8800 GTS backward compatibility with DX 9, 8, 7, ....

[gpuaddict]

Dear all,

Can anyone help me in my problem because i want to buy an 8800 gts video card BUT i'm not sure if i can play my games that need DX 9.0c since 8800 GPUs are DX 10. Particularly, Need for speed most wanted is my favorite and i want to have a really powerful GPu such as the 8800. My OS would be Windows XP and i "dream" GPU is an 8800. I just want to make sure that i can still play games that are for DX 9.0c because my money might go to waste. Pls help me, thanks...

Thanks a lot guys!

[Mike]

DirectX is always backwards compatible.

[MrWizard6600]

DirectX is always backwards compatible.

Oh comin Mike you know what architectural changes are been made with the introduction of DX 10.

Anywho, Yes the 8800GTS supports both Direct X 9.0 (and as such PS and VS 3.0), and Direct X 10 (SM4.0 which, from the numbers, looks to be amazing).

the 7900 series and X1k series will NOT support Direct X 10 fully.

Thing about Direct X 10 is that you need* (well it's in MS spec, but you dont actually have to have a unified architecture, but if you don't you wont see nearly the performance benifi6t of DX 10) a unified architecture. It also brings SM4.0 and minimaps that are ~8x the density of the current ones.

[KARacing]

...the 7900 series and X1k series will NOT support Direct X 10 fully.



MrWizard - I wanted to clarify your statement about the NVIDIA 7xxx and ATI X1xxx families - They will not support DirectX 10 at all...

As I understand it, DX10 is such that it requires cards to have specific hardware architecture and/or capabilities to be supported (which the aforementioned cards do not) and there are no CAPS BITS exceptions in DX10 like its predecessors.

The short answer is either a card fully supports DX10 and all its requirements or it does not. There is no middle ground.

If anyone has information to the contrary - please share....:)

[gpuaddict]

thanks a lot mike, i'll soon be playing my games at top condition. What can u say about vista and its compatibilities (e.g. printer, scanner, mouse, ...)?

[MrWizard6600]

MrWizard - I wanted to clarify your statement about the NVIDIA 7xxx and ATI X1xxx families - They will not support DirectX 10 at all...

As I understand it, DX10 is such that it requires cards to have specific hardware architecture and/or capabilities to be supported (which the aforementioned cards do not) and there are no CAPS BITS exceptions in DX10 like its predecessors.

The short answer is either a card fully supports DX10 and all its requirements or it does not. There is no middle ground.

If anyone has information to the contrary - please share....:)

I do.

(I think I've said this before in this forum. edit: I DID! its in THIS THREAD! LOL) MS Spec states you do infact need a unified architecture (ie stream processors) to utilize SM4.0 and have Direct X 10s reduction in over head functions. Direct X 10 no longer allocates certain functions to certain parts of the pipe, it now just throw all processes at the card, as such Direct X 10 and all current non-8 series/non-X2k series cards will not support this feature (or rather lack of). BUT, thats not to say there can't be something else that does allocute the functions to the correct part of a card with the traditional pipeline architecture.

And I have yet to see why a pipelined card will not support the features of SM 4.0. In that part of the API i see no major changes from SM3.0, just, as always, higher definition textures, and new shader effects.

[Mike]

@gpuaddict: Hardware compatibility in Vista is quite good compared to the launches of Windows 2000 or Windows XP, but it's still not perfect (though it's getting better all the time). At this point it's probably safe to upgrade if you don't have any exotic hardware raid solutions or oddball add-in cards. In any case, it's always a good idea to check with the manufacturer or all your pc components to see if they have Vista drivers before you make the jump.

@MrWizard6600: DirectX *is* always backwards compatible. You can buy a dx10 card today that will play games written 8 years ago for DirectX 5.0. The hardware has changed many times since then and it has never affected the backward compatibility because that's the whole point of having a couple of software layers in there (i.e. DirectX itself and the video card driver)...you can always map the set of DirectX functions to your hardware using a driver...

@KARacing: Yes, cards are either DX10 or not. Technically it's entirely possible to support DX10 without having unified pipelines (in which case you'd have to emulate the unified pipelines in the driver), but it doesn't look like anyone is going to be doing that. So from here on out you can expect any GeForce 8XXX or Radion X2XXX to be a DX10 card.

[bikerdude]

Afternoon

I have done a lot of testing with both the 8800GTS and the 8800GTX and the problem as far as I can see it is the 8800 card/driver.

As some of you might know for a while now, 8bit sky rendering in T2 has been par for the course on nVidia cards. But with the upgrade to an 8800 series card, the 8bit rendering problem has grown to include everything else.
On a 8800 Thief 2 now looks like Thief 1, ie. low bit depth on all textures and shadows. This is the same for both WinXp and WinVista.

# For example remember how much more detail T2 has in shadows compared to T1, now T2 looks as bad as T1 in that regard.
# The quality of the dithering is bad (I assume as the game is now rendering in 8bit rather than 16bit)

The images have the gamma is all the way up @ 100%...and you can clearly see the problem..

8800GTX(8bit) on the left... and My laptop(16bit) on the right... ) Admins - I assume the the pic size is ok..?

http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/4131/dump18800dz0.jpghttp://img261.imageshack.us/img261/2092/dump000re7.jpg
http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/5237/dump28800yd0.jpghttp://img378.imageshack.us/img378/3418/dump001zm2.jpg

Biker

[Jason]

Picture size is fine although I think you'll find quite a few people who it won't show up as side-by-side. I don't think it matters much though because anyone can figure out which is which.

As far as your problem goes, all I can say is "Man, that sucks." I don't know the solution. I was having curious issues with WoW as well and I'm not sure I've narrowed it down myself and I also have the 8800 (although obviously it's not a DX7/8 application). From what I have read on various sites, there do seem to be issues with the drivers. What I haven't been able to figure out is if the people who are saying the drivers are the issue are using Vista or if it's mixed between Vista / XP. I personally use XP so I don't know.

Have you tried any of the "tweaked" drivers from guru3d? I was going to give that a shot but haven't gotten around to it.

I'm curious as to the answer, however. I hope you are able to find the solution to your problem. Having a game look like that on a $400+ card is enough to drive someone to insanity.

-Jason

[bikerdude]

Try disabling FSAA and AF (or one without other). I've encountered the same problem in System Shock 2 (they both use Dark Engine). Haven't tried yet but some guy said disabling FSAA and/or AF shoudl do it. I know it's not the same like playing game maxed out but it should be better with some jaggies but with normal textures. Or just pump up the resolution if you can...

Hmmm, I cant see how that will work, but hey its woth a try! I shall post back with results..

biker

nb. there are some new drivers 158.24 and 165.xx, I will try them along with the guru3d.omega versions....

[bikerdude]

Try disabling FSAA and AF (or one without other). I've encountered the same problem in System Shock 2 (they both use Dark Engine). Haven't tried yet but some guy said disabling FSAA and/or AF shoudl do it. I know it's not the same like playing game maxed out but it should be better with some jaggies but with normal textures. Or just pump up the resolution if you can...

Have you tried any different drivers? Sometimes a newer card will work with older drivers even though it says it won't

Id this a Windows XP issue or does it apply to Vista too?

This applies to WinXp and WinVista...!!!

I tried that, and several driver version's beta and Whql (from 97.97, 158.18, 158.19, 158.22, 158.24, 165.01), also modded drivers (Omega, Ngo, Z-tweaked, etc). It didnt make a damn bit of difference...same crappy banding and lack of depth in shadows. So it cant be an FSAA issue...!!!???

I shall wait for the HD2900XT and buy that instead and junk this 8800GTX on ebay or loot or anywhere else people might be interested.

In the mean time im buying a Belkin Omniview Soho kvm so I can play Thief on my laptop, but use my CRT and full size k/b and laser mouse.... nVidia you should be ashamed, but I wont be suprised if you dont give a F...

I have yet to hear from any taffers that have a 8800 card that can play T2 with out said problem.

biker

[bikerdude]

Nvidia probably made some significant hardware changes which limits 16 bit rendering. Sadly reduced backwards compatibility is inevitable when technology changes. Therefore I doubt this issue will ever be fixed.:

Yeah I new about that, but I had hoped that they would allow for backwards compatabilty - there are plenty of other 16bit games out there...!!!


Slightly OT: I also experience abysmal performance in Thief DS with my new 8800 GTX. 25-30 fps regardless of settings compared to 60+ fps on my old X1900XTX. Strange :weird

what driver version are you using..? T3 is fine for me at any res/setting. (currenty 1600x1200 max settings)

I assume you tried the safe-texture-manager thing on and off.

Im sure I did, but I will check again when I get home


Oh well, I guess that card is screwed Thief-wise. Too bad, and it bodes ill for the future as well

yer aint it just.

I did have some luck on another front though! I got T2 to play in vmware w/s 5 - almost...... The game loaded, menus were fine, got into the game - only one problem the screen was black. I could heard myself walking around etc LOL So when vmware make 3D support official Im gonna buy a copy and play T2 on that!

biker

[keymaster]

um...i dont want to be rude but is T2 the only game that u can play, have u tried out other games and is it still 8bit?...dont jump to conclusions, saying that Nvidia let u down, maybe its the games problem...

thnx