Quick wins for a faster PC:
Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →Some links on this page are affiliate links: if you buy through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you.
Microsoft’s public preview of DirectStorage 1.4 adds Zstandard (Zstd) compression and introduces the initial public preview of the Game Asset Conditioning Library (GACL). Announced at GDC on March 11, 2026, the update is aimed at developers building Windows PC games with large, continuously streamed worlds—not at players looking for a Windows setting that makes existing games load faster.
The potential benefit is meaningful: less storage traffic, more compression-format flexibility, and a simpler route from source assets to runtime-ready data. But DirectStorage 1.4 remains a preview in the official material available through August 18, 2026. Teams should prototype it behind an abstraction layer, benchmark it across real hardware, and retain an existing GDeflate or custom-compression path until the API, drivers, and performance profile are proven for their title.
The short version
- What changed: DirectStorage 1.4 adds Zstandard compression support and is accompanied by the initial public preview of GACL.
- Who benefits: Windows PC game teams streaming substantial quantities of textures, geometry, animation, audio, and other assets from fast storage.
- Does it improve existing games? No. A game must integrate DirectStorage 1.4 and package its content for the relevant compression and decompression paths.
- Is it production-ready? Treat it as a public preview unless a later Microsoft release announcement confirms a final status.
- Should developers adopt it? It is worth prototyping for data-heavy games, but not worth making a hard production dependency without end-to-end testing and a fallback.
Microsoft describes the update as a way to improve compression efficiency, loading performance, and the smoothness of high-throughput asset streaming. Those are design goals, not universal guarantees. The result for a particular game will depend on its asset mix, package layout, storage devices, GPU and driver support, engine scheduling, and memory-management decisions.
Microsoft’s announcement covers the release, while the official DirectStorage repository is the appropriate place to track the implementation material and preview surface.
#1 Best Overall
- MEET THE NEXT GEN: Consider this a cheat code; Our Samsung 990 PRO Gen4 SSD helps you reach near max performance with lightning-fast speeds; Whether you’re a hardcore gamer or a tech guru, you’ll get power efficiency built for the final boss
- REACH THE NEXT LEVEL: Gen4 steps up with faster transfer speeds and high-performance bandwidth; With a more than 55% improvement in random performance compared to 980 PRO, it’s here for heavy computing and faster loading
- THE FASTEST SSD FROM THE WORLD'S FLASH MEMORY BRAND: The speed you need for any occasion; With read and write speeds up to 7450/6900 MB/s you’ll reach near max performance of PCIe 4.0 powering through for any use
- PLAY WITHOUT LIMITS: Give yourself some space with storage capacities from 1TB to 4TB; Sync all your saves and reign supreme in gaming, video editing, data analysis and more
- IT’S A POWER MOVE: Save the power for your performance; Get power efficiency all while experiencing up to 50% improved performance per watt over the 980 PRO; It makes every move more effective with less consumption
What DirectStorage does
DirectStorage is a Windows API for game developers. It is designed to let games use high-speed storage—particularly NVMe SSDs—more efficiently when loading and streaming assets.
A conventional asset-loading path can involve substantial CPU-side work: issuing file operations, moving data through multiple software layers, decompressing content, and preparing it for engine or graphics use. DirectStorage is intended to reduce that software overhead and support higher-throughput movement of compressed game data toward memory and graphics workloads.
A simplified streaming sequence looks like this:
- The engine requests an asset or a block of an asset.
- DirectStorage schedules the storage I/O.
- Compressed data is read from the game package.
- The data is decompressed through an available DirectStorage path.
- The resulting data is delivered to its destination buffer.
- The engine decides when the asset becomes resident, how it is prioritized, and when it can be evicted.
DirectStorage handles important parts of the transfer and decompression path. It does not replace the engine’s residency system, asset prioritization, memory budgeting, shader pipeline, or synchronization model. A title can have excellent decompression throughput and still suffer from texture stalls, world-streaming hitches, or slow loads because another stage is the bottleneck.
What DirectStorage 1.4 adds
Zstandard compression
The headline runtime change is support for Zstandard, commonly called Zstd, as an option for game-asset compression. Zstd is an open compression standard that gives developers another choice alongside established DirectStorage paths such as GDeflate and custom compression.
Compression always involves trade-offs among at least three variables:
- Package size: More compact data can reduce storage traffic and download or installation requirements for affected content.
- Conditioning time: More expensive compression can lengthen builds, cooking, patch generation, and release packaging.
- Decompression throughput: Runtime decoding must keep pace with storage and the engine’s demand for data.
Microsoft says DirectStorage 1.4 is intended to provide improved compression ratios, faster loading, and smoother streaming. That does not mean every asset will compress better with Zstd, or that every PC will decode it through the same optimized path. Compression level, block size, asset type, storage speed, CPU/GPU balance, and streaming frequency all matter.
Textures and meshes should not automatically be treated as one homogeneous workload. Already-compressed or high-entropy data may gain little from another compression pass and can sometimes become larger. Microsoft’s DirectStorage guidance warns titles to detect data that does not benefit from compression rather than compressing every asset blindly. Test representative groups, not just a single showcase file.
Windows Errors? Fix Them Before They Spread
Repair common Windows errors and clear accumulated junk for a smoother, more stable PC - no reinstall needed.Free scan · no reinstallCrashes, No Sound, or Screen Glitches?
Random freezes, missing sound and display glitches usually trace back to one bad driver. Find and replace yours safely.Free scan · under a minuteRank #2
- Ideal for high speed, low power storage
- Gen 4x4 NVMe PCle performance
- Up to 6,000MB/s read, 4,000MB/s write
- Includes Acronis cloning software
- 5-year limited warranty
Game Asset Conditioning Library
GACL is a separate but related part of the announcement. Microsoft introduced its initial public preview alongside DirectStorage 1.4 to simplify asset conditioning: the production stage in which source assets are transformed, arranged, compressed, and prepared for runtime consumption.
GACL should be understood as an asset-pipeline tool, not as a player-facing utility and not as a replacement for an entire engine content pipeline. Its value is potentially as important as the runtime codec: a faster or more consistent way to prepare content can reduce build friction, improve repeatability, and make it easier to compare packaging strategies.
The relationship is therefore:
- DirectStorage 1.4: the runtime API and storage/decompression path.
- GACL: the associated preview tooling for preparing game assets for that path.
Do not conflate the two. A title may evaluate the conditioning workflow separately from its runtime integration, and the best production choice may still be an existing engine pipeline while the preview matures.
How the decompression path changes the result
“GPU decompression” does not describe one uniform experience across all PCs. DirectStorage documents several possible outcomes:
Do these 3 things before closing this tab:
1Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems2Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches3Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors| Path | What it means | What to measure |
|---|---|---|
| Optimized GPU decompression | Supported hardware or drivers provide an optimized decompression route. | GPU occupancy, decompression throughput, storage utilization, and impact on rendering workloads. |
| GPU fallback shader | DirectStorage uses its built-in GPU fallback rather than an optimized hardware or vendor path. | Compute cost, queue contention, frame-time impact, and asset-population latency. |
| CPU fallback | Decompression runs on CPU threads because GPU decompression is unavailable, disabled, or fails to initialize. | CPU occupancy, contention with gameplay and streaming work, and worst-case hitching. |
The selected behavior can depend on GPU vendor and model, driver support, Direct3D 12 capabilities, runtime configuration, and whether the engine disables GPU decompression. DirectStorage exposes IDStorageQueue2::GetCompressionSupport so a title can inspect the decompression support reported for a queue and record meaningful telemetry.
The configuration API includes controls such as DisableGpuDecompression, DisableGpuDecompressionMetacommand, and CPU decompression-thread settings. These controls are useful for controlled experiments, but forcing one path globally can produce misleading results. A benchmark that disables GPU decompression does not describe the experience of a machine that would normally use an optimized GPU route.
What 1.4 cannot solve by itself
Faster storage transfer and decompression are only part of the streaming pipeline. DirectStorage 1.4 cannot automatically fix:
Rank #3
- SPEED UP PROJECTS. Launch creator applications fast with uncompromising PCIe 4.0 read speeds up to 7,100MB/s,[2] (1TB and 2TB[1] models) and write speeds up to 6,700MB/s[2] (1TB[1]-4TB[1] models).
- CREATE AND STORE MORE. Make more room for your 4K videos and high-resolution images with capacities from 500GB[1] up to 4TB[1] on M.2 2280 built with our trusted 8th generation SANDISK BiCS QLC 3D CBA NAND.
- IT GOES WHERE YOU GO. With an all-new power efficient design, your drive delivers high performance with low power, giving you more time to be productive while on the go.
- UNCOMPROMISED RELIABILITY. With up to 1,200 TBW[3] (4TB[1] model) endurance rating, your drive is designed for creators.
- KEEP YOUR DRIVE UPDATED. Monitor your SSD’s performance and check for updates with the downloadable SANDISK Dashboard application.[5]
- Poor asset prioritization or late requests.
- Incorrect residency and eviction decisions.
- GPU-memory exhaustion.
- Excessive shader compilation.
- CPU-side asset conversion or animation processing.
- Engine synchronization stalls.
- A package layout that scatters related blocks inefficiently.
- Network bottlenecks when content must first be downloaded or patched.
Nor does the update guarantee that texture pop-in disappears. Pop-in can result from streaming policy, memory pressure, asset layout, prioritization, or synchronization even when decompression is fast. Zstd may reduce one source of latency without removing the others.
What’s actually slowing this PC down?
Pick the symptom - the matching free tool is one click away.
Compatibility: separate API support from performance support
The confirmed conceptual requirements are straightforward:
- The game must integrate DirectStorage.
- The title must run in a supported Windows and Direct3D environment.
- Assets must be conditioned and packaged for the selected format and runtime path.
- Fast storage, especially NVMe SSD storage, is the intended target for high-throughput workloads.
- GPU and driver support determines whether a machine uses an optimized GPU route or a fallback.
Do not infer more specific requirements from older documentation. The currently indexed DSTORAGE_COMPRESSION_FORMAT reference lists NONE, built-in GDEFLATE, and custom identifiers, but it predates the 1.4 announcement and should not be treated as the complete 1.4 preview interface.
Before committing to an implementation, verify the actual preview package and headers for the following:
- Minimum Windows build and Direct3D requirements.
- Supported Zstd decompression routes.
- GPU and driver availability for optimized Zstd handling.
- Preview SDK package name and distribution channel.
- Whether Zstd is represented by a new public enum value or another interface.
- Alignment, block-layout, and request-format requirements.
- Behavior when the preferred decompression path cannot initialize.
The documented function DStorageCreateCompressionCodec is part of the older API reference, but the available material does not establish that Zstd should be wired through that function directly. Avoid copying an older enum or inventing preview code until the headers supplied with the actual 1.4 package have been checked.
A practical evaluation plan
1. Build a representative corpus
Include textures, meshes, animation data, audio, shader-related data, and already-compressed formats. Include both frequently streamed blocks and infrequently accessed content. A codec that looks good on a large texture archive may be a poor choice for small, latency-sensitive blocks.
2. Compare equivalent pipelines
Run the same content through the existing pipeline and the GACL/Zstd preview path. Keep source data, block boundaries, quality settings, and packaging rules comparable. Record:
Rank #4
- HUGE SPEED BOOST: Get random read/write speeds that are 40%/55% faster than 980 PRO; Experience up to 1400K/1550K IOPS, while sequential read/write speeds up to 7,450/6,900 MB/s reach near the max performance of PCIe 4.0*
- BREAKTHROUGH POWER EFFICIENCY: Use less power and get more performance; Enjoy up to 50% improved performance per watt over 980 PRO, plus optimal power efficiency with max PCIe 4.0 performance**
- SMART THERMAL CONTROL: Samsung's own nickel-coated controller delivers effective thermal control; With its slim size, 990 PRO is a perfect fit for desktops and laptops that meet the PCI-SIG D8 standard***
- THE CHAMPION MAKER: Up to 65% improvement in random performance enables faster loads for an ultimate gaming experience on PS5 and DirectStorage PC games****
- SAMSUNG MAGICIAN SOFTWARE: Get the most out of your SSD with Samsung Magician's advanced yet intuitive optimization tools; Monitor drive health, protect valuable data, and receive important updates for your 990 PRO
- Compressed package size.
- Conditioning and build time.
- Patch-generation time.
- Incremental patch size.
- Failure and retry behavior.
3. Measure end-to-end loading
Decompression throughput alone is not the result players experience. Measure time from request to usable asset, level or world-entry latency, time to first visible detail, and the delay before an asset becomes resident. Test cold-cache and warm-cache conditions separately.
4. Test sustained streaming
Use real gameplay scenarios: ordinary traversal, rapid camera movement, teleportation, repeated eviction and reload, and dense scenes with competing requests. Record traversal hitches and asset-population latency rather than relying only on a loading-screen benchmark.
The Tool Desk
Outbyte PC Repair FREEClear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Outbyte Driver Updater FREEScan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →5. Vary storage, GPU, and driver paths
At minimum, compare multiple NVMe performance classes and include systems that fall back to a shader or CPU path. Record the actual compression support reported by the queue. A test labelled merely “GPU decompression” is not sufficiently precise.
6. Profile the entire system
Use PIX on Windows alongside engine telemetry and storage traces. Track:
- CPU occupancy by decompression and asset-processing work.
- GPU occupancy and compute-queue or copy-queue contention.
- Storage bandwidth and queue depth.
- Memory bandwidth and residency pressure.
- Frame-time spikes during streaming.
- Per-asset and per-block decompression timing.
- Cold-cache versus warm-cache behavior.
A shorter synthetic decode time may not shorten a level load if the engine is CPU-bound afterward. Conversely, fewer visible stalls may be caused by better request scheduling rather than by Zstd alone. Instrument the complete path before assigning credit to the codec.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Packaging, patches, and edge cases
Some data may become larger
High-entropy or already-compressed data may be incompressible. The packaging pipeline should be able to detect when compression provides no benefit and retain the uncompressed or more suitable representation. This is especially important when the title contains media formats or texture data that already use efficient internal compression.
Block layout matters
Data alignment and request layout can affect whether the storage and decompression path works efficiently. Microsoft’s GDK material discusses alignment requirements and request organization, but console/GDK documentation should not be copied as the exact Windows 1.4 contract. Confirm the requirements in the preview headers and documentation for the target platform.
Best Value
- This product has been replaced by our latest generation. Please search for the SANDISK Optimus GX 7100 NVMe SSD
- HIGH-OCTANE GAMING. Experience speeds up to 7,250MB/s read and 6,900MB/s write (1-2TB models), with up to 35% faster performance than previous generation.
- PURPOSE-BUILT. Designed for serious on-the-go gamers, with a PCIe Gen4 interface and SANDISK’s next generation TLC 3D NAND.
- MORE TIME TO CLEAR THAT CHECKPOINT. Built with laptops and handheld gaming devices in mind, with up to 100% more power efficiency over the previous generation.
- DO MORE WITH DASHBOARD. Ensure your drive is optimized for prime performance with the downloadable WD_BLACK Dashboard (Windows only).
HDD behavior is different
Teams supporting mixed hardware should test hard drives separately. Microsoft’s configuration documentation notes that forcing file buffering can help slower HDDs but may reduce performance on high-speed drives because it disables BypassIO. A setting that helps one storage class can hurt another.
Full-package size is not patch efficiency
Changing block boundaries or package ordering can make incremental updates larger even when the final installed package is smaller. Evaluate patch churn using realistic content changes. For live-service games, this can matter more than the best-case compression ratio.
Existing codecs may remain the better choice
GDeflate or a custom codec can still be preferable when tooling is mature, the target hardware lacks a strong Zstd route, build time is critical, patch efficiency is more important than installed size, or the asset class does not respond well to Zstd.
Free tools Windows power users keep installed
One-click scans. No signup required.
DirectStorage supports custom compression identifiers and custom decompression queues, so adopting 1.4 does not require a title to abandon every existing compression path. The most robust design may select formats by asset class or hardware profile rather than impose one codec everywhere.
Production-readiness checklist
Before shipping any dependency on the preview, answer these questions:
- Status: Is the SDK still a public preview, or has Microsoft published a final release?
- Integration: Is the preview isolated behind an abstraction that can be replaced or rolled back?
- Fallback: Does the title have a tested GDeflate, custom, or CPU-compatible path?
- Hardware: Have you tested multiple GPU vendors, driver branches, storage classes, and CPU configurations?
- Telemetry: Can you record the selected decompression path and correlate it with asset latency and frame hitches?
- Packaging: Can the pipeline skip unhelpful compression and preserve deterministic block layout?
- Patching: Have realistic incremental updates been measured?
- QA: Are cold-cache, warm-cache, eviction, teleportation, and degraded-hardware scenarios covered?
- Recovery: Can the game fall back without requiring a complete repack or reinstall?
Who should prototype DirectStorage 1.4 now?
The preview is a strong candidate for experimentation when a game has a large continuously streamed world, targets NVMe-equipped PCs, and is currently limited by storage traffic or asset conditioning. It is also useful for teams that want early access to Microsoft’s evolving DirectStorage ecosystem and can maintain several runtime paths while the preview changes.
Limit adoption to an isolated experiment—or wait—when the dominant bottleneck is shader compilation, CPU-side asset processing, memory management, or engine synchronization. Waiting is also sensible when the team cannot absorb preview SDK churn, must support older PCs with uncertain decompression behavior, or already meets its performance and package-size targets with GDeflate or custom compression.
Recommended Free Tools
Bottom line
DirectStorage 1.4 is a substantial developer-facing update, not a universal Windows performance switch. Zstd gives Windows game teams another compression option, while GACL addresses the asset-conditioning work needed to turn source content into streamable runtime data. Together, they could reduce storage traffic and improve high-throughput streaming for data-heavy games.
The right decision is not based on the codec name or a headline compression ratio. Prototype the preview, inspect the actual decompression path, test representative assets, measure end-to-end gameplay behavior, validate patches, and preserve a fallback. For teams with large-world streaming problems, that makes DirectStorage 1.4 worth evaluating now; for everyone else, its preview status and hardware-dependent behavior argue against making it a production requirement yet.
Quick Recap
Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.
