Quote Subman:
ANyway, my one biggest beef with DX10 is that 'all' audio is rendered via software. I mean, what is MS thinking? Where is my accelerated audio? THat is going to kill FPS in many games. Where is my EAX going to be? EAX won't work - period. Environmental sounds are about to be kicked out the door. /Endquote

This is not entirely accurate...audio rendering in Vista has nothing to do with DirectX10, unlike previous versions of DirectX/Windows. This is what has resulted in the breaking of EAX and other formats that required DirectSound3D found in earlier versions of DirectX. Creative apparently has already patched this problem in Vista using ALchemy. Creative is hoping that the OpenAL architecture will catch on again in Vista, which will provide what EAX no longer can. Incidently there are games out there that used OpenAL...and as far as I understand these games work fine in Vista, including surround sound.

Basically, Vista has reworked how sound and video operate now, and in the long run this new way is far superior. Previously when a video driver or audio driver crashed this resulted in a BSOD and forced a reboot. This is simply no longer the case in Vista. This is also why there is no DirectX 10 support for XP...it would require a service pack in itself to allow for DirectX10 compatibility, which would require a significant amount of resources to accomplish...resources that are being used in other things, like Vista...

The Vista audio renderer operates much more efficiently in Vista now, so software rendering wont impact performance near as much as it did in XP, especially on a computer that is already fast enough to handle gaming in Vista. Incidently, it has been shown that Aero Glass has no discernable impact on frames per second in gaming compared to the non-glass Aero interface.

So in the short run....a lot of current games will have a 'flat audio environment', and will require some hacking to get proper surround sound working again.
In the long run....Vista will provide a more stable platform, and once new games featuring environmental audio support under Vista start replacing the older ones on our drives, the lack of support for EAX will become a thing of the past.

My poor little R600 thread has been hijacked and turned into a DX10 battleground.

/sniff

:|\\

Thanks Gizz and Zantham you give us hope for the future of Vista ...

better than waiting for the next OS from Microsoft, code named "Vienna"
due out in 2012 ...:lol: ,

By the time 2012 comes out we will be well past Vienna...
http://www.winsupersite.com/faq/windows_7.asp


Back to Flintlock's topic:

Here's some benchmarks on the R600 vs the G80. Very interesting reading!

http://level505.com/2006/12/30/the-f...i-r600-test/1/

Note this was done with a prelease card, on prerelease drivers :)

I was off by three (3) years uh, but the article you pointed me too is already talking about Vista sp1 which will help Flintlock's hopes for R600 to run properly ... see how I kept it on topic flint ...

Quote:

Q: Will Microsoft release any Windows updates between now and Vienna?

Quote:

A: Yes. Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1, codenamed "Fiji") will ship simultaneously with Windows Server "Longhorn" and will include a new kernel version that makes that release up to date with the kernel version in Longhorn. As such, we might consider Fiji a major release for a service pack: No previous service pack has ever included a major kernel update.

Maybe, but that is assuming your card supports OpenAL. I can remember playing Doom 3, etc and not having 3D audio on my NForce. I heard many other cards don't support OpenAL either. If they can fix that little problem, then I think things might be OK.

-S

PS. Same thing happened on a friends VIA based board - No 3d Audio support under Doom 3.

No! Those goobers are practically a monopoly. Intel is feeling the "love" from AMD's anti-trust lawsuit.

You are correct!:rock:

R600 ready to beat the 8800
 

AMD claims their ATI R600 is primed and ready to beat NVIDIA's 8800.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Berlind/image...600topBLOG.jpg

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Berlind/?p=364