[B3D News]

Ever since Microsoft announced that v10 of Direct3D would only run on their new Vista operating system, various folks have sniffed a marketing ploy by the software giant rather than a legitimate technical requirement. Even such luminaries as John Carmack have promoted this theory. Well, if this is true, then surely there must be a way to foil Microsoft's evil plan and tiptoe around their "restriction", right?

Read the full article here

[nicolasb]

Will Direct3D 10 ever come to Windows XP?

No.
Next question?

[digitalwanderer]

Even if it's a possible thing to do from a coding aspect, M$ will bitchslap whoever tries with enough lawsuits to keep 'em busy until DX11 comes out.

[santyhammer]

MOD: Thanks for wasting space and not reading the article!

In words of David "LetsKillDave" Weller, one of the Microsoft's directx/xna/gaming authorities:

DirectX 10 for Windows XP? Repeat after me: No. No. No.

Allow me to pull out the inordinately-large-hammer-of-truth on that one and bang out some pretty clear messages:
- Absolutely not.
- Definitely not.
- No f'n way.

More info at http://letskilldave.com/archive/2006...-No_2E00_.aspx

can't be more clear NO!

Even it could be technically possible I think Microsoft won't port DX10 to Windows XP. The reason is very obvious... Vista sales will be reduced. But i'm happy, the new OpenGL Longs Peak/Mt. Evans will solve all our DX10 needings in WinXP!

Also exists this "Alky Proyect" in http://alkyproject.blogspot.com/ and http://www.fallingleafsystems.com/compatibility/

[PSU-failure]

Originally Posted by santyhammer

In words of David "LetsKillDave" Weller, one of the Microsoft's directx/xna/gaming authorities:

can't be more clear
, NO!

We can't call that an unbiased source.

As Digitalwanderer said, though, it's almost certain it won't be ported to NT based OS'es.

[Geo]

Originally Posted by santyhammer

Also exists this "Alky Proyect" in http://alkyproject.blogspot.com/ and http://www.fallingleafsystems.com/compatibility/

You didn't actually bother to read the article, did you?

[davepermen]

Most of the useful features in dx10 are about the behind the scenes memory management and threading management requirements etc, and those only work at all with the new driver model of vista in a useful way (means performance enhancing, etc..).

so a port to win xp would be essentially useless (i know, geometry shaders, blabla). most games will have a dx9 version for the next years anyways.

[Frank]

Well this could easily backfire for MS if OpenGL makes it easy and interesting to use that instead.

We'll see.

[Albuquerque]

Ok, how's this for the folks who are still holding out hope...

For all the work you'll do on emulating D3D10 on the NT5 platform, you'll then need to emulate all the WinVista API's for sound, input and general application handling that will exist on a true DX10 application.

Good luck with that.

[Rodéric]

D3D10 is a new API for new hardware, but it also fixes D3D9 flaws (like kernel mode draw calls)
On Windows XP, you would just want the API, not the whole WDDM/Aero mechanism.

And yes, just having immutable state blocks, views... WILL enhance performance (and even further if the infamous kernel mode draw call is gotten rid of)

Of course it means that IHV will have to write yet another driver, and MS have to release a SP with a new kernel, but I'm confident that it can be done, it's just that it's not in the IHV neither MS interest to do so due to the (not so huge) amount of work involved.

Why would MS enhance an OS they want to get rid of ?

[Frank]

Originally Posted by Albuquerque

For all the work you'll do on emulating D3D10 on the NT5 platform, you'll then need to emulate all the WinVista API's for sound, input and general application handling that will exist on a true DX10 application.

That depends. I doubt it. DXxx doesn't know or care how the I/O of those things is handled.

The timing might change, but technically there really is no reason whatsoever it cannot be done. It doesn't even require hard stuff like kernel patches. And there is technically no reason why all devices should adhere to the rules, as long as MS writes the driver either.

[TG01]

Originally Posted by Frank

The timing might change, but technically there really is no reason whatsoever it cannot be done.

Correct. The only thing you need is the (DX10) Hardware...

Basically it's the same bs MS told about IE being inseparable from their OS... duh..
It all comes down to MS 'not wanting to' instead of 'not being able to'..

[Albuquerque]

Originally Posted by Frank

That depends. I doubt it. DXxx doesn't know or care how the I/O of those things is handled.

The timing might change, but technically there really is no reason whatsoever it cannot be done. It doesn't even require hard stuff like kernel patches. And there is technically no reason why all devices should adhere to the rules, as long as MS writes the driver either.

Stop thinking with your blinders on about D3D10, and start thinking about the entire rest of the program. There are API features in Vista that have nothing to do with 3D that also aren't available in NT5. Ties to DLLs, methods of input and output steaming, etc...

[santyhammer]

You didn't actually bother to read the article, did you?

Ooopz, sorry I didn't see it.

About the XP D3D10 conversion I see some legal problems overwritting system DLLs and copying+modifying+using Microsoft data and schematics/interfaces. Microsoft won't allow to hack one of the reasons to buy Vista. Also is well known the position of the DX team ( read the emphasis, no f'n way ). They won't put the things easy.

And other fundamental quesiton... why I could want a WinXP DX10 wrapper having a better model ( and more portable ) in OpenGL Longs Peak and Mt.Evans. Also consider no game consoles support DX10 currently. There is no need at all to work with DX10.. almost yet. Personally I'm gonna wait to September and use Mt.Evans directly.

About Vista, I think WinXP will be deprecated with the time. No sense to continue improving it ( why not DX10 for Win95/98/ME/2000 then? ). If you want DX10 just buy Vista.

[JHoxley]

Good write up imho. Our thread on these forums might also be of interest to some people.

I also don't see why people don't get the business angle. I'm sure I'm not the only person frequenting these boards that works in commercial software or IT. Consequently, just the simple process of adding up the cost (time+resources+support...) and weighing it against the advantages (happy users, larger install base...) shouldn't come as no surprise. Equally, it's been made very clear in Ralf's article that whilst it might be possible to get D3D10 on XP it would require a lot of work from various parties (3rd, MS, IHV's..) and doesn't just come by waving a magic wand.

I'd even pose the question that most of those grumbling and stamping their feet on these forums would go ape if D3D10.1/D3D11 were cancelled or delayed because every MS engineer working on that were reassigned to D3D10-for-XP instead

Anyway, have a nice day now - my virtual voice is getting tired harping on about this issue

Jack

[WaltC]

Originally Posted by Albuquerque

Stop thinking with your blinders on about D3D10, and start thinking about the entire rest of the program. There are API features in Vista that have nothing to do with 3D that also aren't available in NT5. Ties to DLLs, methods of input and output steaming, etc...

Yes, obviously the changes in the D3d10 driver model correlate to the fundamental changes throughout Vista, and so centering on on DX10 as if it's the only distinguishing characteristic between XP and Vista is to completely miss the boat.

It's difficult sometimes not to feel sorry for Microsoft, at least in terms of the ridiculous positions the public often tries to put the company in. Microsoft is often damned if it does or it doesn't. Half the people complain that it took Microsoft so long to ship Vista, while the other half complain that Microsoft doesn't see much point in extending the life of XP for another ten years by trying to re-engineer and recreate Vista inside of the aging, creaking XP shell. It's bizarre...I mean, even when you patiently explain over and over again the driver model differences relative to the entire Vista OS as contrasted with how things work inside XP, people just refuse to understand that part of progress is deciding what of the past you want to leave behind and what of it you'd like to keep or improve.

[swaaye]

That's because people like tangible improvements. Vista doesn't provide that across the board for everyone, especially for games currently.

It's similar to the 9x to XP move. A lot of gamers didn't want to go to XP because it most definitely was slower for a few years there. Vista isn't even as obvious of an improvement as XP was to 98.

[Geo]

Originally Posted by JHoxley

I'd even pose the question that most of those grumbling and stamping their feet on these forums would go ape if D3D10.1/D3D11 were cancelled or delayed because every MS engineer working on that were reassigned to D3D10-for-XP instead

Not to mention the two year beta to see what touching the kernel might break? My point there being that really the window (err, unintentional pun alert!) of opportunity to consider it seriously is already in the past. Just the public reaction is a lagging indicator.

[AlStrong]

Originally Posted by JHoxley

I also don't see why people don't get the business angle.

Just be glad most of them aren't here. Reading other forums is painful at times.

Great article (dugg!). It was good to see how the supposed emulation fared at this time (showing that it is far from trivial if a triangle can't even get the right colour or if PPL doesn't work.). Were there any significant framerate differences in those comparisons too?

[WaltC]

Originally Posted by swaaye

That's because people like tangible improvements. Vista doesn't provide that across the board for everyone, especially for games currently.

It's similar to the 9x to XP move. A lot of gamers didn't want to go to XP because it most definitely was slower for a few years there. Vista isn't even as obvious of an improvement as XP was to 98.

By "tangible improvements" do you mean tangible things like benchmark frame-rate scores?...;) That's what I'm getting from what you're saying. Truthfully, it wasn't that "XP was slower than 9x" at all--what happened at first was a learning curve as IHVs got their driver acts together, and game developers got their API acts together. Same thing happened when gaming moved from DOS to Win3.x, and then from Win3.x to Win95, and then from Win95 to XP, etc. No different at all in the move from XP to Vista. Lots of things have changed and it will take awhile for the dust to settle. But settle it will, you can rest assured...;)

I think that the improvements in Vista over XP are both tangible and obvious, but you have to be looking past current game benchmark scores to see them...;) Let's be realistic about frame-rates for a moment, anyway. How much "tangible benefit" are we going to see in the future from frame rates steadily in excess of 60fps? I don't think many if any. Instead, the improvements will come as IQ per frame increases dramatically while the overall frame rate remains fluid and playable. Without changes to driver models and the APIs, correspondingly supported by IHV hardware support, we won't see these kinds of improvements, imo. Never forget that "new and improved" is what drives the market. The idea of "old and improved" is pretty much an oxymoron, isn't it? It seems to me that as Vista is the future and XP is clearly the past that embracing the future, instead of poking holes in it and complaining about it, is the only "tangible" way to go.

[swaaye]

Yes, yes, I agree that Vista is most likely the future. Unless the current Mac initiative actually goes somewhere (who knows?)

But, people are too short-sighted for you, I think. XP was slower than 9x and, thus, many people stuck with it for years even after XP's performance was improved. XP was slower though partially because it is simply a heavier OS with more overhead than 9x. Stability was gained by reducing the ways things could bring down the OS. This didn't really help performance, however. Of course there were driver writer challenges that were a major challenge to overcome too.

I really wonder if XP ever did reach performance parity with 9x? Most people just forgot about the OS. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing because 9x was definitely not the best OS in any way imaginable.

Are we going to see the same with Vista? Does the OS strike anyone as significantly streamlined? I'm pretty sure it's not a featherweight compared to XP. Direct3D 10 certainly is looking to be the roughest Direct3D update yet. Bad drivers and non-optimal hardware from the looks of things. And MS is killing the adoption rate by not having it backwards compatible with XP at the least. IMO this spells out that DX9 will be here for years to come and that DX10 is probably a year away from being useful for gamers.

Anyway, I think the question is: Does Vista currently offer a tangible improvement for gaming over XP? Nope. Will it in the future? It might. Could I install DirectX 9 on Windows 98? Yes. Did MS cripple XP's future intentionally? Hmmmm..... Honestly I think that goes down the "yes" path without asking. Does it really matter? Only in that it would cost me a few hundred bucks to pick up the currently-of-questionable-worth-for-gamers Vista OS.

BTW, Win3.1 was never much of a gaming platform. DOS was the choice till Win95. DirectX was created to make 95 an option for game devs after MS failed so horribly with 3.x.

[Geo]

Originally Posted by swaaye

Yes, yes, I agree that Vista is most likely the future. Unless the current Mac initiative actually goes somewhere (who knows?)

But, people are too short-sighted for you, I think. XP was slower than 9x and, thus, many people stuck with it for years even after XP's performance was improved. XP was slower though partially because it is simply a heavier OS with more overhead than 9x. Stability was gained by reducing the ways things could bring down the OS. This didn't really help performance, however. Of course there were driver writer challenges that were a major challenge to overcome too.

I really wonder if XP ever did reach performance parity with 9x? Most people just forgot about the OS. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing because 9x was definitely not the best OS in any way imaginable.

I think it did, actually. Might take some spelunking at [H] or THG or Anandtech to prove it tho.

Are we going to see the same with Vista? Does the OS strike anyone as significantly streamlined? I'm pretty sure it's not a featherweight compared to XP. Direct3D 10 certainly is looking to be the roughest Direct3D update yet. Bad drivers and non-optimal hardware from the looks of things. And MS is killing the adoption rate by not having it backwards compatible with XP at the least. IMO this spells out that DX9 will be here for years to come and that DX10 is probably a year away from being useful for gamers.

I hold MS responsible for this to a degree, and the IHV's to a degree as well. For not communicating very well in the two years or so before Vista launched. Or possibly communicating one true thing that will eventually be true while neglecting to communicate another true thing that is immediately true.

The immediately true thing that didn't get communicated until Vista was actually launching was that moving the dx interface out of the kernel was going to have an inescapable performance cost of a few percent vs XP. When you see benchies that are just a touch slower on Vista, that's what you're seeing. When you see benchies that are comparable, you're seeing performance improvements in the Vista drivers overcoming that inescapable deficit. At least that's my understanding now, and I can tell you that even tho I was deeply interested in this subject for a couple years before Vista launched, I didn't gain that understanding until the end of January in a phone interview with Andrew Dodd of AMD. It seemed like it was pretty obvious to him, but I couldn't remember any time prior to that when AMD (or NV or MS) had communicated to that effect to the mass audience (maybe the hardcore dx techies reading this are going "Well, duh!").

The longer term "eventually true" thing that's going to require software support, for the most part, to reap the benefit of, is the overhead issue that everyone talks about. My understanding is that ISVs understood that issue pretty well on XP and thus architected to not bump into it for the most part. So a straight move over to Vista isn't going to give you a performance advantage on those current titles. However, now that they know they have that increased headroom they'll start taking advantage of it in future titles. As they do take advantage of it for DX10, most likely this means that DX9 paths of their games are either going to be slower on XP as they bump that overhead wall, or less fully featured in some visible fashion as they once again maneuver to avoid it on their DX9 path.

Maybe JHoxley or Demirug can correct my understanding in the above three paras if they don't agree with it.

Anyway, I think the question is: Does Vista currently offer a tangible improvement for gaming over XP? Nope. Will it in the future? It might. Could I install DirectX 9 on Windows 98? Yes. Did MS cripple XP's future intentionally? Hmmmm..... Honestly I think that goes down the "yes" path without asking. Does it really matter? Only in that it would cost me a few hundred bucks to pick up the currently-of-questionable-worth-for-gamers Vista OS.

Currently? Nope. No DX10 content to speak of, so how could it? Neither did XP at first, and my memory is that the comparative gaming performance situation for XP vs Win9x was much worse at the same point in the OS transition. Anyone who lived thru both disagree with that?

[Demirug]

Originally Posted by AlStrong

Were there any significant framerate differences in those comparisons too?

I must confess that I didn’t measure the framerate. As long as both results are not visual comparable it doesn’t make much sense IMHO.

Additional this tutorial samples are not very complex on the GPU side. Therefore I expect that we have a CPU limit there. This is naturally a bad starting point for a wrapper solution.

[Tim Murray]

After seeing that the Alky project is giving away Shadowrun and Halo 2 "modifications" that allow them to run on XP if you order it from Amazon using their referrer link, I have to wonder how much of it is a scam. It seems remarkably fishy to me.

[Demirug]

Originally Posted by Geo

The longer term "eventually true" thing that's going to require software support, for the most part, to reap the benefit of, is the overhead issue that everyone talks about. My understanding is that ISVs understood that issue pretty well on XP and thus architected to not bump into it for the most part. So a straight move over to Vista isn't going to give you a performance advantage on those current titles. However, now that they know they have that increased headroom they'll start taking advantage of it in future titles. As they do take advantage of it for DX10, most likely this means that DX9 paths of their games are either going to be slower on XP as they bump that overhead wall, or less fully featured in some visible fashion as they once again maneuver to avoid it on their DX9 path.

Well, the “Draw Call Overhead Problem� is well known since years by core engine developers out there. There is even a magic number of 500 draw calls per frame per 1 GHz CPU power. This is not necessarily the full true as you need to consider additional calls needed to support a draw call (state changes, etc.).

Therefore the number of objects becomes a more critical component then the number of polys. You may remember the effect of instancing in games like FarCry. It allows to increase the number of plants on the screen. There were even some bad jokes from the OpenGL side. �We don’t need instancing as we don’t have the high draw call overhead from D3D.� That’s right as a D3D draw call costs round about two to three times more than an OpenGL draw call. But if we talk about instancing 10 or more projects this is not enough and therefore even OpenGL gets it’s instancing extension.