]

Because it has less CPU overhead.

Don't like it? Don't use it.

Why should I care about less cpu overhead. I don't notice any difference in the speed of iOS, except for now we have stuttering animations and blocked input during animations that didn't exist before metal took over the UI

 

[Zirel]

Why should I care about less cpu overhead. I don't notice any difference in the speed of iOS, except for now we have stuttering animations and blocked input during animations that didn't exist before metal took over the UI

Buy an Android already.

You won't have Metal or stuttering animations.

It's much better, but the Nexus 6P at that, it doesn't bend.

 

[Jayson A]

Buy an Android already.

You won't have Metal or stuttering animations.

It's much better, but the Nexus 6P at that, it doesn't bend.

I don't want an Android phone. I want a phone that doesn't get worse during an update that was advertised as making it better... especially in regards to performance. How can you even sit there and defend Apple like that? I love Apple products too, but I'm not blind or stupid. I can still admit when I'm displeased with their products or services.

By the way, I just got a brand new iPad mini 4 and the app switcher lags like crazy on it.

 

[Zirel]

I don't want an Android phone. I want a phone that doesn't get worse during an update that was advertised as making it better... especially in regards to performance. How can you even sit there and defend Apple like that? I love Apple products too, but I'm not blind or stupid. I can still admit when I'm displeased with their products or services.

By the way, I just got a brand new iPad mini 4 and the app switcher lags like crazy on it.

You want an Android phone. There are no problems with other phones like you have mentioned, and Apple is evil, because they intentionally slow down devices, and block SMS with iMessage.

We are not giving you your Android phone and/or tablet here.

 

[Jayson A]

You want an Android phone. There are no problems with other phones like you have mentioned, and Apple is evil, because they intentionally slow down devices, and block SMS with iMessage.

We are not giving you your Android phone and/or tablet here.

There are more problems on Android, and I'm already in way too deep in the Apple ecosystem. All of my stuff is Apple. My computer, my phone, my iPad and my Apple TV. They all communicate together and it's nice. What I do want is for Apple to step it up in the software department. If they're going to make claims of better performance, I expect BETTER performance and not to have to upgrade to the next iPhone to get it. Obviously the newest iPhone is going to perform the best, but that's not because of the software, it's mostly due to the hardware. iOS 8 would FLY on an iPhone 6s, but it wouldn't have the 3D touch features obviously, so they had to create iOS 9 for that.

 

[Zirel]

There are more problems on Android, and I'm already in way too deep in the Apple ecosystem. All of my stuff is Apple. My computer, my phone, my iPad and my Apple TV. They all communicate together and it's nice. What I do want is for Apple to step it up in the software department. If they're going to make claims of better performance, I expect BETTER performance and not to have to upgrade to the next iPhone to get it. Obviously the newest iPhone is going to perform the best, but that's not because of the software, it's mostly due to the hardware. iOS 8 would FLY on an iPhone 6s, but it wouldn't have the 3D touch features obviously, so they had to create iOS 9 for that.

Well, other people, like me, and many others, have noticed better performance.

You are not happy, you should stop buying Apple products, sell yours if you want, and buy competing products.

There are hundreds of migration tools from iCloud to other services, and you can even have Apple Music on Android now.

 

[Jayson A]

Well, other people, like me, and many others, have noticed better performance.

You are not happy, you should stop buying Apple products, sell yours if you want, and buy competing products.

There are hundreds of migration tools from iCloud to other services, and you can even have Apple Music on Android now.

Show me better performance compared to iOS 8. Even when doing quick reply from the lock screen, the keyboard doesn't slide up from the bottom half the time.

I have yet to see any better performance, but if you can prove it to me, I'd definitely like to see where they've IMPROVED performance from iOS 8.

 

[Zirel]

Show me better performance compared to iOS 8. Even when doing quick reply from the lock screen, the keyboard doesn't slide up from the bottom half the time.

I have yet to see any better performance, but if you can prove it to me, I'd definitely like to see where they've IMPROVED performance from iOS 8.

Was it perfect in iOS 8?

You are the kind of guy that when iOS 8 was the latest, iOS 7 was the best, and then, iOS 6 was the best...

 

[Salvor Hardin]

Buy an Android already.

You won't have Metal or stuttering animations.

It's much better, but the Nexus 6P at that, it doesn't bend.

The blurring/transparency effects have been largely causing animation stutters since they were introduced in iOS 7 a year before Metal was introduced and 2 years before it was integrated into the OS, turning on "reduce transparency" has always been brought up as a way for smoother performance because it disables the effects.
Metal being a magic bullet that gives large framerate gains seems to be PR more than anything else, Arstechnica demonstrates this nicely http://www.anandtech.com/show/9223/gfxbench-3-metal-ios http://arstechnica.com/apple/2015/1...-os-x-el-capitan-sometimes-great-often-mixed/

 

[Jayson A]

Was it perfect in iOS 8?

You are the kind of guy that when iOS 8 was the latest, iOS 7 was the best, and then, iOS 6 was the best...

Did I say iOS 8 was perfect? I'm asking you to show me PROOF that anything in iOS 9 shows performance gains over iOS 8.

 

[Aston441]

Did I say iOS 8 was perfect? I'm asking you to show me PROOF that anything in iOS 9 shows performance gains over iOS 8.

iOS 7.1.2 was perfect.

Since then, not so much.

 

[Zirel]

iOS 7.1.2 was perfect.

Since then, not so much.

Typical…

Many people said that when 7.x was the latest version, that the 6.X was "the last good version".

Rose colored glasses….

 

[Jayson A]

Typical…

Many people said that when 7.x was the latest version, that the 6.X was "the last good version".

Rose colored glasses….

iOS 7.1.2 worked great. Very few bugs and it was stable. Then iOS 8 came out and it was a buggy glitchy mess. Apple slowly fixed it and it was working pretty good by 8.3. Then Apple went and changed the music app. Then music was glitchy in 8.4 and 8.4.1.

Now, iOS 9 took the glitchy music app experience to the entire OS. So now instead of just music app having performance issues, the whole OS does. However, iOS 9's performance isn't quite as bad as music app in iOS 8.4.1, but there is definitely a downgrade in the animation smoothness in iOS 9 system-wide. There's no denying that.

 

[XTheLancerX]

Typical…

Many people said that when 7.x was the latest version, that the 6.X was "the last good version".

Rose colored glasses….

Yeah 7.1.2 was by no means perfect. Still had hiccups, particularly on iPads. I don't think iOS has ever been in a finished/polished state for iPads since iOS 7 dropped. I only glorify iOS 6 for its smoothness and some little UI elements I preferred. But the flat design is far more modern and versatile now.

iOS 8 was smoother than 9. iOS 8 and iOS 7 were both fairly smooth, with 8 being a little worse but still not nearly as bad as it is now. iOS 8 was just more of a slop bug mess, PARTICULARLY in the earlier stages (pre 8.2). It was never fully resolved to the less buggy (note I did not say non-buggy or bugless) iOS 7, but 8.4.1 was still fairly good. iOS 9 added a bunch though and made everything into a sluggish stutter fest.

That's my opinion, trying to be the least biased I can.

 

[Trahearne]

Please explain how metal is better than OpenGL. I haven't seen a single bit of evidence that metal is better than OpenGL except for marketing mumbo jumbo.

All next-generation APIs including Metal, Vulkan (previously NG OGL) and D3D12 are better than OpenGL (or pre-DX12) by all means. You get lower driver overheads, improved programmability, a scalable queuing model, asynchronous compute, etc. Probably the only exception would be the fact that they are operating at lower level so the cost of entrance is higher, but generally licensable game engines should have done most of the work nowadays. Whether Metal is better than Vulkan or D3D12 is another story, but FYI all of them share a lot of concepts in design.