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#1
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
OK, I'm firmly convinced that for Win XP, DirectX 9.0c is the
latest installable DirectX module. But I got a casual (easy) game collection CD for the holidays that is for Windows XP, but requires DIRECTX 9.0 in the video card and didn't like the 9.0c SW module. I also looked into video cards to possibly upgrade enough to run W7 or W8 fairly well and noticed that various video cards have DIRECTX 10 or ? in them. Apparently this opens the door to having Direct X 10 or 11 on a Windows XP computer. Why would DIRECTX 9.0 in a vid card work better than the DirectX 9.0c software module for a game? Is there a lot of other software that runs on WinXP but can even use DIRECTX 10 (in video hardware)? It's not like these are slow computers where software DirectX runs slow or anything... Is hardware DIRECTX 10 or 11 fairly common for on board video in newer mother boards? |
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#2
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
Greegor wrote:
OK, I'm firmly convinced that for Win XP, DirectX 9.0c is the latest installable DirectX module. But I got a casual (easy) game collection CD for the holidays that is for Windows XP, but requires DIRECTX 9.0 in the video card and didn't like the 9.0c SW module. I also looked into video cards to possibly upgrade enough to run W7 or W8 fairly well and noticed that various video cards have DIRECTX 10 or ? in them. Apparently this opens the door to having Direct X 10 or 11 on a Windows XP computer. No, it does not. The door remains firmly shut on WinXP users. They get DirectX 9.0c, as their named standard. DirectX 10 and 11 are an architectural change. As to which element does what when it comes to graphics. The WinXP OS is not prepared for this (and, it was done on purpose, just to stick a knife in the ribs of WinXP users). http://www.anandtech.com/show/2116/2 "Virtual Memory Microsoft is taking tighter control of graphics memory with it's new driver model, and thus is able to provide virtual memory support for the graphics memory subsystem. What this means is that games no longer need to worry about running out of graphics memory. " WinXP doesn't know anything about that. Why would DIRECTX 9.0 in a vid card work better than the DirectX 9.0c software module for a game? Is there a lot of other software that runs on WinXP but can even use DIRECTX 10 (in video hardware)? It's not like these are slow computers where software DirectX runs slow or anything... Is hardware DIRECTX 10 or 11 fairly common for on board video in newer mother boards? Enjoy your WinXP. Enjoy your DirectX 9.0c for as long as drivers are offered to make it possible with modern video cards. Once WinXP is off life support, the video card manufacturers will not feel inclined to continue DirectX 9.0c support. It costs them money to continue to regression test that everything still works in WinXP, so the day after WinXP support is dropped by Microsoft, ATI and NVidia will be "dancing in the streets" as they eject WinXP support from their buildings. If you like your old DirectX 9.0c video games, make sure you've bought a card (by now) to play them with. Paul |
#3
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
Paul wrote:
DirectX 10 and 11 are an architectural change. As to which element does what when it comes to graphics. The WinXP OS is not prepared for this (and, it was done on purpose, just to stick a knife in the ribs of WinXP users). Enjoy your WinXP. Enjoy your DirectX 9.0c for as long as drivers are offered to make it possible with modern video cards. Once WinXP is off life support, the video card manufacturers will not feel inclined to continue DirectX 9.0c support. It costs them money to continue to regression test that everything still works in WinXP, so the day after WinXP support is dropped by Microsoft, ATI and NVidia will be "dancing in the streets" as they eject WinXP support from their buildings. If you like your old DirectX 9.0c video games, make sure you've bought a card (by now) to play them with. Hopefully, VirtualBox can emulate DX9 functions from a DX10+ card. Or, can it do it already? I don't have a DX10 card. |
#4
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
Paul wrote:
DirectX 10 and 11 are an architectural change. As to which element does what when it comes to graphics. The WinXP OS is not prepared for this (and, it was done on purpose, just to stick a knife in the ribs of WinXP users). Enjoy your WinXP. Enjoy your DirectX 9.0c for as long as drivers are offered to make it possible with modern video cards. Once WinXP is off life support, the video card manufacturers will not feel inclined to continue DirectX 9.0c support. It costs them money to continue to regression test that everything still works in WinXP, so the day after WinXP support is dropped by Microsoft, ATI and NVidia will be "dancing in the streets" as they eject WinXP support from their buildings. If you like your old DirectX 9.0c video games, make sure you've bought a card (by now) to play them with. Hopefully, VirtualBox can emulate DX9 functions from a DX10+ card. Or, can it do it already? I don't have a DX10 card. |
#5
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
http://www.amd.com/US/PRODUCTS/NOTEB...450-specs.aspx
This DIRECTX 11 card has DRIVERS for WinXP and W7. If the DIRECTX 11 hardware and firmware can't be used in WinXP then what does the driver do with it? Would a game application actually prefer DIRECTX 9 hardware/firmware to the DirectX 9.0c software module? I see a card that has shaders and stuff for DIRECTX9. Would the DirectX 9.0c software module USE that stuff? http://www.amd.com/us/products/deskt...fications.aspx I found when studying upgrade options that back when the upper CPU chips were $500 or $600 each, upgrading seemed less worthwhile but now those same chips are $10 to $30 like the high end ones with hw Virtualization. When a CPU that used to go for $600 sells for $30, upgrading isn't so far fetched. |
#6
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
Greegor wrote:
http://www.amd.com/US/PRODUCTS/NOTEB...450-specs.aspx This DIRECTX 11 card has DRIVERS for WinXP and W7. If the DIRECTX 11 hardware and firmware can't be used in WinXP then what does the driver do with it? Would a game application actually prefer DIRECTX 9 hardware/firmware to the DirectX 9.0c software module? I see a card that has shaders and stuff for DIRECTX9. Would the DirectX 9.0c software module USE that stuff? http://www.amd.com/us/products/deskt...fications.aspx I found when studying upgrade options that back when the upper CPU chips were $500 or $600 each, upgrading seemed less worthwhile but now those same chips are $10 to $30 like the high end ones with hw Virtualization. When a CPU that used to go for $600 sells for $30, upgrading isn't so far fetched. "Certified drivers for Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP" Presumably, not the same driver. The driver would work with things usable by the target OS. If it didn't support DirectX 9, there'd be no point listing a Windows XP driver. Using another card as an example... http://www.amd.com/us/press-releases...2009sep22.aspx "superior performance in the latest DirectX 11 games, as well as in DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 10.1 and OpenGL titles" I don't know if I can come up with a search term specific enough to find a table with that information in it. WinXP uses an XDDM driver, while the later OSes have some flavor of WDDM driver. Notice they do mention backward compatibility so that WDDM can support older titles. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WDDM "The WDDM specification requires at least Direct3D 9-capable video card and the display driver must implement the device driver interfaces for the Direct3D 9Ex runtime in order to run legacy Direct3D applications; it may optionally implement runtime interfaces for Direct3D 10/10.1 and higher." But the driver for WinXP would be XDDM. It means it is quite possible the hardware has to support more than one variation in its interface. It also means, you could run into a video device, that no longer has support for XDDM. While WDDM has some backward compatibility defined for it, there's nothing to say ATI/NVidia have to support XDDM forever on new designs. They could drop it at any time, simultaneous with stopping WinXP driver support. (Ref here) http://download.microsoft.com/downlo...GuideWin7.docx Paul |
#7
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DirectX 9.0c software versus Video HARDWARE DIRECTX 9 or 10+?
While WDDM has some backward compatibility
defined for it, there's nothing to say ATI/NVidia have to support XDDM forever on new designs. They could drop it at any time, simultaneous with stopping WinXP driver support. If they want to abandon the population of XP users, then used hardware and support archives would take up the slack. Durable goods like computers should not be obsoleted and scrapped/landfilled because they're 3 years old, or because a big OS vendor wants to DRIVE obsolescence of hardware without regard to speed benchmarks. |
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