> They don't hack the DX9 drivers, and they don't replicate DX10 - they 
> actually trick DX10 into installing on XP, so you get full functionality.

But that's impossible to keep full functionality, DX10 has many new function 
calls that talk to the new window manager in Vista.  Such things simply will 
not work in XP.  I suspect that at the moment very few programs actually use 
those calls (to make developing DX9 and DX10 versions simultaneously 
easier), so most programs probably will still work ok.  One example is how 
Vista handles the mouse pointer compared to XP.

Of course a limited functionality of DX10 would be useful on XP, but I 
imagine it's very buggy in places, which is why MS never bothered spending 
the effort to really tidy it up and get it working properly.

Post a reply to this message