Hacked DX10 for Windows Appears

Oddscurity writes "According to The Inquirer someone managed to write a wrapper allowing DirectX 10 applications to run on platforms other than Vista. The Alky Project claims to have reverse-engineered Geometry Shader code, allowing Windows games to run on Windows XP, MacOSX and Linux. The Inquirer is understandably cautious about these claims, urging readers to investigate the releases themselves to ascertain whether or not it's a hoax."

Re:DMCA??

[OverlordQ]

Thought there was a compatibility-exemption for reverse-engineering.

Re:DMCA??

[Mr. Sketch]

Thought there was a compatibility-exemption for reverse-engineering.

Riiiiight. Tell that to the makers of bnetd.

Re:Presure for legit DX10 on XP?

[Anonymous Coward]

And what if the overhead of DRM requirements [auckland.ac.nz] is left out?

Re:just buy Vista...

[Pengo]

I kind of went along with that too, but have now re-installed XP out of frustration.

I'm using a Dual 8800 GTX video card (the Dell XPS H2C system: http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetail s.aspx/xpsdt_710h2c?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs [dell.com] is my rig).

I have 2 fast disks striped w/hardware raid and things like file copies felt sluggish and slow. (Moving files around the hard disk).

Using the windows explorer was numbingly frustrating.

The Video driver would crash frequently, even after disabling SLI (I know, it's nVidia's problem, not MS's...) But, the driver would recover and then it would go into a chain of driver crash warnings.

The BSOD's would occur not hourly, but seemingly about 1-2x per week.

The AERO didn't seem to make the system sluggish, but I'm running the fastest video cards on the market..

I'm sure if your running a simple system, integrated graphics card and AC97 audio, your disk configuration isn't complex, or has good drivers.. you might be ok, but some of the subtle problems of vista don't show up until after a month or two of using it. (I've been using since Beta 2 off and on, including RTM and bought a copy at launch).

Funny enough, my wife got my old computer (dual core 3600+ AMD, 2 gigs ram and ATI Radion XT1800), and I put a copy of vista on that machine and it works fine, but all she does on her computer is open the web browser and play solitaire. She has FAR from high end hardware, and she runs it in the high graphics desktop mode without a hickup. the issues I've described on my machine doesn't bother her, she doesn't do things like open the file explorer or copy large files around.

We ordered a batch of dell low end desktop for customer-service reps here at our office, they are running Vista. They have integrated video cards (probably Intel) and it seems to be fine with Aero running, 1 gig of ram. But the only app they use is Mozilla.

I personally regret not buying a Mac Pro after spending 3 or so months fighting with Vista on my new machine, I've concluded that XP will have to work until it's EOL'd and I can feel I didn't completely waste my money on that Dell and buy another Mac to replace it.

Re:just buy Vista...

[toQDuj]

A quick google results in "ShapeShifter" http://unsanity.com/haxies/shapeshifter [unsanity.com]

I've had good fun with ctrl scroll-wheel-up and ctrl scroll-wheel-down though. So that might be a way to go for visually impaired.
It doesn't solve the menu bar problem though. Whilst annoying at times, I've recently seen a widescreen windows notebook with adobe reader within a browser. My word! There was hardly any space for the text left due to the sheer number of toolbars present.

Good luck.

B.

Re:If only windows were like Linux

[Bob512]

I wouldn't necessarily list DirectX with the likes of the other projects. DirectX has always tried to be the best at compatibility, with redists and backwards compatibility for OSes that the rest of Microsoft had written off already (it's only recently that the SDK stopped supporting Windows 98, primarily due to lack of demand, since older SDKs still work). You could say that DX10 only supports Vista, but the truth of the matter is that only Vista supports DX10.

It's fairly easy to adapt the API (as appears to have happened here) so that a certain class of applications will run on older hardware (and hence older operating systems), but those applications aren't interesting for DX10 right now, since DX9 already allows you to access the full feature set. As for running newer hardware on older operating systems, adding the required features to older operating systems would be a tremendous effort, since they go all the way up the stack, and would require changes to very old, very sensitive parts of the operating system.

This is something that has possibly severe security implications for Microsoft, but even worse implications for others involved, since it adds yet another version of a very complicated driver from the hardware vendors, and a whole slew of compatibility testing across the board from hardware vendors to software vendors, all to support a shrinking segment of the market (people running new video cards on old OSes). So for everyone involved, it's makes much more sense to continue using DX9 on the applications that need to support older OSes, and consider using DX10 to exploit new hardware and new features that can't be implemented on DX9.

Re:If nothing else...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure the totally different graphics subsystem in Vista has nothing to do with why DX10 is only available on it and not XP.

Re:Presure for legit DX10 on XP?

[elFarto the 2nd]

OpenGL already has extensions to support DirectX features, they were added by NVIDIA.

Also, the entire OpenGL API is being redesigned from scratch (after 13 years of active service). The first version is currently named 'Longs Peak' and will have feature parity with the current version of OpenGL. The next version which is called 'Mount Evans', will build on Longs Peak, adding DirectX 10 features.

From what I've seen of the new API, DirectX is in for a serious challenge (well, I hope anyway).

More information about the new API can be found in the OpenGL newsletters [opengl.org].

Regards
elFarto

Re:that's a hoax!

[frik85]

okay, the video is crap; but we have tested the preview, and it does provide (limited) DX 10 for WinXP! So it works for real, no hoax, but only for DX SDK demos, maybe some more apps.

Very, Very Unlikely

[ThinkFr33ly]

I know everybody wants to believe that Microsoft arbitrarily decided that DX10 would be Vista only so they could "force" people into buying the OS, but, as usual, it's a tiny bit more complex than that.

DX10 relies heavily on graphics card memory virtualization. The new Windows Display Driver Model, WDDM [msdn.com], introduces this feature. In order to accomplish this, it required a lot of low level kernel changes. So many, in fact, that back-porting it to XP would basically make XP's kernel into Vista's kernel.

There comes a point where you just have to say that a particular feature is only available in Vista. DX10 fits that bill.

Re:If only windows were like Linux

[ThinkFr33ly]

I know you, and most everybody else here, would love to believe that DX10's inability to run on XP was some plot by Microsoft to get people to buy Vista, but you're wrong [msdn.com].

You proclaim that there is "no reason why DirectX 10 can't work on windows XP", but offer absolutely no evidence to back up your claim.

Not surprising, I guess, considering the audience.

Re:just buy Vista...

[nuzak]

Here's a little contextual usage. Let's see if you can spot the word you're looking for:

Calling Wikipedia a dictionary is a misnomer.

Wikipedia's reputation for reliability and accuracy is a myth.

Re:DMCA??

[chgros]

I mean *way* back when.
Indeed. That was before the "digital millenium".

Re:Presure for legit DX10 on XP?

[Ambassador Kosh]

Microsoft solved the DirectAudio problem in Vista for you already, they killed it. Because of how they redid the system all things that use DirectAudio in vista (EAX works through DirectAudio) is software done now. It supposedly has something to do with the DRM system but what it comes down to is that if you want to do 3d audio for a game your only choice anymore in OpenAl. Using DirectAudio now is a pretty stupid thing to do. OpenAL will work on xp and vista and can be hardware accelerated on both.

Re:didn't work for me

[mrsbrisby]

And totally illegal as well. All Microsoft EULAs for their free stuff (or stuff which is not sold, like DirectX) forbid installation on non-Windows platforms.

They can forbid it all they want, but Vault v. Quaid, 847 F.2d 255 (5th Cir. 1988) says that it is not illegal. "Shrinkwrap licenses" (also called "EULA") are unconstitutional because your rights cannot be asserted to be taken away by anyone except you, and only by way of a signed contract and a meeting of the minds.

I don't see how this is different from pirating Windows in the first place.

Then you're a fucking idiot. Running software is completely different than distributing copies of someone elses' copyrighted works, and before you said that, I would've thought anyone could see that. Heck, even the US Government can see that [Galoob v. Nintendo, 780 F. Supp 1283 (N.D. Cal. 1991), 22 U.S.P.Q.2d 1587 (9th Cir. 1992), and Foresight v. Pfortmiller, 719 F. Supp 1006 (D. Kan. 1989)], and it's painfully obvious that there's a lot that they miss.

Here's the gist: When one person makes a web page, it is entirely reasonable to assume that I can download that web page, and save a copy on my computer. It is further reasonable to edit it as I would like, and protected under law that I can even distribute my changes (if separate from the original work).

However, I cannot redistribute that web page in whole. Even unchanged.

Copyright protects the redistribution of copies of the work, and nothing more. It doesn't make it "intellectual property", or protect the medium of the work, and it certainly doesn't grant convicted criminals the ability to categorically revoke your rights just because it's on a EULA.

Re:just buy Vista...

[edwdig]

Funny enough, my wife got my old computer (dual core 3600+ AMD, 2 gigs ram and ATI Radion XT1800), and I put a copy of vista on that machine and it works fine, but all she does on her computer is open the web browser and play solitaire. She has FAR from high end hardware, and she runs it in the high graphics desktop mode without a hickup.

As far as most people are concerned, that's a pretty high end system. The processor is towards the low end for current retail products, but the graphics card is pretty far up there, and 2 gigs of RAM is certainly on the high end. That computer is much better than the average system at Best Buy. Microsoft wouldn't be able to sell Vista if a computer like that couldn't run it.

Re:DMCA??

[Anonymous Coward]

As I recall, the beef that Blizzard had with bnetd was that it allowed circumvention of copy protection to prevent online gaming. You see, we all know that the Blizzard games don't sell for single-player but for battle.net. bnetd made it possible to have pirated versions playing online in much the same manner.

Re:Presure for legit DX10 on XP?

[elFarto the 2nd]

Other useful stuff:

• Integer textures, integer texture co-ordinates, integer bitwise operators
• Texture arrays
• Instanced drawing

And some other small stuff like texture compression of 2 channel images, etc...

Regards
elFarto

Re:If only windows were like Linux

[mgiuca]

So .. yes it is a LOT of work to get DX10 running on a non-Vista system. That isn't the point under contention. The point is: did Microsoft have to tie it in so closely?

The answer is, of course not. Nobody "has to" write a graphics API inside a kernel. I think the real "if only Windows was more like Linux" is that Linux is layered. With Linux, you have the kernel, then on top of that, the X Windows system, then on to of that, the window manager, and on top of that, the OpenGL implementation.

Shoving the rendering engine, the web browser, the web server, etc, all in the kernel is a good way to accomplish two things:

• Force people to upgrade to your new kernel, for "technical reasons beyond your control".
• Ensure that if any of those components are compromised, the attacker can take down the whole system.

In other words, this strategy is my favourite example of Microsoft trading bad engineering practises to maintain their stranglehold on the industry - which is precisely why Windows is both a monopoly AND a terrible system.