3DNow!

3DNow! is a deprecated extension to the x86 instruction set developed by Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). It adds single instruction multiple data (SIMD) instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform vector processing of floating-point vector operations using vector registers. This improvement enhances the performance of many graphics-intensive applications. The first microprocessor to implement 3DNow! was the AMD K6-2, introduced in 1998. In appropriate applications, this enhancement raised the speed by about 2–4 times. 3DNow! never gained much popularity, and in 2010 AMD announced its plan to drop support for the instruction set in future processors, with the exception of PREFETCH and PREFETCHW, two instructions that are also supported by Intel's Bay Trail-based processors. The instruction set was eventually dropped since 2017, with the release of Zen-based Ryzen and Epyc processor lines.