MS Says Windows 7 Will Run DirectX 10 On the CPU 503
arcticstoat writes "In what could be seen as an easy answer to the Vista-capable debacle, Microsoft has introduced a 'fully conformant software rasterizer' called WARP (Windows Advanced Rasterization Platform) 10, which does away with the need for a dedicated hardware 3D accelerator altogether. Microsoft says that WARP 10 will support all the features and precision requirements of Direct3D 10 and 10.1, as well as up to 8x multi-sampled anti-aliasing, anisotropic filtering and all optional texture formats. The minimum CPU spec needed is just 800MHz, and it doesn't even need MMX or SSE, although it will work much quicker on multi-core CPUs with SSE 4.1. Of course, software rendering on a single desktop CPU isn't going to be able to compete with decent dedicated 3D graphics cards when it comes to high-end games, but Microsoft has released some interesting benchmarks that show the system to be quicker than Intel's current integrated DirectX 10 graphics. Running Crysis at 800 x 600 with the lowest quality settings, an eight-core Core i7 system managed an average frame rate of 7.36fps, compared with 5.17fps from Intel's DirectX 10 integrated graphics."
Software rendering (Score:5, Funny)
What a revolutionary & useful idea.
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
I did, but then I only got 5fps. :-P
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
Great news then... (Score:4, Funny)
Running Crysis at 800 x 600 with the lowest quality settings, an eight-core Core i7 system managed an average frame rate of 7.36fps, compared with 5.17fps from Intel's DirectX 10 integrated graphics."
So they compared one unusable (and dirt cheap) setup to another, super-expensive and still unusable one, and then they brag about sucking 20% less?
This is typical for MS. They are mostly a software company, and there are too many people who advocate software-only solutions that make no sense, just because that's the only thing they know how to do (maybe.)
Re:From the summary: (Score:2, Funny)
But, but, that's like, a 42% improvement! That's like, massive, man! MS are awesome!
Wish they had done a press conference... (Score:5, Funny)
It's truer than ever (Score:5, Funny)
"Every time Andy gives us more power, Bill takes it away".
Re:lol (Score:5, Funny)
Re:From the summary: (Score:5, Funny)
No, the game goes full speed, you just die randomly however as someone runs in, head shots you, runs out and your computer is still trying to render the first frame.
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
But what if I want to play Crysis on my EeePC during that boring office meeting!?
Your 8 core Core i7 EeePC?
Re:Oh boy. (Score:1, Funny)
Remote Desktop.
Re:Yes. (Score:4, Funny)
Running DX10 games on servers? Get back to work you lazy servermonkey!
Oww it hurts! (Score:4, Funny)
Running Crysis at 800 x 600 with the lowest quality settings, an eight-core Core i7 system managed an average frame rate of 7.36fps, compared with 5.17fps from Intel's DirectX 10 integrated graphics.
and this is ball-slapping good news?
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
Eight cores at 3GHz beat one core at 400MHz!!!
Film at eleven.
Re:Imagine a DX 10 game on an 800mhz CPU -SSE/MMX (Score:3, Funny)
So you're saying the next Office will require eight cores to run? (and only be as fast as on an Intel IGP...)
Re:Larrabee? (Score:3, Funny)
Still won't be vista capable.
Re:Oh boy. (Score:4, Funny)
Nope, correct question would be:
your eeepc with 800x600 resoultion?
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, the battery life is awesoNOCARRIER
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
At one frame per meeting, you're at least better off than people who play Quake over email ;)
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
To: "John"
Subject: Re: Quake
Boom headshot!
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)
Much better frame rate than Halo over e-mail, where half the e-mails are spent teabagging each other.
Re:Oh boy. (Score:5, Funny)