Re: Group Project: Minesweeper solver, Pt. 1

Tech-Archive recommends: Repair Windows Errors & Optimize Windows Performance

"Tom Shelton" <tom_shelton@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:OXTN5BkpIHA.2256@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

You know what Mike, it might interest you to know that
I just saw an article this morning that seemed to indicate
that this isn't necessarily an issue with Vista. It appears
that newer graphics cards are dropping support for GDI
hardware acceleration, and focusing on Direct3D acceleration.
Now, I'm sure that has a lot to do with the fact that Aero
renders using direct3d and not GDI or GDI+ (which
apparently, never really had any hardware acceleration
support).

Yes, but Vista cripples graphics cards that already do have hardware accelerated GDI functions. So we cannot use the accelerated hardware functions that are actually present on the card whether we are drawing to the screen or not if we are running Vista.

It appears that newer graphics cards are dropping
support for GDI hardware acceleration, and focusing
on Direct3D acceleration . . .

Graphics card manufacturers have always focussed heavily on Direct3D acceleration, basically because games are the driving force behind the sales of these cards. But they have always provided very fast GDI functions in hardware as well, mainly because Microsoft spent a lot of time and effort in the past persuading them to do so. If Vista had not crippled those hardware functions then the card manufacturers would have contiunued to provide them but, as you quite rightly say, many manufacturers are dropping support for GDI functions on their cards, simply because Vista prevents them from being used and so there is no longer any point in providing them. By and large most new graphics cards are supplied either as part of a new ready built computer, which these days will usually have Vista installed and which cannot use GDI hardware functions on the card, or as a separate "card only" sale, which is invariably to a "gamer" who has never really been interested in the GDI functions and requires only the 3D stuff. That's why they're dropping GDI hardware functions. Shame, really. We could have had both.

Mike



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