DirectX 11 - What you need to know about the next graphical upgrade

DirectX 11 and its subset of Direct3D 11 commands has officially launched and what you need to know is that so far the graphically improvements are impressive. 

DX11 officially launched with Windows 7 and then last week it was also released for Windows Vista for those of you still holding out before a move to 7.  Those of you "die-hards" on Windows XP are still screwed much like you were with DirectX 10.  Besides, unless you are running 5+ year old hardware there is no reason not to run 7 considering it manages resources even better than Vista did.

But wait you say, "don't I need DirectX 11 hardware to take advantage of all the cool things in Microsoft's latest graphical API"?  Generally you would be correct but this time around there are also advantages for those of you on Directx 9-10 hardware.  Bonus features for those of you without the upgrade bug, can you really complain?  You can read some of the concepts over at MSDN for those of you into the technical aspects.  Basically what you need to know is that DX9 and 10 with both support the shorter pipeline for graphics rendering possibly providing more FPS on older cards.  Multithreading and a better use of resources will also back-port to older cards that support DX9 and 10.

Those of you who suffer from the upgrade bug like me will get the most benefit.  The only game in town right now for Directx 11 is AMD/ATI's fantastic 5xxx series.  The 5750, 5770, 5850 and 5870 are all out right now and all support the fantastic eye candy you see in the above video.   Their upcoming dual-GPU cards (5970 and 5950, renamed from last generations 4870x2 and 4850x2) will also support DX11 out of the box.  If you insist on holding out for Nvidia you still have a bit of a wait.  Don't expect DX11 cards from the green guys until mid-to-late January at the earliest. 



Graphically you can expect a much more significant change from 10 to 11 than you did from 9 -10.  The new tessellation feature is one of the most notable features which is something you see within the video providing a huge bump in detail in the polygons.  The new C shader will allow for better access to the shader pipeline on the physics front and for stream processing which will also make it easier to add effects after the fact.  Shader model 5 is the next generation of graphical rendering and will also be included.

So what about the games?  Right now Battleforge supports DX11 and later this year Dirt 2 will as well.  Aliens Vs. Predator and Crysis 2 expected out early next year will also allow for those graphical enhancements previously mentioned.  There are various other games like LotRO which will support it as well as D&D Online.  You can expect more and more games to be added to the list as it is quite easy to change over from DX10 to 11 even mid-development of pretty much any game.

As of right now the game support is still a bit thin but that is always the case with new hardware support.  The good news is that you don't need DX 11 hardware or games to make use of some of the new features and potentially see improvements. 

Here a couple more previews for those you with the itch to learn more about the future of PC graphics.  I realize it make take some cool new software like AVP or Crysis 2 ( see CryEngine 3 in action here) to get everyone really fired up for DX 11 but in the mean time the new features are certainly spectacular on the software and hardware front. 

I have a feeling that DirectX 11 won't be as "skippable" as DirectX 10 was for many of you.  How many games can you name with full DX 10 support besides Crysis without looking it up?  I could only name 8 and I image many of you won't get that far.  DX 10, partly due to Vista, just didn't take off like many hoped.  Hopefully this time around things changes as 11 is a massive step up from the previous generation.