Submitted by “DirectX 10 would not work with XP, and that was fine and dandy. It was an honest technical reason why you could not backport DX10 to XP without a major rip and replace operation. Microsoft wasn’t going to bend on this one at all.” More here.
DirectX 10 is Doable on Windows XP?
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Didn’t nVidia already implement most of the DirectX features in their OpenGL? So you could use OpenGL games with the DirectX 10 features?
Well, it’s not just about games. I am personally interested in PureVideo HD 2.0, which is only available in Vista currently. Nvidia said that they will make an XP Purevideo HD 2.0 driver available for XP this summer too, BUT, it will use a proprietary API and apps will have to be coded to take advantage of it, while on DX10 and Vista, all apps can take advantage of 100% CPU offloading in h.264 1080p video automatically.
So, personally, I pretty bummed about XP not supporting DX10, even if I don’t play any 3D games anymore. And I can’t upgrade to Vista, because I have many apps for my hobbies that don’t quite work on Vista, while I need Purevideo HD 2.0 for my video editing with Sony Vegas (Vegas does not support GL cards like the Quadros you see, so these Purevideo cards would have been perfect if DX10 was supported on XP).
It certainly is a real shame. You’ve raised some good points, but for me I am primarily a gamer when it comes to DirectX 10 and as such I feel that I am being forced to upgrade to Vista to enjoy the benefits of DX10.
I guess, fortunately, there aren’t many impressive games yet that offer any decent benefit over their counterparts to force the upgrade. Yet…
Shame on sony for not supporting openGL but for supporting DirectX10 so heavily.
Lots of industries are in a big quandry because of microsoft discourating opengl and pushing directx10. Small fragile industries are faced with having possibly deal with investing a fairly tidy sum into supporting a “lock in” technology instead of improving their products already based on open cross platform standards.
Ugh.
bnolsen:
This is a little off-topic, but I’d like to point out that Sony’s Playstation 3 uses OpenGL as its primary API (although it uses Nvidia’s Cg rather than the OpenGL standard GLSL for the shading language). So Sony does support open standards in this case. Refer to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playstation_3
The real shame is that “Playstation Edge” SDK has not yet been released to the wider public (registered developers only), unlike the XBox 360’s XNA
A separate question is why people would develop for the platform-limited DirectX 10 rather than OpenGL 2 (or the imminent 3), since they now have near feature parity? I much prefer to use OpenGL when doing graphics.
A thought on your your seperate question. If I was a game developer and had my choice between OpenGL and Direct X (At least now) I would go with Direct X just for the fact that my game that I developed would be published on Windows and Xbox360 with virtualy no extra effort of porting. Both of those two platforms have a very large user base. then after if I knew my product did well in those two markets I would port to Mac,Linux and or the other game systems.
steverez1:
That is a common argument that is made, but it is also incorrect. The difference between OpenGL and DirectX is the different between logical AND and OR.
With OpenGL you are developing for Linux,PS3, MacOSX *AND* Windows (and possibly Xbox). Using OpenGL doesn’t exclude you from Windows in the slightest, although admittedly you have to use other libraries such as OpenAL for game-related things that are in DirectX but not in OpenGL.
With DirectX it is Windows only (and you are pretty much limited to games only, since DirectX lacks some of the CAD-friendly things such as picking). Using DirectX excludes you from anything except Windows.
The difference is between choosing 100% percent of the market or 90% percent of the market when you develop.
Can you really develop games in OpenGL for Xbox?
If not, his point stands. Using DirectX means being able to develop for 2 larger userbases with minimal effort.
I did not quite follow your last sentence. You are saying Opengl has 90% of the market?
After some additional research I am corrected. I believed OpenGL could run accelerated on the xbox after hearing Quake III ported to xbox but after research it appears it’ll be software only, see http://forums.xbox-scene.com/lofiversion/index.php/t502610.html
What I’m saying is that any program written for OpenGL will run on 100% of platforms (although it may not always be accelerated, so perhaps it isn’t worth it). While DirectX is available on fewer, especially since various versions of DirectX are only compatible with specific versions of Windows.
Say you are writing a CAD application, should you use DirectX? Perhaps not.
Say you are writing a game, then DirectX is viable, but which version? Use 9c and you miss out on new effects and are associated with a obsolescent platform (WinXP), choose DX10 and only the small percentage of the market with Vista use your stuff (not everyone upgrades their computer at a rate faster than 3 years). However, if you choose OpenGL (as ID continues to do) you can have new shader types and effects on Windows XP (via OpenGL extensions) and can write programs that will work on WindowsXP AND Vista (as well as MacOS X).
The thing is, if you use OpenGL on ‘DirectX 10 class hardware’ you can have all the ‘DirectX 10’ (and Direct X11, and DirectX 12 …) effects without caring about the platform. This is because OpenGL abstracts the hardware and platform, while DirectX doesn’t (this is a deliberate strategy from Microsoft, by the way). I know which 3D API makes most sense from a strategic perspective for me (yes, I am writing commercial software that requires use of a 3D API).
Why not use SDL*. It is truely cross platform in graphics multimedia and works with both DirectX (under Windows) and OpenGl (Under Linux, BSD, Solaris, OS-X). It is also F/OSS under the LGPL which allows its use in proprietary/closed source software.
(SDL == Simple Direct Media Layer)
SDL is like (parts of) DirectX; you still need to use Direct3D or OpenGL for doing 3D with it.
SDL + OpenGL + OpenAL (if only it didn’t suck) would result in an easy-to-port application. SDL exists for a ridiculous number of platforms… Windows, OS X, Linux, *BSD, etc. and consoles like the DS.
It’s a great set of libraries, but it’s not a magic bullet.
– chrish
For the record, DirectSound is no longer in Vista, so OpenAL looks like the future as far as hardware accelerated sound goes.
http://www.openal.org/openal_vista.html
Specifically, DirectX 9. DX10 does not, and will not run on the Xbox 360 (as I understand it). If this really is the case, any developer supporting DX10 would have to be insane, as this only gives you the Vista market, which is already covered by both DX9 and OpenGL.
>> Aseparate question is why people would develop for the platform-limited DirectX 10 rather than OpenGL 2 (or the imminent 3), since they now have near feature parity?<<
Some answer as always, because some company (A..) provides better driver for DirectX than for OpenGL.
Note: ATI being the company with the crappy Opengl implementation (something they say they are going to fix soon, due to the whole Vista fiasco and the general crappiness of the *nix drivers).
Lots of industries are in a big quandry because of microsoft discourating opengl and pushing directx10.
How dare them try to promote their product…
It’s not about promoting a product, but about deliberately hinder other products in working. Particularly open standards.
Same Company, Same Old Story.
When they deliberately hinder OpenGL from working?
Oh yeah.. they didn’t.
You all have it backwards.
When it comes to 3d (not other aspects of directX), it’s the HW which has “features” and OpenGL and DirectX are just the interfaces to use those “features”.
OpenGL is actually the one to have things first most of the time, because it offers an extensions mechanism, while you always have to wait with directX for the next release to get them.
gee where to start.
it has ALWAYS been possible from day one to get DX10 into XP with out major reconstructive surgery. this was MS spreading FUD.
the new opengl is on par with directx on features and effects, along with visual quality.
does anyone remember how MS was originally talking about not supporting opengl except through a DX10 wrapper? that bombed not for any technical reason, but the market for lots of video editing and CAD type and rendering software is done in pure opengl so they would have killed its performance. literally forcing large render houses to switch to linux/ solaris. etc.
i dont get why peeple dont like the inq, and the reg. they are more often right then not, and a lot of times they post opinion pieceis. its hard to be WRONG when its an OPINION. also their attitude and peeple skills are what keep me around, most other news sites are fruity at best.
“it has ALWAYS been possible from day one to get DX10 into XP with out major reconstructive surgery. this was MS spreading FUD.”
Hmmm, do you work for MS or one of the VC manufacturers?
Please explain to me (feel free to be as technical as you can) how you know this to be true. Every thing that I have read about GPU memory virtualization is a good thing, and perhaps they were forcing users to upgrade to Vista to get that DX10 goodness, that doesn’t mean that the goals weren’t justified.
The benefits of virtualization might have been worth it for MS, but then when Nvidia couldn’t get it together, MS was looking at a disaster, if Nvidia couldn’t support Vista, Vista was dead in the water, so they loosened up the requirements to make sure that both companies were able to sell VCs for Vista, and users kept the ability to choose the best VC from the best company for them.
MS has backported quite a bit of functionality from Vista to XP, they can’t backport everything, or why would they even bother with developing Vista anyway? They are a business, and they have to keep improving (as far as they are concerned) Windows to continue to exist. offering free upgrades to their newest toys doesn’t do MS, it’s employees or it’s shareholders any good, and could be disastrous for the company. Other companies don’t backport everything from their latest releases, so why does MS have to?
“the new opengl is on par with directx on features and effects, along with visual quality. ”
so what? OpenGL can be installed on Vista, and MS has relented and allowed more direct OpenGL support, so it is not crippled like in their original plan. So if you need an application that uses OpenGL, it can be installed.
In the case of the Inq, it might have something to do with the consistently poor-writing and tiresome attempts at sensationalism. The Reg does seem to be of a slightly higher calibre, but it’s not as if the Inq sets a terribly high standard.
While I have no doubts that DX10 is as much about moving customers to Vista, as it is about improving functionality and performance in DirectX, I have my doubts that you can jump as easy from premise to conclusion as Inquirer does here.
I admit that I do not know much about 3D and driver development, but the premise seems a bit weak to me. The devil is always in the details.
And The Inq has never been the most credible source to begin with….
Edited 2007-07-12 20:02
While I agree with you that the Inq is far from the paragon of journalistic rigor and integrity, I don’t find it hard to believe the argument that MS is using DirectX 10 as an incentive to move to Vista.
If the facts presented in the article are true, and it shouldn’t be to hard to find out, then it really does mean that the only reason MS isn’t providing DirectX 10 for XP is that they want to force their users to upgrade – and in my book that’s a pretty shady thing to do.
If the facts presented in the article are true, and it shouldn’t be to hard to find out, then it really does mean that the only reason MS isn’t providing DirectX 10 for XP is that they want to force their users to upgrade – and in my book that’s a pretty shady thing to do.
Wonder if people will make the same comment about Apple if they don’t backport Core Animation (along with the other nifty new Leopard features) to OSX 10.4.
Anyway, how much of Vista’s functionality should MS reasonably be expected to backport? They’ve already got the new DotNet stuff from Vista in there.
This is *really* not the same thing as Core Animation. We’re talking about DirectX here, one of the cornerstones of PC Gaming! You really can’t compare this to Apple’s new desktop features.
From your comment, I gather you are opposed to any backporting of DirectX 10 to XP, and therefore approve this shady tactic on MS’s part to force PC gamers happy with XP to upgrade?
Can anyone say “MS shill”?
Can anyone say “modded down for personal attack”?
Mod away (though, since you’re being off-topic, I’ll mod you down as well). Personally, I don’t see how someone could side with MS and
(i.e. those who bought XP) without having some kind of personal interest at stake.
So you may doubt that WorknMan is a MS shill (we already know that such a thing is impossible in your mind), but as far as I’m concerned that’s what he is.
we already know that such a thing is impossible in your mind
No you don’t know that. Don’t make assumptions about me, thank you.
Classy.
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Can anyone say “modded down for personal attack”?
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Can anyone say “flagrant abuse of the moderation system”?
It was a personal attack. That’s EXACTLY one of the options. Not an abuse at all.
Relevance to the price of tea in China?
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Relevance to the price of tea in China?
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http://supertart.com/priceofteainchina/chart.html
Edited 2007-07-13 12:56
Thank you! That’s the funniest damn thing I’ve seen all week – I’m going to start surreptitiously projecting it on the wall during meetings.
Hey, guys. That was a fair question. Don’t mod him down for it!
Edited 2007-07-13 20:04
This is *really* not the same thing as Core Animation. We’re talking about DirectX here, one of the cornerstones of PC Gaming! You really can’t compare this to Apple’s new desktop features.
I dunno .. if it ends up being used by a lot of developers, will apps built using this technology work in OSX 10.4, which was only released back in 2005?
From your comment, I gather you are opposed to any backporting of DirectX 10 to XP, and therefore approve this shady tactic on MS’s part to force PC gamers happy with XP to upgrade?
Personally, I don’t do much gaming so couldn’t care less. But if I did, I’m thinking that XP is 6 years old .. I don’t expect that they’d support it forever. Hell, a lot of people are still happy with Windows 98, so why not demand of MS to release DX10 on Win98? Or why not a version for Windows 3.1? Where exactly do you draw the line?
I don’t know if MS not releasing DX10 for WinXP is a shady move or not, but it’s ironic that people who endlessly bash MS don’t hold Apple and other companies to the same standards.
Edited 2007-07-12 22:15
Why even bother to comment then? Oh yeah, I forgot: any criticism of Microsoft must be brushed aside, for Microsoft can do no wrong and never attempts to screw its customers. Right.
Edited 2007-07-12 22:26
Yes, brushed aside by the huge contingent of rabid Microsoft supporters here – both of them! I hear it’s rumoured they might even be recruiting a third.
If you think there are only two pro-Microsoft cheerleaders here, then you haven’t been paying attention.
Anyway, this is all quite off-topic. I’m done with this particular thread.
Are you joking? Two was the generous estimate, I can only think of a single poster offhand who actually qualifies (NotParker), and he hasn’t posted here in months.
*Sigh* modded down with no replies. Really mature, folks.
Hey! I know what you mean. You are left wondering *why* whoever it was was so offended. You’d really like to know, but they won’t say.
Notparker was banned, btw. Permanently, I guess. And yes, he was certainly single minded. He made some good points… but you could never sway him from his “mission” long enough to really get to know him. I tried.
That said, I’ll take your original assertion that there are few dedicated Microsoft advocates here under consideration. My perception is that there are. But lately, a number of those whom I considered to be in that category have said and done some things that surprised me. Which is quite cool. Because as a staunch Linux advocate, one of the things that draws me here is the fact that the naughtier members of any number of “choirs” hang out here to share misgivings about their church. (That includes my own.) 😉
Edited 2007-07-16 01:52
Exactly. I don’t mind being modded down – it would just be nice if folks doing had the guts to own up to it.
Ah, I must have missed the banning. Did he do something particularly egregious, or did the mods finally just lose patience?
I never could entirely tell whether or not he was serious, or simply trolling (my suspicion is a bit of both). Too bad, as he did occasionally make some decent points as you say – and he was one of the more coherent writers around here.
I don’t discount the possibility, my perceptions of certainly coloured by having spent quite a bit of time on the ArsTechnica battlefront (OS advocacy) forum. While I find there tends to be a much higher standards of debate and literacy there (relative to OSNews), it does have a rather high volume of Microsoft fans – not to mention a few of their employees. Compared with that, I don’t think there are any current posters here who come anywhere close to the BF’s usual suspects.
In many cases, the “MS shill” accusations I’ve seen flung around here seem to be primarily based on hypersensitivity and a lack of context. There certainly is quite a vocal contingent here that react to any positive statement towards Microsoft (or even the mere suggestion that rational, consistent standards be applied to them) by implying sinister, ulterior motives. In many ways, it seems like the OS/software advocacy equivalent of “crying wolf.”
Definitely – a dose of counterpoint is always healthy. If nothing else, it forces people to re-examine and often refine their own positions.
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Ah, I must have missed the banning. Did he do something particularly egregious, or did the mods finally just lose patience?
“””
I don’t think it was anything more egregious than usual for him, but he may have strayed onto some “too thin” ice and jumped a bit too high. 😉
Regarding his seriousness or trolling. IMO, most of us fess up to doing a bit of both, lie about it, or have really boring personalities. 😉 I think he was mostly serious, though. That’s why I tried to understand more about where he was coming from. I never got very far, though. At least I don’t think I did.
Regarding the “MS shill” thing, you are no doubt talking about Archie’s post.
I would encourage you to keep an eye on archiesteel’s posts. I have a great respect for his opinions, which don’t often involve the word “shill”.
*Sigh* modded down with no replies. Really mature, folks.
My second comment was modded down (from 3 to 2) with no reply. Of course, when someone can’t form an argument “they” can always just mod you down.
I wish Thom and Eugenia would just get rid of the whole system. For whatever good intentions may have existed in implementing it, it just doesn’t work as intended. I have seen too many good comments (many I didn’t agree with but wanted to read anyway) modded down to -1 or worse. It is now at the point where I have set my threshold to where the system effectively masks out nothing so that I don’t miss a good post.
There is no reason I should have been modded down for my comment. I didn’t carry out a personal attack, I didn’t use foul language and my comments were relevant.
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I wish Thom and Eugenia would just get rid of the whole system. For whatever good intentions may have existed in implementing it, it just doesn’t work as intended.
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The alternative is moderation by Thom. Not an attractive alternative. We’ve been there… done that… got the T-Shirt. ;-P
Personally, I would support:
1. Changing the official policy to simply allow modding people both up and *down* for the same reasons. Namely , that you either thought it was a good post for whatever reason, or you thought it was a bad post for whatever reason. It’s what people do anyway.
2. Lowering the default threshhold. I browse at -5 because although there is some really atrocious stuff down in the dregs, there are some really good posts down there, as well. Are we really so lazy that we can’t just recognize and ignore the utter crap without an automated filter?
You draw the line at the point where a simple legal copyright/patent monopoly becomes a DICTATORSHIP OVER AN ENTIRE INDUSTRY. This sort of thing is what Anti Trust is all about. It’s also why I use Linux.
Can’t be a monopoly if you can use linux. My phone company has a monopoly. I have to pay out the ass ($70 a month for DSL and basic phone service , no long distance, and it costs me 10 cents a minute to call anywhere even local) and there is NOTHING I can do about it. They are the ONLY phone company and the only ISP that works in my area. What Microsoft has engaged in is Anti-competitive practices, they are not a monopoly.
While they may not be a monopoly in the strictest sense any company that can tell hardware manufacturers what literally what a computer MUST be every five years (and usually in favor of their redicuously bloated software which basically consists of building new junk on top of old junk) is a DICTATORSHIP over the industry.
Dictatorships have absolute control. Microsoft does not they have. They have a lot of leverage, but not the final say.
I can see your point, but it’s still not a monopoly as long as you have a choice. It can be a really crappy choice, but it’s still a choice. And as far as I know MS has yet to go out and have dissenting parties shot in the streets and publicly humiliated. Barring the secret existence of MS Death Squads hell bent on terminating all resistance, I’d say “dictatorship” is an overly strong word too. It still falls into “Anti-Competitive Practices”. I would also use words like “Strong-arming” to put it into scope. A larger entity using its inherent position or might to get it’s way. Much like a street corner thug back in the days before they just used guns.
They can’t physically FORCE manufacturers to follow them. Manufacturers follow them because it is the path of least resistance to profit. MS says, support us and only us and we’ll give you X, and look how many customers you have access to by supporting us. Who knows what MS is offering the companies, better API support, money, relaxed licensing fees…
It’s just disconcerting to see people use language to describe things that don’t really fit the bill. It kind of weakens the definition of the word and it begins to lose its power. Like the word “Rape” it’s been so over-used for dramatization of things that the shear sickening violence of the actual crime doesn’t affect people like it should or used to. Ask a rape victim if they feel like the word “rape” feels as violent as what happened to them or if they like hearing the word used casually.
Edited 2007-07-13 02:39
Can anyone say “MS hater”?
I’ll let you get back to your regular witch hunting in the name of the holy GNU.
Sticking up for Windows XP user is “MS hating” now?
I’m sorry, I must have missed this morning’s Shill memo.
It seems you were too busy doing the usual trolling/spamming.
“Sticking up for Windows XP user is “MS hating” now?”
You seriously underestimate the intelligence of the readers here.
“I’m sorry, I must have missed this morning’s Shill memo.”
Your “shill” accusations are getting old. You seem to have been long under the impression that bringing out the “shill” card automagically destroys opposing argument. It doesn’t. Instead it only makes it look like you have a weak position such that you have to resort to such a ploy. It would behoove you and your debating to stick to real argument and stop the baseless accusations.
Edited 2007-07-13 01:12
I’m sorry, but that is *exactly* what ronaldst implied. Go back and re-read his post.
So is the constant pro-MS cheerleading coming from some of the users here.
No, I don’t. I keep the two separate: logical arguments, and comments about the motives of some posters based on their posting history.
It’s not a ploy, it’s an opinion, and it comes separate from my actual arguments. But you’re right, I should refrain from it, because it gives something for the MSDF to argue about instead of actually trying to come up with valid counter-arguments.
I *do* provide arguments. The “shill” comments are a bonus, free of charge. And they’re not baseless accusations, either – when someone *consistently* adopts a pro-MS position, even when others try to take the side of XP users who *don’t* want to upgrade, it’s reasonable to question that person’s motives.
Hey, I get accused of being anti-Microsoft all the time, even though I actually like many of their products and have developed games for their consoles. Someone even accused me of working for IBM back in the days. I didn’t get all uppity about it. If those who feel targeted by my jibes are getting tired of them, maybe they should try being more objective about Microsoft, and actually criticize them when they do something wrong. The way some people talk here, MS is perfect and can’t possibly have anything but the purest of intentions. I find that a little hard to believe…
Let’s sum up your posts:
If MS don’t do what Archie wants then MS are shady/bad guys. Someone disagrees with Archie? Then that someone is an MS “shill”.
Are you done trolling/spamming the comment section yet?
Actually, you’ve got it wrong. It’s like this: if MS does something shady, then I’m not going to be shy about calling them out. If someone *always* side with MS, that raises questions about his/her motives.
Modded you down as off-topic – please feel free to mod this post down as well.
Edited 2007-07-13 06:09
So is the constant pro-MS cheerleading coming from some of the users here.
So is the constant anti-MS pro-OSS cheerleading coming from some of the users here.
But you’re right, I should refrain from it, because it gives something for the MSDF to argue about instead of actually trying to come up with valid counter-arguments.
That’s cute. You’re the one that initiates these off-topic arguments with your baseless (yes, baseless) accusations. Then you cry foul when people call you out on it, accusing THEM of not being able to come up with valid counter-arguments?
If your arguments were really that good, you shouldn’t need to use insults in the first place (and yes, calling someone a Microsoft shill IS an insult).
Hey, I get accused of being anti-Microsoft all the time, even though I actually like many of their products and have developed games for their consoles.
I hate a lot of their products (MSN Messenger, IE, Word in particular), but that doesn’t seem to stop the shill accusations.
If you don’t want YOUR motives questioned, don’t resort to attacking the person instead of the argument.
(Note that I never insulted you or attacked you in any way in this post)
I did not directly accuse anyone of being a MS Shill. What I *am* saying is that whenever someone defends MS in all circumstances, even against people who actually *use* their software, then it’s legitimate to question that person’s motives (I’m not talking about you, btw).
I don’t need to use insults. My arguments stand on their own. As I’ve indicated to MollyC, the “Shill” comments were a bonus. If they bother you, the OSNews moderation system is designed specifically for that. Whenever I make such a comment, I *expect* to be modded down. Writing 25+ post to underline this is not necessary, and off-topic too.
Where did I accuse you of being a shill in this thread? Oh, right: nowhere. I’m well aware of your criticism of MS (though I disagree with some of it: MS Word is, IMO, an excellent program – as long as you disregard the way it handles pictures). I suggest you chill out a bit, and just mod me down whenever I make comments which you deem objectionable.
My motives are quite clear: I like many of MS’s products, but I do feel like they don’t always treat their customers well, especially with regards to people who have chosen to remain with the excellent OS that is XP.
That said, I don’t mind if people *do* question my motives. Maybe I don’t have as thin a skin as some of the posters here. Rest assured, though: as long as people continue to defend MS in *every* situation, I’ll continue to question their motives, and expect to be modded down for that. Having comments scored negatively is a small price to pay for freedom of speech.
I did not directly accuse anyone of being a MS Shill.
You did. ‘Can anyone say “MS shill”?’ Don’t try to pretend you weren’t accusing or implying anything.
I don’t need to use insults.
Then don’t. Calling someone a shill, a cheerleading or something similar is an attack and serves no other purpose than to attempt to discredit the person.
Where did I accuse you of being a shill in this thread? Oh, right: nowhere.
You didn’t (that I remember..). Other people have though.
That was at best an indirect accusation.
I hope you’ll show the same diligence when I’m called a “MS hater” or “Linux zealot” or “fanboy”.
That said, you’re wrong. There is another purpose than to discredit the poster: to bring his/her attention to the fact that his support for MS is unnaturally one-sided, and that it might be a good thing for her/him to have a critical mind when discussing the actions of the software giant.
Again, if you don’t like these kind of comments on my part, by all means mod me down. Just don’t waste your time writing post after off-topic post to tell me what I should, or should not say. It will all save us time (since I don’t plan on changing my ways anytime soon).
The fun part is that the person I made reference too is about the only one not to have posted about it. Perhaps he’s got thicker skin than you give him credit for…
Either that, or it’s common MS policy to have other employees defend their own when they’re accused of shilling. 😛 (KIDDING!)
That was at best an indirect accusation.
Fine, but an accusation and attack nonetheless.
I hope you’ll show the same diligence when I’m called a “MS hater” or “Linux zealot” or “fanboy”.
The thing is, if you were, it’s more likely the person would be modded down to -2 or below, so it’s generally not an issue. I did call someone out once for a similar insult. I believe it was CrazyDude0 or something.
That said, you’re wrong. There is another purpose than to discredit the poster: to bring his/her attention to the fact that his support for MS is unnaturally one-sided, and that it might be a good thing for her/him to have a critical mind when discussing the actions of the software giant.
Then say that straight out instead of of calling them cheerleaders, shills or whatever.
It’s taking away from your argument when you do it. If you’re ok with then, then I apologize for wasting your time.
The fun part is that the person I made reference too is about the only one not to have posted about it. Perhaps he’s got thicker skin than you give him credit for…
It’s not about them at all. If they get offended, then they maybe shouldn’t be on the internet. It’s about you.
That sounds like him alright.
All right, fair enough. I’ll try to refrain from using that epithet, though that doesn’t mean my criticism of uncritical attitudes towards MS will be any less scathing… 🙂
Yes, and people should certainly know better than to expect anything other than perfunctory attempts at backwards-compatibility from Apple.
Oh, please. Can anyone say intellectually-lazy characterization?
Don’t try to change the subject.
Are you seriously comparing DirectX with Core Animation? How many multi-million dollar projects depend on Core Animation?
I don’t think people here realize the relative importance of the PC game industry compared to the technology used in a well-made, but marginal OS.
If people don’t want to be called shills, then they shouldn’t be so consistently one-sided. Even I can praise MS when it does something good.
No, I was simply pointing out the silliness of holding up Apple as a positive example of backwards compatibility when they, in fact, regularly break it between relatively minor version iterations.
It’s becoming obvious that you’re using the word “shill” when you really mean cheerleader/fanboi/etc.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/shill
Who exactly was holding Apple up as a positive example of backwards compatibility? I certainly wasn’t. What I *was* saying is that the comparison is irrelevant.
Indeed.
Another example is that Apple could’ve easily provided Spotlight to Panther users, but made it a Tiger-specific feature to add incentive to upgrade to Tiger (and ideed, Spotlight is THE feature wrt Tiger). And good for them! That’s the way things work. It makes no sense to make all features of new versions of software available for old versions if you want to provide some reason for users to buy the new version.
The only thing is that Microsoft gets ripped for making Vista features unavailable to XP, while Apple got praised for making Tiger features unavailable for Panther. And Microsoft did back-port .NET 3.0 and PowerShell to XP; they do much more of that sort of thing than does Apple.
This isn’t the same thing at all: did Apple introduce a new framework for game development in Tiger, ensuring that games made for Tiger wouldn’t play on previous versions of the OS?
It seems the Microsoft Defense Brigade is already all over this. Would it be too much to ask for you guys to consider the possibility that MS could be in the wrong, here?
No, but they did add frameworks so that apps (like Apples Appature, and the latest versions of Final Cut and Logic to name just a few) written against 10.4 won’t run on 10.3 (and they added features to 10.3 so that some apps written against it wouldn’t run on 10.2 etc.) Did they do this because back porting was impossible, or did they do this because they wanted people to upgrade?
I’m far from an MS supporter and I’m not denying that MS could very well be doing this to make people upgrade to Vista, but it’s hardly a unique MS strategy.
No, but they did add frameworks so that apps (like Apples Appature, and the latest versions of Final Cut and Logic to name just a few) written against 10.4 won’t run on 10.3 (and they added features to 10.3 so that some apps written against it wouldn’t run on 10.2 etc.) Did they do this because back porting was impossible, or did they do this because they wanted people to upgrade?
I think this is the point that archiesteel is missing. People go on a tirade about how MS is evil because they do xyz, and then don’t even bat an eyelid when their competitors engage in the same business practices.
Think Windows XP users are getting screwed? Alright, fine, I’ll agree with you .. just like OSX users are getting screwed too. Maybe we should all just switch to Linux
Edited 2007-07-13 02:17
I was already going to say something along those lines. Let’s face it, Apple and Microsoft are proprietary software companies. They’ll release a new version of their software that has new features to try to get people to upgrade and buy that new software. In my opinion though, it is kind of crappy of them to make new APIs (which by the way I, among many others, wouldn’t really consider a FEATURE. It’s a programming interface. All it really does is FORCE people to upgrade. Rather than for the example used before about Apple’s Spotlight. That’s a feature, some people may need or want that, and some may not. No one was forced to upgrade because of it. Now on the other hand if a application you want to use has a new feature or bug fixes added to it, and you want to upgrade, but because of an API upgrade in the newest version of your operating system prevents you from using that newer version of the software you want, that is shady practices. That’s basically saying “hey, we don’t care about our older users at all. When $COMPANY barks, we must jump.”
API upgrades are not feature upgrades. Same thing with bug fixes.
On the other hand, Linux is great because of it’s openness. If a new version of SDL, for example, comes out, everyone can benefit from it.
Besides, no one here has yet mentioned the fact that Vista in general has poorer 3D performance and more overhead than XP. Of course people would rather keep XP around and have DirectX 10 then to upgrade to Vista and have their fancy new 500+ video cards (well 1000+ for those with crazy SLI rigs) to work like crap.
“They’ll release a new version of their software that has new features to try to get people to upgrade and buy that new software.”
You know, KDE and GNOME have features in newer versions that aren’t in earlier ones. They’re forcing us to upgrade if we want to use applications that use these newer features! It’s an outrage!!
For the love of God people, stop being retarded. MS isn’t forcing anyone to do anything. They’re providing more features in a new product, end of story.
Want to complain? Complain about the software development houses who would take the path of least resistance and make their games not run on earlier DX versions.
The upgrade is free, and does not require more powerful hardware. I don’t believe that this is the case with Vista…
Again, I’d like to point out that almost every post in defense of MS has followed the same patter: “but X does the same thing.” No one has tried to argue MS’ position on its own merits – basically, people are saying “yeah, it’s bad, but everybody does it so it’s okay.”
The fact is that *if* it is possible to port DirectX to XP, and MS isn’t doing so people will upgrade to Vista, then the least we can say is that it’s not very nice for people who have chosen to continue to use XP. Some of you here seem ready to say “screw ’em”, and that’s your right…I just don’t agree with that attitude, and that’s *my* right.
(Note that I said “if”, just like in my original post. I could very well be that there *are* other technical imperatives that prevent MS from porting DirectX to XP…however, I think it says a lot about some of the posters here that I was ganged upon for merely making a supposition…)
Edited 2007-07-13 06:19
“The upgrade is free, and does not require more powerful hardware.”
The fact that it is free is irrelevant and you cant seriously suggest that newer versions of KDE and GNOME does not require beefier hardware to run well.
“No one has tried to argue MS’ position on its own merits”
As I said, it’s their product and they have no legal obligation to backport newer features to old products.
This may come as a surprise to some people but the reason companies make new products is that they want people to buy them. Software is in this regard no different from any other sector.
“The fact is that *if* it is possible to port DirectX to XP”
It doesn’t really matter if it is technically possible or not. They have no obligation to do so either way.
MS isn’t preventing anyone from making their game work both with DX10 and earlier so if you want to complain, complain to the game developers.
Actually I can, for KDE at least. The code base has been getting leaner/faster as it has improved, and I haven’t seen any noticeable performance decrease from KDE 2.2 to 3.5.
As for Gnome, it might be slightly heavier (I don’t use it much, so I wouldn’t know) but I’m quite certain it’s *nowhere* near the jump in requirements from XP to Vista.
Who ever said anything about a legal obligation? Don’t put words in my mouth. I’m talking about being *nice* to their customers, about respecting those who have decided to continue using their great OS that is XP.
So you are in favor of planned obsolescence, then? Getting people to spend hundreds of dollars to upgrade even though they have no compelling reason to do so?
No wonder more and more people prefer free software. At least the upgrades are *always* free.
Actually, it does matter quite a bit as far as customer perception goes.
You really don’t get it, do you?
Right, because that is both technically easy and financially feasible…
“Getting people to spend hundreds of dollars to upgrade even though they have no compelling reason to do so? ”
This is bullshit. You’re not forced to upgrade. You’re only “forced” to upgrade if you want to take advantage of the new features. If you dont need them, you have no complelling reason to upgrade and do not need to do so.
“Actually, it does matter quite a bit as far as customer perception goes. ”
Way to confuse the topic. customer perception has nothing to do with what MS has to do or not. They can ignore customer perception as much as they want. Probably not a smart thing to do but it’s their decision.
“Right, because that is both technically easy and financially feasible…”
Right, because it’s much easier to blame MS than the ones who are actually “forcing” you to upgrade.
– I already posted, as did a few others now, that there were more than just the memory technical limitation.
– It’s also been pointed out that there are no sources to back up this claim theinquirer made.
Even if it were just the memory issue AND it is true what theinquirer said, it would have been pretty late in the game. Too late for Microsoft to have been able to backport all of DX10 to XP in a timely manner and not delay Vista any further than it already was.
Who’s saying anything about delaying Vista? There’s nothing preventing them from releasing DirectX 10 for XP. MS has actually done that quite a few time in the past, i.e. DirectX 8.1 version 4.08.01.0810 was an WinXP/2K3 exclusive, and version 4.08.01.0881 was a backport for Win98/Me/2k.
There’s actually two points here: can MS do it? And if so, is it good customer relations to not do it? We don’t have an answer for the first point, but if it was *yes*, then the answer to the second question, IMO, is a resounding “no”.
IF they could, it would have had to have been after Vista was released.
I don’t have a problem with that. That’s what they did with previous versions. It’s not too late for them, either.
That was kind of my point. The difference of course being that KDE and Gnome are FREE upgrades. They don’t charge for it. MS isn’t only forcing customers to upgrade if they want any of the newer software coming out, but they’re forcing developers to upgrade their software to work with Vista. That’s why Vista is failing.
There’s a difference with “Oh, our new libraries support new functions and some applications are going to require those functions. But don’t worry, our upgrades are completely free.” with “Our new libraries support new functions, but you’ll have to pay for it and you developers will have to upgrade otherwise your older applications won’t even work. Sorry.” of course they say sorry with a smile on their face and a greedy glint in their eye.
I’m not “missing” anything. All I’m saying is that you can’t compare DirectX, one of the cornerstones of the multi-billion dollar PC gaming industry, with a few enhancements to OS X. How big is the industry depending on those features that Apple has introduced?
In any case, I find the fact that people here defend MS against its customers a little disturbing. XP is a great OS, and many people don’t want to do a double upgrade just so they can run Vista *and* play DirectX games.
Even Eugenia opined in that direction – funny, I didn’t see many of the MSDF try to challenge her…
I’m not “missing” anything. All I’m saying is that you can’t compare DirectX, one of the cornerstones of the multi-billion dollar PC gaming industry, with a few enhancements to OS X. How big is the industry depending on those features that Apple has introduced?
So you’re saying it’s ok that Apple does it, because it doesn’t affect as many users? How many people does it have to impact before it becomes wrong?
So you’re saying that something that affects a multi-billion dollar industry is the same as something that has only limited effect for about 3% of the desktop market share?
Are you saying that, because Apple does it, then it’s okay for MS to do it (despite the fact that Apple’s actions are *totally* irrelevant to the discussion at hand, and have the relative importance of a drop of water in the ocean)?
Are you saying that, because Apple does it, then it’s okay for MS to do it (despite the fact that Apple’s actions are *totally* irrelevant to the discussion at hand, and have the relative importance of a drop of water in the ocean)?
I’m saying that if it’s ok for Apple to do it, it’s ok for MS to do it. If it’s wrong for MS to do it, then it’s wrong for Apple to do it.
I’m not talking about numbers here, I’m talking about principle. I don’t care if you say MS is wrong for doing this .. maybe they are. But to give Apple a passing nod for doing the same kind of sh*t is just a bit hypocritical.
Except that I *didn’t* give a passing nod to Apple. In fact, I even said that I thought Apple should backport these upgrades if possible.
I also said that, because the contexts are *so* different, the comparison with Apple is flawed, and just another example of MS apologists trying to change the subject every time someone dares to criticize their favorite monopolist.
Next thing you know, you’ll be arguing that all car makers that made cars the previous year without the option of antilock brakes is doing something shady because the current model year cars have that as an option.
Really, let’s be realistic here! No manufacturer is under any legal or moral requirement to upgrade their older model product to have the same functionality of the newest model, unless they’ve signed a contract stating otherwise.
Calling any manufacturer “shady” because they don’t update their old product in a way that adds new features is pure BS, regardless of the manufacturer.
No manufacturer is under any legal or moral requirement to upgrade their older model product to have the same functionality of the newest model, unless they’ve signed a contract stating otherwise.
This is all that needs to be said.
Umm, not same thing at all, ppl buy cars to _drive_ them, and the cars will still be _driven_ even without that option, most WinXP users however did buy the friggin OS bc of games, so not backporting DX10 means what ? well u guessed it, they wont be able to use their OS for what they paid for it in the first place.
I was counting on people to make the stupid whine that “it’s not the same at all!” because I picked antilock brakes.
Well, there’s no real difference here with XP without DX 10 versus Vista with it: XP is still useful as-is for what it was originally claimed it would run with: games with DX 9 and earlier, which is what’s still the majority of games that exist for Windows are written for, and this is for an OS that’s been out for at least a couple of CPU generation refreshes.
So you sat down and counting, waiting, to get a stupid reply to a superduper retarded comment ?
So you re saying I can run DX10 games then ?
I see, it was originally claimed that next winny version would have DX10 and that it would not be backwards portable to XP ?
Tell that to those that bought XP some months ago (since vista quite sucks at gaming – and other things – right now). Regardless how many CPU generations XP has been out for, it still is fine for those (majority of the) ppl spending their money only for one and only ones thing: _GAMES_, and oh, u think Halo 2 also proves that XP is insufficient ? :=)
It’s quite revealing how many of the people who challenged me because I *dared* to criticise MS can’t make an argument without resorting to inadequate comparisons and half-baked analogies.
The fact is that MS said that they couldn’t backport DirectX because it required features that were only in Vista, then backpedaled when Nvidia didn’t want to implement those features.
Instead of wasting your time to attack someone who criticizes MS, perhaps you should think of those who are forced to upgrade their PCs so they can run Vista, only because they want to play DirectX games…
AFAIK, this “backpedaling” is about a single feature that nVidia failed to implement.
Do you seriously believe that a single feature is the difference between the XP and Vista graphics subsystems?
No, I don’t. I never claimed that the Inq article was accurate (go back and re-read my first post). However, it seems that even discussing this matter is out of bonds for the MS defense brigade…
It’s not out of bounds at all. Discuss it all you want! That doesn’t mean you or theinquirer won’t get called out for it though.
The analogy I used is less than half-baked as your idea that I’m picking on your posts because it’s Microsoft: I would have shot you down for your claim that a manufacturer should provide such a major feature enhancement (not correcting a defect) for free, regardless of the manufacturer, regardless of the industry.
I could only hope that in your work, you get an abundance of customers that demand the same thing from you that you’re demanding here: that you upgrade their product/service (that’s over 5 years old) with some arbitrary thing for free to make it more comparable with a later product/service that they might otherwise buy if you don’t update their older product. If you don’t practice what you preach for your own work, then you shouldn’t fight this so hard, either.
Again, this is something (providing backports of DirectX) that MS has done *repeatedly* in the past. So, really, they are breaking a tradition with DirectX 10, one that may actually hamper adoption of the new framework.
I can accept the “it’s not technically feasible” argument, if it turns out to be true (something for which we don’t have a definitive answer yet). I still think the “MS shouldn’t do it because they have a right to squeeze every penny out of their customers” argument sucks, however.
That situation doesn’t present itself in my work, since I do not produce game development platforms. Unlike you, I don’t like to use faulty analogies instead of actually sticking to the topic at hand.
Analogies are intellectually lazy. Faulty analogies are intellectually dishonest.
I still think the “MS shouldn’t do it because they have a right to squeeze every penny out of their customers” argument sucks, however.
That’s one way to spin it. Another way is “MS shouldn’t do it because they have a right to make a profit on their new product by offering incentives for upgrading”.
Yeah, I like my way better. MS made *billions* overcharging for their products, it seems only natural that they would provide backports of DirectX for XP, just as they have *always* done in the past.
Meh. The PC gaming industry is in decline anyway. Give me a console any day (except for Flight Simulators – another excellent Microsoft product).
Not nearly as lazy as someone that won’t take an identical situation and judge it the same, as others have repeatedly pointed out to you. Since you couldn’t see that Apple doing the same thing (or insert any other software manufacturer) is no more right or wrong, then someone inevitably has to make a comparison using another product that nobody would have expected to have a major feature upgrade/update made for free: a car.
So, sadly, it’s you that’s being intellectually lazy and intellectually dishonest in not realizing what people are saying is logically true, and no matter how much you may wish something to be true because it suits your purposes, doesn’t make it true or right.
But it is *not* identical, because it has *nowhere* the same kind of impact. Context matters.
That said, did I claim anywhere that I thought that what Apple did was okay? In fact, I didn’t, because to me the comparison is irrelevant. For the record, however, I *do* think that Apple should backport these technologies if feasible.
Or they could have simply refrained from making *any* comparison or analogy, and simply debated the issue on its own. This would have been much more constructive.
It may be logically true as long as you limit the context, but when actually putting it in context, it becomes irrelevant. MS not backporting DirectX (contrary to what they did for previous version) has a huge impact. Apple not backporting Core Animation has a insignificant impact.
But since you’re basing your entire argument on this change of subject (a logical fallacy, by the way), then for the record I would also disapprove of Apple’s action. Happy now?
I am really surprised by you. You seem to – without realising it – try incredibly hard to paint Microsoft as being somehow wrong for not backporting DX10. Somehow Microsoft and DX10 is a different scenario to Apple and Core Image or Core whatever. You say Microsoft is wrong because they are depriving the game industry of access to an improved API for game development for PC’s running a previous version of Windows. Apple on the other hand is not wrong for depriving application developers of a superior API to develop Mac applications for previous versions of Mac OS. Whats the difference? If you don’t think Core API’s are a big deal go and tell that to Apple.
DX10 is a Vista feature period. Of course it is possible to backport – anything is possible with software – but thats completely irrelevant.
I never claimed that. What I said was that you can’t compare the two because the context is too different.
I don’t, and I won’t.
It’s *not* irrelevant – it’s the whole point of the discussion! Up until now, MS *always* provided backports of DirectX for previous versions of Windows.
You should’ve picked a better analogy.
Antilock braking is a safety feature, you’ll find there’s a great deal of moral requirement for them to provide retrofitting the feature onto their previous car models. They even get additional sales! As a company they’d be stupid to ignore it.
I don’t feel the need to call MS shady, because it’s obvious they need people to upgrade to Vista. It’s completely overt.
No, Beta, while antilock braking is an safety feature it is an optional safety feature that in reality is not an absolute requirement for stopping a car. Antilock brakes allow you to choose where you crash if you don’t have enough space to stop: they do not always help you stop faster and I’ve even heard of people that have had them cause them to stop slower at the low-end and as a result, get into an accident, that older non-antilock brakes wouldn’t have done.
Antilock brakes are actually a fairly good example, because while they can be retrofitted onto an older model, there’s more involved with doing that correctly than you’re probably aware of: I do have first-hand experience in working with the embedded software/hardware in the automotive world, and the electronics/hardware training that goes with it, so I know that it isn’t the simplest thing to just retrofit that onto a car that didn’t have that feature before, because that requires new hardware that takes up space that wasn’t allocated before. You don’t think that antilock brake mechanical hardware and electrical wiring takes up zero space, do you, or that they don’t need to add new electronics that tie it into the rest of the system (dashboard indicator lights for the startup diagnostic: believe me, if you don’t see that indicate things are fine, you do NOT want to be driving that car: that can fail, for example, if your alternator is dying, due to low voltage: I’ve seen that in person, in my car) and then there’s the instruction manual they have to update, etc.
So, in theory, they could do it, the result would be expensive to engineer, a pain to retrofit, and chances are would cause a lot of trouble for the user, ad cost a lot to add to an older vehicle, which may no longer be within normal operational parameters that allow it to be installed safely. In some cases, antilock brakes aren’t what someone really wants/needs (police departments have actually had problems with them on their police cruisers, because they’re used in a different way in chases, though perhaps they’ve trained cops to not do brake-torqueing now, etc.) and in all cases, the buyer (like in XP) never was promised or guaranteed in any contract that this new feature (DX 10 or antilock brakes) would later be added.
Wonder if people will make the same comment about Apple if they don’t backport Core Animation (along with the other nifty new Leopard features) to OSX 10.4.
If I understand correctly, applications currently running on OS X 10.4 will run on 10.5 (the reverse might not be true obviously)
That is not the case with Vista.
I for one, do not want to spend money upgrading all my applications just because I need to move to Vista.
Me being a geek that I am, I might have done so, provided that Vista itself presented compelling enough reasons to upgrade. IMHO it doesn’t. Not at the moment.
So, from XP, moving to Vista or OS X would present a similar effort (new, faster hardware would be needed for Vista anyways) and Macs do run XP and its application, so…
Go tell apple you want spotlight in 10.3 and see what happens. Newer versions of apple’s own software(itunes, etc.) require newer versions of OSX.
Go tell cyber media that you want HD-DVD and Blue Ray support in an earlier version of PowerDVD. Not going to happen.
Companies want to sell software and the only way to continue to do so is to come up with new features in updated versions to sell.
It’s just common sense. Microsoft releasing DX10 in XP(and there is alot more to it than the article suggests) would not sell as much product for them.
Businesses are in it to make money. It’s common sense, it’s to be expected. If I want you to buy a new product I will put new features in it that are only in that product. Otherwise there would be no reason to purchase my product. Makes sense.
Edited 2007-07-12 23:10
IIRC didn’t they have a DirectX 10 build working on Windows XP?
If the issue is performance, then why didn’t Microsoft say, “Windows XP supports DirectX 10, but for the best possible performance, we suggest you upgrade to Windows Vista”.
With that being said, I question whether DirectX is just simply a waste of time given that Microsoft would be a lot better off to tell developers to move games development to the XBox and be done with it.
That’s only possible insofar as Vista came from the same codebase as XP (well, it came from the 2003 codebase, of which XP was just one fork).
There are actually some serious changes across the kernel to make the Windows Driver model work. Most notably, the memory management system was changed to encompass the GPU memory as well as the main system memory. There is also some added security mechanism to allow for DMA transfers directly from usermode without risking system stability. These things are pretty serious changes and you’d need to replace the XP kernel with the Vista kernel to really get it to work.
I stand corrected. Mind you, by Microsoft keeping DirectX 10 as a Windows Vista only thing, wouldn’t that alone risk gnomes developers deciding not to move to Direct X 10 for an extended period of time, thus, slow down the adoption of Windows Vista?
With that being said, one has to ask – maybe game producers should look at alternatives such as OpenGL and alternative platforms; given how much Microsoft will eventually expand its own games offerings (and its ability to crush competitors), wouldn’t it be prudent to look at platforms which aren’t Microsoft dominated.
Very well said. Backporting DirectX 10 to XP, if possible, would not only be a nice thing to do for XP users, but might also speed up adoption of DirectX 10…but careful, the Microsoft Defense Brigade might gang up on you for suggesting something that could actually help MS!
Edited 2007-07-13 14:33
To push the evelop even further – why did they even develop DirectX? why didn’t they work within the OpenGL group to expand the API into something that covered audio and multimedia as well? so that there was a complete platform independent stack?
One could argue that DirectX was merely developed to lock developers into Windows via a so-called ‘superior’ API which is little more than veiled attempt top maintain and extend a monopoly.
Then again, one could argue that ultimate it was the games companies who were suckered into DirectX – they had the opportunity to say “no, we want a framework which is platform agnostic and does not tie us to Windows” but the fact is, they chose to stay silent, and now customers are suffering because of it.
Then again, one could argue that ultimate it was the games companies who were suckered into DirectX – they had the opportunity to say “no, we want a framework which is platform agnostic and does not tie us to Windows” but the fact is, they chose to stay silent, and now customers are suffering because of it.
Maybe the game companies want to be locked into proprietary platforms?
If they don’t they should start developing with OpenGL.
“the only reason MS isn’t providing DirectX 10 for XP is that they want to force their users to upgrade – and in my book that’s a pretty shady thing to do.”
Their product, their decision, their rules. I don’t find this any more shady than, for example, Sony not backporting PS3 games to the PS2 and therefore “forcing” people to buy a PS3.
“If the facts presented in the article are true, and it shouldn’t be to hard to find out, then it really does mean that the only reason MS isn’t providing DirectX 10 for XP is that they want to force their users to upgrade – and in my book that’s a pretty shady thing to do.”
Yes indeed, I also found shady that my 1983 Honda Civic wasn’t updated to latest Civic model in cardealer, free ofc. If DX10 is one of the main big thing in Vista then why should they bring it free to Windows XP, answer they shouldn’t! Whole article was pure crap mostly (call it Inq quality) and I been hearing this same nonsense since Vista was released. Hey get used to it that if you want something new you must pay, same goes with cars.
Sure, except that when Microsoft came out with DirectX 8 and DirectX 9, it backported it to Windows 98 and ME (which are as different from XP as XP is from Vista). In other words, MS *used* to backport DirectX to previous systems – heck, the last version to support Win98 and ME came out in December 2006! Oh, and contrary to your irrelevant claim that “if you want something new, you must pay”, these updates to DirectX were free.
I vote that archiesteel is awarded an “Entitle Mint” (you know, the one that tastes great to start, but causes everything else to taste worse than before because it doesn’t mix well) for arguing on emotion and cutting every bit of logic out, attacking everyone, etc. and calling all logical rebuttals in the discussion “intellectually dishonest” and “intellectually lazy” and calling everyone “MS Shills” because people won’t bend over and acknowledge his opinion as being consistent with how life should be.
Even if hit upside the head with an unbreakable Clue-By-4, it would only be a noisy affair, as nothing could possibly sink in to someone that only uses emotion and refuses to allow logic to seep in.
Everyone, at least on this point, we might as well give up attempting to convince archiesteel using any form of pursuasion: he simply is not amenable to any remote bit of logic, and he’ll only scream bloody murder “That’s not true!” based on emotions.
A highly emotional post accusing me of being too emotional. Cute.
Listen, just because you can’t come up with good counter-arguments doesn’t mean you have to lash out…
Modded down for personal attacks.
Good to see that the Microsoft Defense Brigade sticks together, and mods up off-topic personal attacks against those who dare question the software giant’s motives.
Let us not forget, it is also not their first time at such foolishness. If DX10 genuinely requires features only included under Vista, then o.k. – maybe they shouldn’t be *forced* to include additional extensions, wrappers, etc. for the sake of an older product line.
However, if they are doing OS version checks, and then purposely locking-out older versions – even if that OS is capable – then that is wrong.
It has happened before: Windows live messenger (8.0) runs fine on W2k, once you grab your hex editor and change it’s version check. Same to some screensavers and the like.
It’s good to see such news articles of high integrity.
Just the first paragraph itself was a testimony to the fair handedness and objectivity that many other news outlets seek to emulate.
I thought the reason had to do with the new display architecture which XP doesn’t support. Anyway I don’t trust anything posted there, especially about Windows since that is a very biased anti-Microsoft web site that has no journalistic integrity at all. They call Microsoft “the vole” crying out loud, how stupid is that.
Edited 2007-07-12 20:48
“Anyway I don’t trust anything posted there, especially about Windows since that is a very biased anti-Microsoft web site that has no journalistic integrity at all.”
Ignoring bias of your own statements. The Inquirer does not pretend to be anything else, and it doesn’t hide behind any subterfuge, unlike Ars Technica which is a higher class site but lies, and is pro-Microsoft. This is very different from say something like phoronix which is just plain bad.
The bottom line is Nvidia is a hardware manufacture it does not sell Vista…It does not even care about selling Vista, unless their is mutual benefit from it doing so, and there would be if Vista was selling better.
OpenGL 3.0 which contains DirectX10 features in a few months so will be available to XP.
They call Intel “Chipzilla” and AMD/ATI “DAAMIT” quite often too. They’re equally biased toward each depending on the article. People read too much into the tone of the article(which is as far as i’m aware) is intended to be humorous and not lacking in personal opinion and not enough into what the article actually says.
I really cannot find flaw with the actual facts they’re reporting, the rest is just down to your own personal opinion of their type of journalism. From my point of view at least they’re upfront about what to expect unlike newspapers (mostly just lies) or other sites that try to pretend they aren’t biased yet make excuses only for the party they support.
Here’s where people fight about whether directx should be backported or not. Honestly I dont think they should have to. The only reason people are making such a fuss is because vista is such a massive failure of an operating system, especially for gamers. Things like changing hardware and then, oops, you require a new £200 licence to use your OS you paid for 3 months ago are just silly. That shuns customers and people hate it, it’s unacceptable.
As vista is such an utter failure in many regards (spying on you, drm, gaming, huge driver related issues) if i was still using windows i’d be *demanding* DX10 on XP. Not because XP is great, because it isn’t(i’ve never considered any os great…) but because it’s reasonable, it does do some things extremely well…..gaming being one, backwards compatibility being another, and just general unrestrictive ease compared to vista.
My point really is that if vista were a slightly better, slightly upgraded XP we wouldn’t be here. As it is now vista is a worse desktop OS than XP ever was.
I highly doubt anyone would care that DX10 was Vista only if vista was actually any good. People would just move to vista. Right now what im hearing from friends in pc retail is that more than half of their vista PCs come back demanding they put XP on them. That’s a pretty damning statement on its own.
Fairly unrelated but ive just found out my (seemless) bluetooth printer adapter doesn’t work in vista….I find that kind of odd considering it works by disguising itself as a usb printer(thus requiring no drivers, just like if the printer was plugging in directly) when using the adapter. Does anyone have any idea why that might be? It’s worked in every version of windows since 2000 and pretty much every linux distro since linux had usb2 support :/
Edited 2007-07-13 06:44
So what? Voles are quite nice
First off, barely anything uses DX10 yet. If you need something so bad you would switch operating systems, why in the world would that switch be to Linux? So you could play killer ogl games like tuxracer?
If you cut through the stuff that just plain doesnt make sense, and all the vista hating, he does make a good point. There is no good reason not to port DX10 now. The problem is even worse because typically gamers are some of the last people to jump on board with a new operating system, because if you view your computer as a gaming platform you want to squeeze every FPS out of it. The move really wont do anything for Vista adoption, and it will do nothing but slow DX10 adoption.
The only valid reason i could think of is not wanting to support multiple platforms, but when you have the money that MS does, marketshare is worth more then a couple thousand in support costs.
why in the world would that switch be to Linux? So you could play killer ogl games like tuxracer?
No, SuperTux.
how bout warsow, nexuiz, racer, or even savage2. not that they dont have windows ports but they are opengl.
and more with: vendetta-online, eternal lands, secondlife (yeah we have that too), ufoai, Defcon, Darwinia… we’ve got quite a few games over in Linux
I don’t know that i’d call any of those good.
The best games are Neverwinter Nights, Tribes 2 and RTCW:ET but now all of those are old and no longer worth playing IMO.
RTCW:ET is old and not worth playing ?
I am shocked and saddened by your assumption.
Come and play with me on our community server, (note not a “clan” server), but a community..
85.236.100.205:27960
I like the part where the author said he dump XP for Ubuntu and a Wii as part of his forced upgrade.
I like this phrase the best in this article, it being true or not (an sadly we again and again find it to be), it’s a good way of saying it.
Nalle Berg
./nalle.
The funny thing about Microsoft is they are a business. Their goals are completely focused around market saturation and profit. Although partnerships with Microsoft can be beneficial to both, Microsoft is only looking out for Microsoft.
I’m not knocking Microsoft for being that way, but it’s not particularly friendly competition and it certainly isn’t designed to benefit partners.
As for DX10. It looks real nice, but just about everybody I know who plays games these days owns at least one gaming console. Although I don’t ever see computer gaming going completely away it seems to me to be a dying breed. As consoles have gained hard drives, memory cards, keyboards, lan connections, etc. the games that once relied on computers to connect online can now be played via the console as well.
Hence why I liked to quote about Ubuntu and Wii. To me the PC is slowly becoming the least favorite place to play games among the general population of gamers.
Here’s what was said back in February: http://blogs.msdn.com/ptaylor/archive/2007/02/14/why-dx10-wasnt-cre…
So what are theinquirer’s sources for their claims anyway?
Edited 2007-07-12 21:35
Those reasons are the one the Inq article claim are not valid anymore.
As for sources, they’re not necessary: all you need to do is validate if GPU memory virtualisation is still a requirement for DX10. That’s the crux of the article’s argument.
They are necessary. A source that validates even that claim should be necessary for the article.
Besides, the URL I linked talked about MORE than just the memory management. There was also “GPU task switching and more”.
I wish I could find a more in depth explanation, because I know there was one.
Someone who states he uses Ubuntu, refers to Vista as “Me II” and obviously knows nothing about the inner workings about DirectX10 is commenting on how practical it is to port DX10 to Windows XP?
Typical Inquirer article.
… to read that article if it wasn’t of the thick and immature fanboyism and anti-MS gooing all over it.
Religious people are annoying. Even more so in the computer geek world.
Is ANY of this true?
First off, GPU and framebuffer virtualization is not a component of DX10 but of the underlying WDDM and DirectX Graphics kernel. The DXGK provides (in WDDM 1.0) surface level swapping of framebuffer memory to and from system memory along with command batching from the usermode driver to the miniport driver (the WDDM 2.0 spec supposedly will support 4k page level swapping and full GPU command stream preemption). Let me reiterate DX9l (ex) and DX10 both rely on overcommit and swapping (DWM.exe, aka Aero Glass, being a perfect example of a DX9ex app that does so). I might also add that regardless if DX10 is back portable, it is NOT a trivial matter as even forward porting DX9 to the WDDM model, which was essentially a bottom up rewrite of the DX9 libraries for WDDM, was a huge undertaking. Quite simply, it wouldn’t be a port of DX10; it would be a whole new implementation of the libraries on the old display driver model OR you would end up backporting the entire WDDM/DXGK infrastructure. NOT A TRIVIAL UNDERTAKING PEOPLE.
I think one of the most fundamental problems with this discussion is most people have little to no understanding of just how radically different the WDDM driver model and DXGK are from their predecessors. In the old model, the kernel mode “miniport” driver was responsible for implementing all GPU management, including scheduling and memory management. In Vista the DXGK is responsible for this work and is the arbitrator for all pipelines rendering to the display (DX9, DX10, OGL ICD, GDI) and, as of yet, I have not seen a SINGLE source, reference or technical document stating that Microsoft or Nvidia have any special implementation of the WDDM spec (relaxed or otherwise) that remove or limit framebuffer virtualization.
Edited 2007-07-13 05:06
Thank you for providing that information. It’s basically the same type of stuff I read previously about why it wasn’t backported. It’s nice to see actual information posted here instead of all the other crap.
Thank you for providing that information. It’s basically the same type of stuff I read previously about why it wasn’t backported. It’s nice to see actual information posted here instead of all the other crap.
There are a lot of technical issues with backporting DX10, but with enough time and effort, it is, in theory, possible. It’s just not practical and Microsoft gains nothing from it other than the very temporary praise of a few gamers. Actual developers WOULD STILL have to develop multiple rendering paths and, let’s face it, graphics alone do not a good game make. The whole premise for this argument that developers and gamers would somehow massively benefit from a backport is just silly. DX10 is a new API, requiring new hardware with lib’s built around the WDDM/DXGK infrastructure. People just need to get over it.
The bigger issue, as I illustrated in my first post, is that I believe the Inquirer’s article to be completely wrong with no technical merit whatsoever. The technical specifications, documentation and ACTUAL current drivers, strongly support my position and no one has provided one iota of information to the contrary. I would assert that the ONLY reason the Inquirer article has any credence is because Jeremy Reimer of Ars Technica essentially republished the Inquirer’s statements (in very un-Ars like fashion). I have an e-mail out to Jeremy asking for technical clarification of the issues, but until I see some documented proof, this entire discussion is, IMHO, based on a false assumption – namely that the Inquirer article is correct.
I’ll be doing the same; I’m looking at getting a Wii soon, and play good old ‘platform games’ like SuperMario 🙂
I don’t understand this fascination that some people have to thinking they *NEED* to run games on PC’s when a games machine in terms of longevity and usefulness means its a lot better value for money.
Btw, playing games is a hobby – not a way of life, I think SouthPark put a nice spin on it with their take off of obsessive people using games to escape from real life.
“Btw, playing games is a hobby – not a way of life,”
This is going offtopic but…
Are you sure? I mean, they have Gaming Olympics and Cyber Athletes (that made me laugh harder than I have ever done before) nowadays and gaming is serious, or at least big, business.
Cyber Athlete…seriously…there’s nothing I can say that could possibly make those two words any more hilarious than they already are.
Ok, I’m being sarcastic, sue me, but this whole gaming “lifestyle” is just really annoying me. Playing computer games is even less of a sport than chess is.
Then again, poker is apparently a “sport” these days so what do i know.
Edited 2007-07-13 06:48
More correctly, ESPN can turn anything into a damn sport these days – hence the reason you’ll never see my watch ESPN – Rugby, Soccer, Cricket, they’re sports – they require some physical and/or metal prowess – but overweight V-Drinking gamers as sports men? dear god.
Do half an hour of Wii Boxing, then get back to us on that… 😉
Half hour? Geez, my arms get too sore to play anymore after 15 – 20 minutes.
I can do 2 hours of hockey, but only 15 – 20 minutes of boxing..
“Do half an hour of Wii Boxing, then get back to us on that… ;-)”
Sorry, it’s still not a sport. Sex is also exhausting but you don’t see that in the olympics, do you?
The requirement about virtualization which impeded Direct X to be installed on XP is one thing.
Another is that Vista can only be virtualized with business or ultimate versions.
It’s a kind of Microsoft gamble. I can’t believe most of people will be happy to follow this narrow “path to Vista purity” Microsoft ask them to follow.
These kind of hurdles hurt the installed game addicts and all Windows users. They make a stark difference with the ease of use of XP (not speaking about low memory footprint). I am convinced that these are bad business decisions that will in the end be detrimental to Microsoft.
In the IT world, you can vote with your feet…
This article is worse than the usual crap I see on digg.
First off – you seriously believe Microsoft supports DirectX 10 on Vista only to migrate users off of XP?!? So I also take it you believe that the sun revolves around the earth and the government is putting mind controlling substances into our water system…correct? So when was the last time you saw Elvis since you know he’s still alive.
Uh, wow. Convincing argument.
You had me on “mind controlling substances”…
That is a reason to not support an API that prevent further interpolarity between platform from Windows XP to other UNIX like system. DirectX 10 just means another lock-in. Too bad a giant company are not interested for a better API that is OpenGL so it can compete for the merit. It is also too bad gaming industries aside the like of ID software to name a few in PC world still choose to invest for a short term solution.
Its the driver model that changed in Vista. I expect MS to upgrade how there drivers work in a new OS. As for the actaul features that is allowed by the directx 10, if the hardware supports it then its just a matter of having the drivers support the feature. OGL is extensible so anything DX10 can do, OGL can do. It’s a matter of how the hardware manufacturer decided to handle the drivers. Most game comapanies do/should abstract the render path so that OGL OR Directx can be used. Far Cry ddoes this, Warcraft 3 does this (which is why it runs kick ass in Wine). Most companies are doing this anyway due to the consoles, Sony uses Opengl for their toolkit and MS uses Directx and OGL for theirs.
Like it has been stated before the real issue with OGL is the fact that not all features are implemented by the drivers or their is some obscure extension that has been added by one manufacturer that the other doesn’t have. OGl is a standard with a committee, this shouldn’t be the case at all. The reason this happens is that the OGL standard is slow to be updated, as directx gets a new feature, the hardware manufacturers usually extend OGL to support those new features, usually these features aren’t in the OGL standard. OGL 3 is supposed to address a lot of these issues.
I don’t get why this is even a debate.
New software has new features. In this case, Windows Vista has a feature, which is called DirectX 10. Microsoft probably spent a fair amount of resources developing this feature, so naturally it will add to the charge for the product, which is Windows Vista.
If an older product is provided upgrades that gives it these additional features, it would, in fact, be the new product, and provided the upgrade is free of charge (which seems to be the line of thought here), all the resources spent will have been thrown out the window.
I do not have much sympathy for Microsoft at all, but this is actually a case where they cannot be blamed for anything.
As for the people who complain that Windows XP users bought their copy of Windows to play games, and the lack of DX10 limits this capability, you got it all wrong. DX10 does not prevent you from playing all the games that are not written for it. Expecting to be able to play every game released ever, without ever upgrading your system, is bogus…
It’s like expecting to get a new computer with your new game if your current computer does not match the system requirements.
– Simon
Edited 2007-07-13 14:40
I’m not sure you can say that DirectX 10 is a feature of Vista. It’s a set of libraries and programs that are separate from the OS (i.e. the OS can function without them, AFAIK).
Also, MS used to provide backports of new DirectX versions for older OSes. DirectX 9, for example, was made available for Win98 and Me.
Also, MS used to provide backports of new DirectX versions for older OSes. DirectX 9, for example, was made available for Win98 and Me.
Fair point, but it doesn’t take into account how different of a change DX8 -> DX9 was from DX9 -> DX10, as well as a difference in the driver architecture from W98 -> XP from XP -> Vista.
Again, we don’t know for sure. That is why I said “if this is true” in my first comment.
Can we at least agree that *if* it’s true, then it would be a nice gesture from MS to backport DirectX 10 to XP?
Please read through some of the other “main” posts in this thread…
Others have already pointed out reasons (other than gpu virtualization) for why DX10 will not be backported as well as why it’s not so trivial as theinq tries to put it.
Sure it would be nice if you could use DX10 on XP, but the effort involved would be so large that MS would probably do it for a “Windows XP Second Edition”, so you’d still have to pay up…
Maybe they should have gone that route when they first realized Vista was going to take longer than planned to get out to ease the transition path from Windows XP to Windows Vista, but they chose not to do so.
IF, then yes it would be nice, not not necessary. Nor would I reasonably expect them to do so.
People claiming that Microsoft should port DirectX 10 to XP is laughable.
This is like claiming that Adobe should port everything in CS3 to 1.0, simply because they don’t want to have to pay for upgrades.
But Vista is expensive! Not as expensive as Photoshop.
But DirectX is a huge part of the gaming industry! The creative suite is THE digital graphics industry.
But Linux is free! So use it.
But NEW linux stuff runs on older hardware! Ok, so run linux on your older hardware.
Nobody is forcing you to move to the New version of Windows, but if you WANT the new features, then you are going to have to buy the new Version, and stop being cheap about it.
You use your operating system day in and day out. XP was released in 2001 thats around 2,500 days. If you bought the full version of XP Home, at 200$, that is less than 12 cents a day. For something you use, day in, and day out.
Cry me a river if you want something but can’t have it because you are too cheap to upgrade. I don’t expect Adobe to backport their features to their older products just because their products are expensive. You get what you pay for most of the time, and if you don’t like it, move on.
XP as it stands now is quite stable, and with some good preventative measures, you won’t be getting virus'(virii?), or spyware, or malware, any time soon. The same goes for Vista.
But Vista requires super ultra mega computers to run! Yeah? No way! So did XP when it came out, and it ran like crap on my PII 450mhz processor with 128 megs of ram. Microsoft, whenever they update Windows, Pushes the hardware industry, and often breaths new life into it. Microsoft often times doesn’t just create new jobs for itself, but for the whole industry.
So stop complaining, if you want to use Linux, use it, if you Don’t like Microsoft, then you have every right to not like it, but hate microsoft for one of the other millions of reason to hate them.
Edited 2007-07-13 20:59
is that Open GL has always looked better compared to DirectX at least till DirectX 10.
More solid textures and better colour depth. I always found DirectX to be washed out.
I’m pretty sure that has little to do with opengl or directx and more to do with the engine.
@archiesteel
Stop whining, it should be below you. This is a forum where Microsoft Users do not buy Vista. In fact the great thing is the DirectX 10 being Vista only, *in the short term*, hurts hardcore games; PC game companies; graphic card Manufacurers; DirectX as a gaming platform.
I love how Microsoft stuffs its content provides; hardware manufacturers and customers. The sad thing is there is nobody to take up the slack. OpenGL 3.0 should have been ready to take up the slack, Linux still has 3D graphics issues and its market share is nothing like that of Microsoft.
@chris_dk
I actually loved this. Maybe they want the largest support; which use the largest features of the graphics cards…which was DirectX 9*, now its well nobody
@kaiwai “One could argue that DirectX was merely developed to lock developers into Windows via a so-called ‘superior’ API which is little more than veiled attempt top maintain and extend a monopoly.”
This is an API that allows *Direct Access* to Hardware features DirectX 9 does not allow this. DirectX10 is simply not available to over 95% of its dedicated platform, and the platform it is has shown to be poor for gamers from both performance and game compatibility.
@Caspian Ignoring what passes for an analogy. Your talking about locking *hardware* to an *api* how is what you said relevant. Its transparent what Microsoft has done, and you can see why. They have been forced to backdate IE7 already.
Why is this discussion only about XP, from my understanding of the matter it should be quite feasible to port to Win98 also.