Windows 7 and Direct X11 – A Winning Combination?

Now that Vista is no longer Microsoft’s “latest and best” Operating System, gamers requiring the sharpest side of the cutting edge needed beyond DirectX 10 to, wait for it, DirectX 11. The headline improvements over DirectX 10 are as follows:-
Improved multi-core processor support through better use of multi-threading
Hardware Tessellation via Direct3D 11 (quite remarkable improvements here)
Shader Model 5 via Direct3D 11
GPGPU – allowing 3D card owners to run DirectX 11 applications, rather than just games!
If all this sounds great, it’s because it is. We have been crying out for new ways to utilise all those idle transistors in our new computers, and now we get two in the form of Direct X11’s improved leveraging of CPU power, and the language provision for allowing developers to access CPU’s and Graphics cards directly to create some potentially amazing software in the next 12 – 18 months.
Of course, we are now waiting for AMD, nVidia etc. to release their DirectX 11 video cards, whereupon we will really see the platform shine. It’s a good time to be a gamer and a technology fan, that’s for sure. Better yet, Microsoft are not confining this to Windows 7, and DirectX 11 has very recently been made available for Vista, too. A good move that broadens the recipient base massively, and accelerates adoption meaning, in turn, a greater incentive for software developers to showcase this extra technology.
Our advice? Get Windows 7 today, and wait for DirectX 11 cards to launch and then come down in price! By this time, the software will have caught up and you won’t have had to spend a fortune on the hardware by being an “early adopter”. Good Luck!
For sure Nemark will test out the new games in the office – in our lunch break of course:)