®®® Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 In early 2007 you'll find Windows VISTA beeing rolled out with version 1.0 of Windows Vista Display Driver Model (WDDM). Out of the box and raw in this state it will hopefully feature enhanced stability as advertised in the MS Reference Article about WDDM: In Windows XP, display drivers, which are large and complex, can be a major source of system instability. These drivers execute entirely in kernel mode (i.e., deep in the system code) and hence a single problem in the driver will often force the entire system to reboot. According to the crash analysis data collected during the Windows XP timeframe, display drivers are responsible for up to 20 percent of all blue screens. Thus it became one of the primary goals of Windows Vista to reduce such crashes and provide customers with a more reliable desktop experience while also lowering partner support costs. Reliability is even more important now, as there are mainstream features that require the graphics pipeline to perform efficiently around the clock. The new Desktop Window Manager, which draws onscreen windows, is an example of such a feature. The benefits of experienceng a stable desktop experience, free of redrawing errors, certainly apply to all customers, and not just gamers. At a technical level, WDDM display drivers have two components, a kernel mode driver (KMD) that is very streamlined, and a user-mode driver that does most of the intense computations. With this model, most of the code is moved out of kernel mode. That is, the kernel mode piece is now solely responsible for lower-level functionality and the user mode piece takes on heavier functionality such as facilitating the translation from higher-level API constructs to direct GPU commands while maintaining application compatibility. This greatly reduces the chance of a fatal blue screen and most graphics driver-related problems result in at worst one application being affected. WDDM also provides fault-tolerance against display driver hangs. This enables Windows Vista to detect system hangs and restart the display driver again without the need of a system reboot. Additionally, display drivers in Windows Vista have been significantly simplified by eliminating the need to include code for the support of various device driver interfaces introduced over many years. Thus, Windows Vista implements only a single interface while ensuring that all the older drivers are recognized and function optimally. Here's the official list of mobile NVIDIA GPUs that will have complete WDDM support included in future driver versions for VISTA Final: GeForce Go 7800 GPUs GeForce Go 7600 GPUs GeForce Go 7400 GPUs GeForce Go 7300 GPUs GeForce Go 7200 GPUs GeForce Go 6800 GPUs GeForce Go 6600 GPUs GeForce Go 6400 GPUs GeForce Go 6200 GPUs GeForce Go 6100 GPUs GeForce FX Go5700 GPUs GeForce FX Go5650 GPUs GeForce FX Go5600 GPUs GeForce FX Go5200 GPUs GeForce FX Go5100 GPUs NVIDIA Quadro NVS 300M GPUs NVIDIA Quadro NVS 120M GPUs NVIDIA Quadro NVS 110M GPUs Please keep in mind that only future GPU generation (GeForce Go 8xxx) support the upcoming v2.0 of WDDM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odgregg Posted October 18, 2006 Report Share Posted October 18, 2006 I'm a bit concerned that the GeForce Go 7900 GS in my Toshiba laptop is not on that list :) I only got this particular laptop as it should be able to run Vista well and have good support for the GPU. Perhaps I was wrong. And it's got one of those "Vista Capable" stickers on it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabrice Roux Posted October 19, 2006 Report Share Posted October 19, 2006 1- Follow second link. 2- Click on 7800 family. 3- Feel warm to be "able to see thru windows title bar" in the future. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darith Posted October 20, 2006 Report Share Posted October 20, 2006 Yes, what about the 7900GS?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabrice Roux Posted October 20, 2006 Report Share Posted October 20, 2006 Yes, what about the 7900GS?! *clearing throat* 1- Follow "official list of mobile NVIDIA GPUs" link. 2- Click on 7800 family. 3- Feel warm to be "able to see thru windows title bar" in the future. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.