Lost Planet: DirectX 9 vs. 10

By Alec Meer Published 24 May, 2007

We check out the differences between the two PC demos.

Oh, dear. This isn't right, this isn't right at all. With Vista leaving gamers at best perplexed and at worst furious, getting out a game that actually used its trumpeted but unproven new DirectX 10 graphics, and that looked jawdroppingly, heartbreakingly, console-shamingly blinkin' gorgeous with it, was incredibly important. As DX10's leading lights, Crysis and Alan Wake, are still trying to work out what weekends they've got free to finally come visit, it's fallen to a port of Xbox 360 shooter Lost Planet to trailblaze the future of gaming graphics on PC.

As you're probably aware, two demos have been released - one in traditional old DirectX 9, good for Windowses XP and Vista alike, and one in fancy-pants DirectX 10, and Vista-only. A fine opportunity to demonstrate all the unparalleled gimmicks DX10 brings to the table, no? Unified and geometry shaders mean a mighty performance hike.

The move away from API object overhead means the old limits on how many different objects - from characters to vegetation to slavering snow-monsters -can be shown at once are removed. Support for vastly improved polygon counts means the age of boxy background scenery with token shiny surface effects is over. Virtualised graphics memory means larger textures, better textures, more unique textures on-screen at once. Or, at least, that's what was supposed to happen. Hopefully, soon it will - but it certainly hasn't in Lost Planet.

'Lost Planet: DirectX 9 vs. 10' Screenshot 1

Outdoor snow effects on DirectX 10. Swirly, no?

Using a DirectX 10 graphics card, a splendid GeForce 8800 GTS 640Mb kindly lent to us by Foxconn for this test, we played the hell out of both versions of the demo. The differences? While there's some pretty impressive effects that the card handled with aplomb in both demos, so long as a couple of graphical settings were dropped slightly, it takes an eagle eye to spot the variations. Are those shadows a bit softer? Is that bug's skin reflecting more light? Was there an extra snowflake there? Am I starting at these demos so intently that I'm losing my mind, seeing invisible snow, phantom lights, hallucinated haze? And how can a planet be lost, anyway? It's not like it can go anywhere...

There are certainly some refinements, but few that you'd notice whilst actually playing the game. The most obvious are the enhanced motion blur effects, which admittedly do a decent job of making monsters look less like clusters of polygons and more like the fast-moving, organic horrors they're intended to be. Other differences, like minutely improved detail on monsters' skin and glass, are only really apparent through close, nay anal,screenshot study. Essentially, play on DirectX 9 - i.e. Windows XP and/or an older graphics card - and you're not really going to be missing anything.

'Lost Planet: DirectX 9 vs. 10' Screenshot 2

And the same scene on DirectX 9. On close inspection, the big beast isn't /quite/ as distorted by the snow haze, but you can't tell that when it's moving.

However, that's not a reason to write off DirectX 10. As a game made for the Xbox 360, the GPU of which is neither DirectX 9 nor 10, but a custom chip that shares some features with both (primarily the former), Lost Planet simply wasn't born a DX10 game, no matter what it calls itself. It's got a few DX10 knobs on, sure, but basically it's a DX9 game in a fancy hat. We won't see the real money shots until games made for DX10 from the ground up - Crysis and Alan Wake, specifically. DirectX 10 still has everything to prove - Lost Planet isn't a proper test, sadly.

The other DX10 promise though, apart from the visual benefits, is performance. Microsoft has proffered some real chinny-reckon percentage stats of how much faster they think games will run under DX10 in Vista. Unfortunately, Lost Planet turns out to be an extra insult to the framerate injuries Vista has already inflicted upon most games. With all settings save shadow quality at max, at 1600x1200 with 8x anisoptropic filtering and no anti-aliasing, on the Foxconn GeForce 8800 GTS in Windows Vista, the DirectX 10 demo knocked out 26 frames per second in the first, outdoor level, and 33 in the other, indoor one. The Direct X 9 demo on the same system - including Vista - went to 29 and 40. Just a little more than could be safely attributed to natural margin of error (confirmed by repeat tests), and thus proof that DirectX 10, in Lost Planet's implementation at least, is hungry.

The difference is also that between perfectly playable and intermittent distracting chug. Not a price worth paying for more motion blur, frankly. On either demo, by the way, dropping the shadow resolution and HDR levels down one notch adds five-ten frames per second with minimal visual difference, ditching the sporadic slowdown entirely on our test system. Incidentally, the DX9 demo on the same PC but in XP added just a couple of extra frames - possibly margin of error, but more likely the well-documented Vista universal performance penalty at work again.

'Lost Planet: DirectX 9 vs. 10' Screenshot 3

Motion blur a go-go in DX10. It's not a perfect art in Lost Planet – weird edge and texture echoes, rather than smooth blur, appear often.

It's also worth noting that the DX10 demo allows shadow quality to be set one notch higher than the DX9 one. You really can't see the difference in-game on that unless you've golden eyes, but it slices the frame rate quite literally in half, way down to unplayable levels on a single 8800. It's possible that 3D card driver updates will fix that, but it's certainly not a visual improvement worth dropping a second graphics card in for, in case you're pondering the SLI or Crossfire route.

While we're on 3D cards, it's been reported that Lost Planet DX10 plays like a dog on the very recently-released first DX10 card from ATI, the HD 2900 (one of which we haven't gotten hold of for testing just yet). Lost Planet is an NVIDIA ‘The Way It's Meant To Be Played'-branded game, and, if these reports are accurate, would seem to have a GeForce bias in its coding as a result. This is something to potentially watch out for in future DX10 games. NVIDIA and ATI alike offer graphics engine help to some developers, usually in exchange for intro screen and back of the box branding, and the significant differences between the two firms' latest GPUs mean the performance gulf on different games may vary wildly. The decision on which graphics card to upgrade to could become a whole lot harder. But that's another story - one for later perhaps, if such tech-talk hasn't already dragged Eurogamer's traffic to a sleepy halt.

'Lost Planet: DirectX 9 vs. 10' Screenshot 4

Again, the same scene in DX9. No, we wouldn't know which one was which if it didn't say the DX version number in the bottom left either.

So now, back to games! Lost Planet, whilst having some flashes of extreme prettiness, is unfortunately not the DirectX 10 showcase we were hoping for, not even slightly. The PC is certainly king of graphics, it's just that lately it's been a little cackhanded when it has to prove as much. That will change later in the year - Crysis, we need a hero. Get a bally move on, will you?

As to Lost Planet's merits as a PC game, well, some answers can be had from Eurogamer's review of its Xbox 360 iteration. Speaking personally on the strength of the demo alone, I'm not convinced its blatantly linear tunnel structure, references to A buttons and foes with unnaturally-glowing weak spots suggest it's entirely appropriate for this platform. Fancy snow effects aside, it feels pretty throwback and generic in the two levels on show here, but maybe the full version will do a better job of breaking the ice.

Picture of Alec.

About Alec Meer

A 10-year veteran of scribbling about video games, Alec primarily writes for Rock, Paper, Shotgun, but given any opportunity he will escape his keyboard and mouse ghetto to write about any and all formats.

Read more articles from Alec by visiting the Alec Meer archive page.

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Comments (53) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • JediMasterMalik #1 5 years ago

    Pretty much identical, the differences are so minor it isn't funny. This is no Crysis that's for sure.

  • Overlush #2 5 years ago

    So the DX10 version has...smudging?

  • #3 5 years ago

    DX10 in crysis.

  • RedPanda #4 5 years ago

    Post deleted at 14:31:59 28-01-2012

  • BadBoyBonner #5 5 years ago

    A Capcom representative told us that the DirectX 10 improvements primarily enhanced performance by up to "10 to 20 percent" through the use of "geometry shaders, depth resolve, and stream output." That means that the Lost Planet demo is only using DirectX 10 to increase performance, not to produce advanced graphics effects.

  • Darren #6 5 years ago

    I thought the demo looked bloody good in DirectX 9 when I tried it (GeForce 7900 GT graphics card) and it ran smoother than the 360 version with no visible tearing. Still a mediocre game though so I won't be buying it on the PC either... :p

  • BadBoyBonner #7 5 years ago

    However

    We found that the DirectX 10 version of Lost Planet performed markedly slower when compared to the DirectX 9 version at the exact same settings. Additionally, the high-quality shadows we saw in DirectX 10 didn't seem to justify the performance hit.

    http://uk .gamespot.com/features/6171326/...

  • kangarootoo #8 5 years ago

    This is the kind of stuff you don't notice untless you are looking for it.

    On a related note, played right through Lost Planet recently. Great game with a few minor (typically Capcom) annoyances. Some of the boss battles were great, which is nice as boss battles are typically an area where the wheels fall off. Plus they have of the best grappling hook in the business :)

  • BadBoyBonner #9 5 years ago

    Hopefully Just Cause 2 can give it a run for it's money in the grappling stakes. Everygame should have one!

  • UncleLou #10 5 years ago

    Well, interesting, but no surprises here. In Crysis, it'll most likely be more noticeable. Anyway, I don't think people should expect too much of an improvement. PCs are about constant progression, not generation leaps.

    At least Capcom have done a slightly better job than usual with their PC ports, even if stuff like the reference to pad buttons is annoying.

  • Disco_Stu360 #11 5 years ago

    Either way I bet it screen tears like the 360 version...

  • login_name #12 5 years ago

    "640meg graphics cards are out?"

    Yup, in fact the 8800GTX has 768MB of on board memory.

  • UncleLou #13 5 years ago

    This is the most BORING article on EG ever!

    Not quite as boring as reading comments from you how boring you find everything recently, be it on the forum or here.

  • UncleLou #14 5 years ago

    Either way I bet it screen tears like the 360 version...

    There's a vsync option in the graphics menu, so, no, no tearing.

  • Darren #15 5 years ago

    Disco_Stu360 - "Either way I bet it screen tears like the 360 version..."

    Not if you enable or force v-sync (plus triple buffering to avoid having a lower framerate) you don't! :)

  • #16 5 years ago

    Yeah slurpy stfu you boring git!

  • bioreit #17 5 years ago

    "Am I starting at these demos so intently"

    Envisages shouting match at graphics, northern style:

    "You mip-mapping anisotropic-filtered textures at 1600*1200, with added bump-mappin'?"

    "You askin'?"

    "I'm askin'."

    "Then I'm mip-mapping anisotropic-filtered textures at 1600*1200, with added bump-mappin'"

    Edit 1: Busy hands make hashed spelling :/ Least I wasn't the only one to spell anisotropic wrong, eh Alec? :p
    Edited by 1 at 24/05/07 @ 12:13

  • #18 5 years ago

    lol

  • Haloboy #19 5 years ago

    How about you entertain yourself ?


    Well go on then.

  • sickpuppysoftware #20 5 years ago

    Sickpuppy's twattish decisions #121 of a series of inifinity

    I was downloading the demo of this. Which one I thought? I'm on vista which runs DX10 so rather foolishly I downloaded the DX10 version.

    What I didn't realise was that I'd need a DX10 card or it would crash instantly. I still haven't bothered downloading the DX9 version.

  • SBfistfun #21 5 years ago

    Vista is for Pc world n00bs

  • Talha #22 5 years ago

    RIP OFF! RIP OFF! RIP OFF!
    This article is a straight port of a GameSpot article that appeared a few hours ago!

    Anyway, the effort is appreciated. The point to note is that I have played the demo and it absolutely crawls on my Core 2 Duo machine with 8800 GTS and 2 GB of RAM. If this is how DX10 games will be 'optimized', a great **** *** is in order for everyone from NVidia to MS to CApcom.

  • menage #23 5 years ago

    Eh,, since Alan Wake is also coming out on 360, woudln't be surprised if it didn't rock the DX10 world either.

  • Bonzrat #24 5 years ago

    It's super of you to insult a man you've never met with a such an unproven claim, but I can assure you that's not the case. I wrote the piece earlier this week, and have yet to read the Gamespot article. Certain conclusions about the demo, however, are inevitable unless you're carrying some mad bias, so of course some details in both pieces will naturally match.

  • Psi #25 5 years ago

    vista is twatfull, sorry i've even upgraded my memory too twatfulltwatfulltwafull

    it's windows me all over again, it'll never be rollout as a desktop standard at my place, there would be an uproar, twatfulltwaffulltwatfull

    they cant even get dx10 games looking great to sway the hardcore gamer.

    they need putting down with a dog needle

  • Khanivor #26 5 years ago

    It's beyond boring, it's pathetic. The topic of DX10 and Vista is a worthy one that deserves a whole bucketload more respect then using a demo of a non-directXgame with four freaking screenshots.

    God, will the summer be full of puff-pieces like this?

    /scuttles back to forum

  • mcwildcard #27 5 years ago

    Well considering the original 360 version this has been ported from is more DX9 than DX10, I'd say this isn't a true reflection of DX10.
    I believe that the utilisation of DX10 in this demo was supposed to help performance (despite the fact it runs about 20% than the DX9 version).
    They just wanted to make a name for themselves by being the first to give us 'something' that was DX10.
    I'll wait for a non-port DX10 title before I make any sort of judgement about it, either way, I still love the way my 8800GTS chomps through DX9 games, so I'm a winner whatever happens.

  • BootLace #28 5 years ago

    Were the DX9 performance figures taken running the DX9 version under XP or Vista?

  • FooAtari #29 5 years ago

    I was pretty dissapointed with the DX10 demo. But I don't belive Lost Planet is an ccurate representation of waht we can expect.

    It's a poor port with DX10 stuck on as an after thought IMO, and very poorly optimized as well.

    I'm fairly sure things will improve with newer drivers and games developed for the PC and DX10 from the start. It's also very different to DX9 so devs need to get some experience with it.

  • El_MUERkO #30 5 years ago

    I'll wait for service patch 1 before i even consider getting Vista.

  • Ryuken #31 5 years ago

    This isn't even a proper PC game in the first place (you know, Capcom port and all that).

  • kangarootoo #32 5 years ago

    Can those whining about the article please put an enormous sock in it? EG write articles like this because some of their readership want to reas them (not me, but I'm adult enough to realise I'm not at the centre of the universe).

    Of course there will be those not intererested, as there will be with any article. Might I respectfully suggest you bugger off and read an article that does interest you. I mean what kind of loony reads something that bores them, and THEN proceeds to write about how bored they are on the associated comments page. Is there nothing else you can be doing?

  • Phattso #33 5 years ago

    The NVidia DX10 drivers are a fucking shambles anyway. The last version totally screwed STALKER, and the performance is lower than running under XP.

    If/when they sort the drivers out, we might have more luck.

  • Haloboy #34 5 years ago

    Crytek will show them all how it's done. And then some!

  • Talha #35 5 years ago

    @Bonzrat: If you look at the opening line of my comment, you can clearly see it was intended as a JOKE. I am NOT accusing EG of plagiarism.

  • Lov3 #36 5 years ago

    So... what does it look like on OpenGL?

  • Introspectre #37 5 years ago

    pcgaminglol

  • Meho #38 5 years ago

    Thanks for the article. I am not planning to upgrade to Vista any time soon and reading this comparison was certainly interesting (even though I read the Gamespot article earlier this morning). I just have to wonder how come Microsoft are not thinking a little deeper about this. To pimp Vista/DX10 you clearly shouldn't use port of a shooter game developed by Capcom. I mean, I like Capcom, but come on, they are not exactly known for doing top drawer shooter titles on PC, are they? I'd expect MS to have their own ace in the sleve, not let third party developers/ publishers do all the work.

    But perhaps Microsoft are losing it anyway, apparently the Halo 2 on Vista is not a very good port (as reviewed out of the box on Gamespy) so who knows where their head is at.

  • Bonzrat #39 5 years ago

    Talha: I'd dispute the clearly (purely because actual vitriol from others in this thread makes it trickier to gauge jest), but fair enough ;) Apologies for the misinterpret.

  • Pablo2k5 #40 5 years ago

    This game runs, looks and plays mighty fine on my PC running Vista.
    I guess some of you noobs having problems just haven't got the intelligence to configure their PCs correctly.

  • RedPanda #41 5 years ago

    Post deleted at 14:31:59 28-01-2012

  • Pablo2k5 #42 5 years ago

    I haven't tweaked anything, just made sure I was running the latest drivers for my system. I'm also careful about what I download and install etc...

  • Talha #43 5 years ago

    @Pablo2k5: your comment succinctly describes what is wrong with PC gaming and how the attitude of some PC users is making it worse - reveling in the tweaking and not demanding/expecting software makers to make it easier for 'noobs' to play games on a PC.

  • Pablo2k5 #44 5 years ago

    @ Talha
    Listen, apart from one or two badly coded and bug ridden games I don't think there is anything necessarily wrong with PC gaming at the moment, I just avoid said games.
    What I object to is people who blame Microsoft and hardware drivers for every single problem they get when they haven't got a clue what they are talking about.
    PC's are great because they are so flexible, and as such I except that not all games and harware are plug and play.
    The PC is NOT a games console (thank god) but with the right hardware it can run games excellently.
    Edited by 1 at 25/05/07 @ 08:28

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #45 5 years ago

    I am skeptical about this article's faith in Alan Wake as a DX10 showcase. Since it's being co-developed on Xbox360, which I'm guessing is probably the lead format since it'll sell more (or at least make more money from the fact that they'll charge more for it), then surely it'll make no more use of DX10 than Lost planet, which has followed the same route?

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #46 5 years ago

    Or some of us aren't total geeks and just expect a game to be decently coded so it doesn't demand stupid amounts of tweaking?

    What, like a console game?


    PC gaming is becoming more an more an exclusive enthusiast pursuit (Blizzard 's games notwithstanding, perhaps). Actually that's wrong, it always has been, it's just that unlike console gaming it's not getting any more mainstream.

    This article seems to be saying to me that Vista and DX10 haven't changed anything about that.

  • Talha #47 5 years ago

    @Pablo2k5: I accept your argument. Surely not EVERY problem is MS's fault or that of the devs. But the tone of your initial comment was quite patronizing and it was a very sweeping statement, implying (IMPLYING) that anybody who had problems with this demo was not qualified to play on PC.

    Also, surely you agree that while playing games on PC will never be as easy as doing the same on consoles, it should at least GET EASIER with time, don't you think? I purchased SPlinter Cell Double Agent and tried to run it on Vista. Despite having the latest drivers for every hardware component imaginable and the game being patched to the latest patches, Sam Fisher still appears to be sprouting about 5 legs and no arms on my PC. Guess what - NVidia's drivers' readme files do list this problem but it hasn't been resolved yet. And surely you know how many months ago the game was released, right?

    These days, Vista does not talk to a large section of the available PC hardware (especially printers and soundcards). NVidia's drivers are perpetually broken, their Vista drivers still smack of 'beta' and I am having the horrific feeling that the problem isn't just restricted to the drivers but the architechture itself. Meanwhile, most recent PC games happily occupy as much gigabytes as they can, but still do not perform as well as their XBox 360 cousins with almost the same graphics. Also, many AAA titles require a whole lot of patches to run on the latest hardware. And except in case of TrackMania and Half Life 2, I have never - repeat, NEVER - gotten a consistent framerate out of my system, which you'd think would be possible given that I have had 1 GB of Ram since 4 years and the have upgraded to a second-fastest NVidia GPU (6800 GT, 7900GT, 8800 GTS) every year.

    Correct me if I wrong, but I don't recall ever having such huge problems in getting PC games to run in my lifetime of PC ownership, i.e. about 10 years. Even the transition to XP was a cakewalk by comparison to this mess.

    And you might as well burn your salary and spend a month in a coma if you plan to get things like vibration/force feedback from your PC games. Meanwhile, Vista boots slower than XP and any Adobe CS3 program takes an age to bootup, meanwhile slwoing down every other process in the bargain (even with 2GB of RAM that my DUAL-CORE system has).

    So my question remains: why is it a chore, and fast becoming a torment, to play games on the PC?

    Sorry for the long, long rant - I feel better now!
    Edited by 1 at 25/05/07 @ 11:20

  • UncleLou #48 5 years ago

    Exaggerating as always. I think you're just really, really unlucky, Talha. I haven't had as many problems with PC gaming in the last 10 years like you seem to have on a daily basis.

  • Talha #49 5 years ago

    @UncleLou: Given that what I have written is based on FACT and I am not consciously making any of it up, how can you term it as exaggeration? And how can you imply I always exaggerate?

    Yes, your experience would be different because (1) the experience inherently differs from user to user and (2) as we have discussed before, you tend to just let the game run at its own chosen pace while I try to meddle and tweak constantly to get an extra leaf on the screen or an improvement of 2 FPS (remember the Far Cry discussion?).

    But I won't accuse you of downplaying your problems since I am witness to my friend running GRAW PC on his four-year-old rig with 128 MB of RAM. Still, i think many readers would relate to the scenario mentioned instead of terming them as exaggeration.

    Edited by 1 at 25/05/07 @ 12:50

  • UncleLou #50 5 years ago

    I just found it a bit tiring to read another anti-PC rant from you in a PC related thread, with sentences like why is it a chore, and fast becoming a torment, to play games on the PC. Well, probably it's true for you, but it still sounds like an exaggeration to me.

    Then of course I didn't make the mistake of buying Vista just yet. ;)

    Anyway, no hard feelings, sorry if I sounded rude. :)

    Don't really remember the Far Cry discussion, I have to admit - I tinker quite a bit, too, actually, till I find the best compromise between visuals and framerate.



    Edited by 2 at 25/05/07 @ 16:22

  • kangarootoo #51 5 years ago

    @Pablo2k5

    I think there is an irony in suggesting that people with problem PCs are intelligent enough to configure them properly (though it is an excuse that seems to get used pretty often).

    Perhaps these apparently dullard people just assumed that they would work in the first place?

    I know there tends to be this l33t attitude held by some that PCs somehow seperate the boys from the men because they require a degree of technical savvy to be effectively used, but frankly there are plenty of very technical people on here who simply can't be ARSED configuring a PC for best performance.

    I've been there, overclocking away to squeeze more points out of 3DMark, meddling with BIOS memory settings, cocking about with Powerstrip and similar utils. Then one day I thought "why am I spending money and time titting about instead of just playing games", at which point a bought an XBox (I probably already owned a PS1 at the time) and never looked back.

    I know there are plenty of people that love PC gaming, and I'm not saying they are wrong, I made my choice and they made theirs. But please don't patronise or insult people just because they have different priorities to you. It doesn't mean they are stupid, it just means they aren't you.

  • Pablo2k5 #52 5 years ago

    @ Talha
    I'm sorry you are having so many problems with Vista. I have to admit I am running alot of my old stuff on XP still (I dual boot between Vista and XP), simply because I couldn't be arsed to re-install everything (and feared some may have issues).
    The Splinter Cell problems are well documented and not being a fan of/or bought the game haven't experienced this. But I can well believe it is a driver issue, not everything can be a 'user error' for sure.
    I do regret the tone of my initial post. I sometimes lose it when I allow daft comments by other people to wind me up.
    I agree that Vista should have made PC gaming easier and hasn't. I also agree this hasn't been the smoothest transition for PC gamers.
    I just can't see the point in slagging off Microsoft and nVidia, things will get better.

    @ kangarootoo
    I apologise for sounding like a twat, like I said to Talha I do regret the tone of my initial comment.
    I guess you could call me an enthusiast and I can tend to be a little snobby and defensive about PC gaming but having said that I'm seriously considering getting a PS3 once they've dropped in price a little! Then I'll be able to satisfy my driving/fighting hunger which is an area my PC doesn't deliver in.

  • Khanivor #53 5 years ago

    @kang - the article is wank. I'm well interested in hardware and software and wear me geek badge with pride (unless I'm outside of the house) but this article is akin to an Argos catalogue's lingiere section when yer after hardcore pron.

    @tahla - sounds like you upgraded to Vista too soon. Go back to XP. Problem solved. Early adopting for gamers is well risky, always has been. Or did you have no issues running a game on Win98 the day it came out?

  • thinred #54 5 years ago

    Some people just don't learn... Honestly, why on earth rushing to upgrade to Vista? It's bloody ridiculous.

    Early adopters of new OS MUST be ready to face a lot of problems and keep tweaking and patching their systems until everyhting's sorted.

    The same goes for pretty much anything else, DX10 included. That's how it always was and that's how it'll always be.

  • Talha #55 5 years ago

    @UncleLou: Hey you weren't rude or anything - I just got p.o.'ed at the way you termed my post as a straightaway exaggeration. That's all. My point is this: while you may be tech savvy enough to keep your PC gaming running smoothly, a majority of the gamers are not. That's what has contributed to the rise of the consoles.

    @Pablo2k5: Well no regrets are needed - we have all been there one time or another. Your subsequent posts have cleared away any hard feelings I could have had about that. And thanks for reading my rants so thoroughly!

    For the record, I am dual-booting with XP. Here are two POSITIVE things I'd like to share about PC gaming that I encountered during the weekend:

    1) In case you are dual-booting, most games installed on XP work as it is on Vista (believe it or not). Just locate the .exe file, make a shortcut on the desktop, locate the saved profiles from the XP installation (more often than not they are in My Documents or a sub-folder - you'd have to look) and copy them into the corresponding Vista location. I am currently playing Flight Simulator X, Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six Vegas and Top Spin 2 in both XP and Vista off the same installation. Just remember to duplicate the savegame files after every play.

    Well, what;s the point then, you might ask. It's just a perfectly geeky thing to do! ;-)

    2) Colin McRae DiRT demo is running like a dream on my system with all settings cranked up. Honestly didn't expect framerate this smooth

  • Genji #56 5 years ago

    DirectX wha...?

    Civ 4 runs fine in Vista.

    That's, uh, all I need. None of this fancy crap. ;-D