From: Gary Britt 

That article doesn't address any of the problems or concerns I raised and
to which you responded.

Gary

Rich Gauszka wrote:
> All the articles I've read state that Vista's DirectX 10 (DX10) improves on
> gpu performance. Although newer video card gpu s wouldn't hurt which is why
> Nvidia and ATI are probably smiling a lot right now
>
> http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,128275-page,1/article.html
> Pipeline Power-Ups
> The revamped, more powerful DirectX "allows us to do a lot more processing
> on the GPU [graphics processing unit] and speeds everything up immensely,"
> says Chris Donahue, director of business development for Microsoft Games for
> Windows.
>
> DirectX 9, used widely for today's games, employs different parts of the
> video card to determine the visual appearance of pixels and vertices (where
> lines meet). A set number of "pipelines" handle only pixel
shaders, while
> others are just for vertex shaders. If creating a certain 3D scene hits the
> pixel shader pipelines hard but uses only a few of the vertex shaders, the
> extra vertex pipelines lie dormant.
>
> DX10's Shader Model 4, however, uses the same hardware resources for pixel,
> vertex, and even new geometry shaders. That approach allows GPU vendors to
> design chips with pipelines that can run any type of shader, and also makes
> it easier for GPUs to handle things like physics effects that currently must
> run on the CPU. In general DX10 is more CPU-friendly, with less processing
> overhead.
>
> The end result? A more flexible graphics system, and one that makes better
> use of the GPU's processing power.
>
> "It's a step forward," says Mike Goodman, a senior analyst
for research firm
> The Yankee Group. "This is another way to take advantage of the processing
> power of PCs that Vista will operate on."
>
> "Gary Britt" 
wrote in message
> news:45d1e4df{at}w3.nls.net...
> OK Maybe Vista does use a GPU in some ways, and what I've read previously
> wasn't correct.  I'm still not convinced however for several reasons.
>
> 1.  The article you cite reads like the under NDA Windows 95 garbage and
> deliberate misinformation that MS was shown to have deliberately lied about
> with Windows 95 architecture at the time of its release.  It reads more like
> a reprint of some MS marketing materials for writers and mag editors than a
> real investigation of the facts pro and con.
>
> 2.  NT 3.1 had the graphics driver outside ring 0 kernel level.  NT 4 moved
> it into the ring 0 kernel level to INCREASE performance.  Now that mag
> article you cite just whips out the statement (without offering any
> explanation or investigation or substantiation) that moving the graphics
> driver back outside the ring 0 kernel level will somehow magically make the
> graphics driver perform better.  Have the laws of physics changed since NT
> 4??
>
> 3.  The article gives a very basic broad brush look at how supposedly VISTA
> talks to the GPU directly but fails to compare that and explain why its
> better or worse than having a ring 0 kernel driver let the GPU do the work
> directly with the GPU or why its better than letting applications deal with
> the driver and the GPU.  It does nothing but repeat the MS marketing
> materials about how wonderful the new Vista driver model is without
> investigating whether that model is faster or slower than the older model,
> and while mentioning the wonderful everything will be DirectX and vector
> graphics marketing hype does not consider or address whether this is just
> yet another way for Microsoft to try and lock everyone into another
> Microsoft proprietary format.
>
> 4.  Finally, there is no consideration paid to how the new Vista graphics
> hardware and driver requirements will or could result in cards without the
> ability to run Linux or other operating systems full speed (maybe even XP
> and Win2K not full speed) and that they might result in new cards without
> the ability to have decent XP, Win2K, or Linux drivers.
>
> I'm afraid the article you cite Richard isn't up to your usual quality
> standards for citation, which is usually quite excellent.
>
> Gary
>
>
>
>

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