Fantastic editorial about DX10

D

dbzeag

Wants to kiss you where it stinks
Jun 9, 2006
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I am not a gamer, but I can totally understand what he's saying. Any comments?

http://overclockers.com/articles1375/

Have I got a deal for you!

DirectX 10 is coming, and to enjoy the fruits of Microsoft's pixel-bullying labors, you'll need a few minor hardware upgrades. You need to throw out that entry-level, mid-grade, or pinnacle video card you're currently using and buy one that requires probably four times as much power and outputs who knows how much more heat. That's going to necessitate some augmented cooling in your case and possibly your computer room, so be prepared to either play with your fan setup if you have a good case, or buy a new case if you don't.

I did mention the power requirements, right? Yeah... you're going to need a new power supply for this monster video card as well. That crusty old obsolete 500 watt dinosaur you bought two whole months ago has got to go as well.

So... about that DirectX 10 part: You're going to need to upgrade to Vista as well if you ever want to use DX10, because Microsoft doesn't plan on allowing DX10 upgrades for any of their other operating systems. Since you're upgrading to Vista, you're probably going to need more memory in your box, since all indications point to Vista using ~750 MB of physical memory, just to stand there and do nothing other than presenting a desktop. Are you excited yet? I sure am!

Now wait wait, wait... I want to make sure of something here. Are you what people might refer to as a 'PC enthusiast' or a 'dirty overclocker'? Do you build your own machines? Tsk tsk tsk... That could be a problem.

Microsoft also plans on limiting Vista activations to a mere two 'machines', where 'machine' is defined as 'significant hardware change.' You know, the sort of change experienced when you, say, upgrade your motherboard and processor. If you plan on doing that, you may run into problems. This isn't set in stone, mind you, but it's possible that this 'two machine limit' is exactly that, a hard two machine limit.

The days of calling Microsoft and explaining that the old system you last activated your key on doesn't exist any more just might be over. Personally I can't see this happening, but that's more of a dumbfounded "I can't believe they'd do this" reaction than any hard logical-thought-process-arrived-at knowledge.

So where were we... oh yes! To enjoy the new eye-candy offered by Microsoft's proprietary third API, you'll need to buy completely new hardware (normal) with completely ludicrous power and thermal requirements (crazy), a completely new operating system (crazy), more memory (mixed reaction), and you may be stuck with the hardware you get for a long time, unless you plan on buying another license for that new OS (completely unacceptable, if true.)

So seriously, what the hell happened here? How did we let this happen? I really lament the decline of the game industry's support for OpenGL. The fact is - if more game developers supported OpenGL in their products, this sort of monopoly on your gaming rig wouldn't exist. A game written in C++ and supporting OpenGL could be compiled to run on a variety of platforms - and in the PC market, variety drives prices down and freedoms up.

And as far as DX10 and DX10 cards... when isn't too much too much? I mean sure, I love games getting progressively prettier and prettier, but every single one of us had the option of buying some insane SGI workstation that people like Industrial Light and Magic used 5 or 10 years ago to add realistic-looking special effects to movies.

We didn't though, because that was too much cost for a living room solution. So what changed since then to make a $250 OS (guess), a $300 video card (guess), a $200 memory upgrade, and an undefined serious impact on monthly electric bills OK?

Is anyone else here disgusted, or is it just me?

If you can't deliver the technology using processes that yield hardware reasonable for home use, don't. And for God's sake don't make it mandatory.

If this whole situation is as bad as it seems to be, it spells the death of PC gaming for me. I'm sure the Dells and HPs of the world will be selling Vista DX10 machines so that Joe Sixpack can buy Yukon Hunting Simulation VII and Microsoft Eighteen Wheeler 2007, but I'm not going to.

I'm also not going to be buying Half Life 3 or Unreal Tournament 2009 or SimCity 5, etc... because I'm not going to buy a video card that requires fuel rods or an operating system that requires more hardware just to sit there and drool prettiness compared to the games I play today.
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wow... what a wonderfull article. :rolleyes:

while i can see his point on DX10 only running on Vista, most of his psycho babble goes a bit off the beaten path and into raving nut territory.
 
So what's the best video card for someone who games and also does a lot of photography on their monitor?

I can't afford a CRT so don't mention that... :hs:
 
HydroSqueegee said:
wow... what a wonderfull article. :rolleyes:

while i can see his point on DX10 only running on Vista, most of his psycho babble goes a bit off the beaten path and into raving nut territory.
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I agree he seems to be a bit too pissed off about technology that isn't released yet, but why do you say he is off the beaten path?
 
dbzeag said:
I agree he seems to be a bit too pissed off about technology that isn't released yet, but why do you say he is off the beaten path?
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Because he doesn't make a single point and when he does, he's wrong. Its obvious this is someone that's been reading articles written by person who read a blog entry that some friend's father works at an OEM who actually saw Vista running. I'm dual-booting Vista on a 3 year old office PC, so don't give me all this wild nonsense. 750MBs of memory? I'm clocking in at around 100. I don't know where some of these figures come in. Are the first batch of DX10 cards expensive, power hungry beasts? Yeah, but the first wave of every new gen of video cards is expensive. It always trickles down. Will there be a $150 DX10 card at Vista launch? Doubtful. Will there be one? Eventually, yes. This dude is just whining about crap he knows nothing about.
 
theacoustician said:
Because he doesn't make a single point and when he does, he's wrong. Its obvious this is someone that's been reading articles written by person who read a blog entry that some friend's father works at an OEM who actually saw Vista running. I'm dual-booting Vista on a 3 year old office PC, so don't give me all this wild nonsense. 750MBs of memory? I'm clocking in at around 100. I don't know where some of these figures come in. Are the first batch of DX10 cards expensive, power hungry beasts? Yeah, but the first wave of every new gen of video cards is expensive. It always trickles down. Will there be a $150 DX10 card at Vista launch? Doubtful. Will there be one? Eventually, yes. This dude is just whining about crap he knows nothing about.
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If you have 2gb of RAM, Vista will take what it can get. I have vista installed and without anytihng else installed on it, 33% of my 2gb is taken up when I use Aero. That number is not out of touch I don't think.

Will there be slower (lower) cards that will run DX10? Sure, but they aren't going to drop in power usage too much. You won't need to run an AC unit in your case, but air cooling will cause enough noise to put you in the nut house.

If someone wants to play DX10 games in January, they will have to get the following:

500W PS at least (800W for SLI) (according to nVidia)
Vista and its prereqs (1gb of RAM and 1ghz processor at least according to MS)
DirectX10 (of course)
Whatever the prereqs for the games themselves are

Then expect 15% performance hit from using Vista instead of XP, according to MS.

This much is known and published. What is rumored is the heat dissipation of the new cards that can run these types of games and how lenient Windows is with swapping out hardware. If you get the expensive cards now, then later get better cards for more sanity because of better cooling, will the same OS install work?

This editorial was definitely stream of conscious writing, but it definitely made me think about what's going on.
 
dbzeag said:
If you have 2gb of RAM, Vista will take what it can get. I have vista installed and without anytihng else installed on it, 33% of my 2gb is taken up when I use Aero. That number is not out of touch I don't think.

Will there be slower (lower) cards that will run DX10? Sure, but they aren't going to drop in power usage too much. You won't need to run an AC unit in your case, but air cooling will cause enough noise to put you in the nut house.

If someone wants to play DX10 games in January, they will have to get the following:

500W PS at least (800W for SLI) (according to nVidia)
Vista and its prereqs (1gb of RAM and 1ghz processor at least according to MS)
DirectX10 (of course)
Whatever the prereqs for the games themselves are

Then expect 15% performance hit from using Vista instead of XP, according to MS.

This much is known and published. What is rumored is the heat dissipation of the new cards that can run these types of games and how lenient Windows is with swapping out hardware. If you get the expensive cards now, then later get better cards for more sanity because of better cooling, will the same OS install work?

This editorial was definitely stream of conscious writing, but it definitely made me think about what's going on.
Click to expand...

That's just it, who uses Aero? I turn it off much in the same way I make XP revert to classic look and rearrange stuff to my liking. When you turn off the bullshit, it actually runs faster than XP. Some of the new features in Office are actually useful too.

Some of the other things - the performance hit at the OS level I think should be expected. A lot of the underpinnings of Windows is getting rewritten and most of it is geared towards 64 bit. Until people get used to it and move out of 32 bit, I can see how this will be a problem. They're still writing code for XP, so Vista has to do more legwork for compatibility.

Video cards - DX10 makes things more efficient, not less. You don't need the massive card to run it. Intel is already making a chipset with integrated graphics has DX10 (IGA X3000). I think the "You need SLI" stuff comes from people looking at they system requirements for the first games that use DX10 API, which is shit like Crysis. There are some nice features in DX10 now for CAD/CAM, medical imaging, and video editing, that will be useful and not require a video card that needs its own power substation to run.

But let me back up and say I don't think Vista is going to be worth it to the private individual. Not including WinFS and support for EFI is unacceptable. IE7, WMP11, and all the other minor tweaks aren't worth it. The security, API, WIM management, and new group policy features are awesome for corporate America. I'm just trying to learn to live with it for work and slowly trying to ween myself over to Ubuntu for the home system. I need to keep working on that. Once I have it down ... time to teach the girl a little about Linux.
 
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