If you are, maybe you can explain to me what it is all about and why I should care?
I spend a fair amount of money making sure that my PC games look great, but the move to dx10 is particularly big: you need to install Windows Vista AND new hardware. *ouch*
With such a big investment involved, I find myself asking why? What is so different about dx10? Why do I need new video hardware for it?
To be honest, I am having a surprisingly difficult time answering those two questions. The only evidence out there that you need dx10 is Crysis - the single dx10 game everyone is raving out. (Note: single game.)
As far as I can tell, dx10 fundamentally changes the traditional graphics pipeline and how pixel and vertex shading is done. Since video card hardware is built to perform regular software algorithm's very quickly, changing the algorithm enough means that you need new hardware. That makes sense but I still want to understand the changes better as whether ATI and Nvidia are doing the same thing.
And there is still a big question in the air: Will people move to Vista/DX10 or will it flop?
Games are built for the largest install base in order to drive sales. How well are games going to do on a system that has few customers yet, namely Vista? How are they going to handle the huge install base of DX9 customers who do not have DX10 hardware? How will they support both DX9 and DX10 in the same games?
Microsoft built it, but will they come? If the only games are Halo2 and Crysis, probably not - at least for a year or more until the install base is larger or it is time for your next PC upgrade anyway.
