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MS Says Windows 7 Will Run DirectX 10 On the CPU
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."
What a revolutionary & useful idea.
I did, but then I only got 5fps. :-P
But what if I want to play Crysis on my EeePC during that boring office meeting!?
Just imagine the demo. "Here is the slooooow intel extreme, geez what a dog, they should be ashamed! Now check out the BRAND NEW straight out of the labs tech, this will blow your mind (cues 7fps slideshow). I know, I know, we do seriously kick butt.
But what if I want to play Crysis on my EeePC during that boring office meeting!?
Your 8 core Core i7 EeePC?
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
Yes, the battery life is awesoNOCARRIER
-- "So, what's the deal with Auntie Gerschwitz et all?"
To: "John"
Subject: Re: Quake
Boom headshot!
Much better frame rate than Halo over e-mail, where half the e-mails are spent teabagging each other.