More reasons to not worry about DX10.1

Extremetech has a thorough review of the new ATI chip the RV670, in its R3870 form here. And it states this about DX10.1:

"A quick word about DirectX 10.1, which is coming to Vista users with Service Pack 1 early in 2008: While this is the first chip to support the new API standard, and AMD is likely to make a big deal about that, you shouldn't really get too excited. DX 10.1 makes some of the things that were optional in DX10 mandatory (like 32-bit texture filtering), and it adds a few new nice little wrinkles that could be of use to developers, but it's certainly not going to be "the next big thing." We don't expect many games to support DirectX 10.1 for awhile yet, and all the games that do will also support regular DX10. In most cases, you'll hardly be able to see any difference between them (the DX10.1 version might run slightly faster, or have a better anti-aliasing option, for example). It's a nice feather in AMD's cap to be the first to support it, but don't let it be a big factor in your buying decision"

Which is in agreement with the advice I have been giving for months, it is just another minor version rev of DX and no big deal.

Comments

• Anonymous
  November 26, 2007
  Phil, Most users have a problem with this because:- a) DX10 has no native games because they are all simply DX9 ports with a few extra bells and whistles. So, how is DX10.1 going to solve this? b) Our nice shiny £360 DX10 compatible graphic cards are now rendered somewhat obsolete by this upgrade. Yeah, we can still run DX10 games, but as detailed in your post they are going to run slower than new graphics cards which meet the DX10.1 standard. I guess that the DX10.1 cards will run at the speeds that DX10 users were expecting. Assume the position guys, cause here comes DX10.1. ArchCarrier

• Anonymous
  November 26, 2007
  Each card becomes "obsolete" with a few months by something new which runs faster. This is a normal situation int the field of computers for many years now. If the update would be called DX 10.0a (like updates to DX 9 were), would people be less upset? :) I agree the little DX10 native adoption may be seen as a problem, but I fail to see how is it related to a few more improvements available in 10.1. Sooner or later, there will be no more DX 9 cards manufactured, and no more DX 9 OS sold. Now it seems it will be later than MS and GPU vendors expected (or wanted), but again, how is this related to 10.1?

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  Will the Vista SP1 affect FSX somehow?

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  "Each card becomes "obsolete" with a few months by something new which runs faster. This is a normal situation int the field of computers for many years now." I don't think there are any cards which have been released which renders 8800 or 3800 cards obsolete. There are different versions, yes, but what they can do is the same, some of them just do it faster. I have always been pro MS which is why I upgraded to Vista when it was first released, but the Vista, DX10 and FSX fiascos have rapidly changed my mind. ArchCarrier

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  Lesson of the year. Don't buy a product(s) based on promise. I don't blame ACES for DX10. Nobody appears to be what I would call successful with DX10 at this time. Everybody that runs it takes a large performance hit. I'm curious as to why this is- is it the API itself? Hardware implementation by the major vendors? Drivers? Like any issue, it's probably a combination of the three. Right now I feel that D3d10 in general is not a step forward. Maybe it will be in the future, but not today.

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  Somehow, this "no big deal" blog entry forces me to visit Ebay^^ Especially if i think of the Nvidia driver-related issues with XPack... @ArchCarrier Selling a GF8 and buying a Radeon HD3870 should not be a real big problem. For me it's only the big question if it makes sense for FSX (driver, performance, visual improvements). Or is it only a coincidence that Phil Taylor has made a second blog entry about AMD/ATI? ;) It would be very helpful for me to get a hint, if this article is of interest for a 8800GTS owner and FSXA user - thanks in advance!

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
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• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  ArchCarrier, what CPU do you have? I use an E6750, 4GB Ram and a 8800GTs with 640MB and i have better FPS (Water max, aircraft shadows on and HDR Bloom). Flying over e.g. Istanbul is really cool :) I only have flickering on some airports and with some effects. I hope this is a driver-related problem and if that would be solved by the new Radeon, i would sell my GTS at Ebay ASAP. I have read many problems with the GTX and GF7 cards. The GTS and ATI cards seems to be less affected, but maybe there are only less people who are using this cards. BTW, i love the cockpit shadows in the P-51 :) I blew up my engine because i watched the shadow^^

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  Cartman I'm using an E6600, 2Gb Ram and a 8800 GTX with 768MB. ArchCarrier

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  All I think Microsoft is doing by releasing dx10.1 is because dx10 was suppose to be a set standerd. what i mean by standard is: If you have dx10 - you can play this game - no question. But dx10.0 didn't turn out that way - nvidia released the crapy low end 8500/ 8400 cards. So to run dx10 like it is supposed to be played, Microsoft is just telling you - you must buy a dx10.1 capable card. Which I think is a good move by Microsoft. If you have a good card now - the 8800, no need to wory.

• Anonymous
  November 27, 2007
  What I would be curious about is... if the new 8800GT (DX10) and the ATI 3850/70(DX10.1) both address the stuttering - pause/ skip issues that is almost always present on anything DX10 related and in particular if the ATI does being 10.1 compliant and DX10 compatible If this doesn't make sense... does the upgraded hardware/ shader fix the stuttering problem I've seen reports of everywhere

• Anonymous
  November 28, 2007
  So..  will my Nvidia 8800GTX card support DX10.1 if not do I get my £450 back cause I haven"t used its features yet, almost a year now!

• Anonymous
  November 28, 2007
  @ArchCarrier Your CPU isn't the best. Perhaps overclocking gives you a few more fps. I'm happy with the fps i get, but i wait for cheaper Intel Quads to get FSX hopefully really smooth. @Steve, you didn't used your graphics card? Your card isn't DX10.1 compliant and nobody forced you to buy this card. But you will get enough money back from Ebay to buy a DX10.1 card, if DX10.1 is important for you. I doubt that the HD 3870 would be better for you. It's only sure, that the new Radeon cards have the best price performance ratio for mid-range cards, so i think i will get rid of my inefficient and loud GTS. But your GTX has still more power..

• Anonymous
  November 28, 2007
  Cartman, I'm pretty happy with the fps I get in game. Its smooth enough to be playable and looks good enough for me. I probably will upgrade my CPU at some point in the near future, but as I can play most current games with settings maxed out at the maximum resolution of my monitor I am happy at the moment. (the use of "most" excludes FSX and Crysis, but includes HL2EP2, Quake Wars and Bioshock) I think you misunderstood Steve's point which was he has really only been using the card for DX9 games and applications, because games and applications that use DX10 have not been forthcoming or use DX10 badly. Accordingly he has not been using the card to its full or advertised potential. This raises the question of what is the problem with DX10 that its application in games has been so poor? There are three possibilities:- a) DX10 API is the problem. i.e. poorly optimised code, Vista required etc. b) DX10 Hardware is the problem. i.e. poor drivers, poor hardware implementation, etc. c) DX10 Games are the problem. i.e. DX10 features bolted on top of the existing DX9 version as an afterthought or fully featured DX10 promised and not fully realised, etc. I personally think it is a bit of all three. ArchCarrier

• Anonymous
  November 29, 2007
  But he used his card and it doesn't matter for what, so no money back, only selling or not selling :) I bought also the "wrong" card because i was impatient and curious, but it was my decision. I'm not sure what i will do now, because the most benchmarks with the AMD cards are without AA and there is no need for a DX10.1 capable card ATM. It's only the efficiency and the hope that their drivers and image quality will bring a improvement for FSX. And if i wait too long, the price of my GTS will drop heavily... Sadly, the latest Nvdia beta driver (169.12) didn't removed the flickering :(

• Anonymous
  November 29, 2007
  If microsoft made it absolutely clear from the start that their FSX was not actually Dx10 ready than many others and myself included would not have bought the 8800GTX, its not a case of "being forced into buying the card" they were just the cause of one buying it, just to see on screen when loading the game -    "A RUNNING PROGRAM IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH CERTAIN ELEMENTS OF WINDOWS"

• Anonymous
  December 01, 2007
  "I bought also the "wrong" card because i was impatient and curious, but it was my decision." Wow... somebody is actually able to take responsibility for their own decisions. I've said from the beginning that people on the front lines of technology go there willingly, knowing that they could get burned.  Kudos to you for accepting that instead of trying to blame others. Besides... there are bigger things to be angry about in this world.

• Anonymous
  December 01, 2007
  "If microsoft made it absolutely clear from the start that their FSX was not actually Dx10 ready than many others and myself included would not have bought the 8800GTX, its not a case of "being forced into buying the card" they were just the cause of one buying it, just to see on screen when loading the game -   "A RUNNING PROGRAM IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH CERTAIN ELEMENTS OF WINDOWS" Couple things here:

1. The 8800's are the best cards out for DX9 apps too - there's really no reason you should have bought anything else.
2. The switch to Vista Basic when running FS has nothing to do with DX10 support.  It happens on all video cards and all versions of FSX.  I'm not entirely sure why they disable Aero like that - no other game I've tried in Vista does that including FS9. Ryan

• Anonymous
  December 02, 2007
  Phil, a quick question, Crysis which use the crytek2 engine claim that certain elements of crysis use DX10, is this true? I think i now know why a game of FSX's magnitude cannot run on platforms such as PS3 and XBOX 360, it just goes to show that a PC is unmatched in every single category.

• Anonymous
  December 03, 2007
  And now Nvidia announce the 9 series cards which will be DX10.1 compatible. Things move on, but as there isn't anyone having a good experience using DX10 with existing cards, could we please have that sorted out first? Who knows, maybe Nvidia will allow 8 series users to trade in their cards for a nice shiny new 9 series card? And the price of bacon might rise! I know I choose to buy a DX10.0 compliant card, but this is now completely beyond a joke. I won't upgrade so quickly and blindly again. I will wait and see how DX10 and the associated hardware performs before committing. ArchCarrier

• Anonymous
  December 03, 2007
  RE.  the preceding two posts, there are a number of games that now use DX10, including Crysis, World in Conflict, Call of Juarez.  There are others as well, but these are just a few.  And some people are having a good experience with their DX10 games.  From what I've read, 10.1 will be an incremental increase, and DX10 cards certainly won't be obsolete any time soon.  I'm not aware of any games at this time that are DX10.1.    

• Anonymous
  December 03, 2007
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  December 03, 2007
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  December 03, 2007
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• Anonymous
  December 04, 2007
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• Anonymous
  December 05, 2007
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