Gaming and Vista?

While being satisfied by the cool effects and new interface of Windows Vista Codename Longhorn, many of us testers are what you would call "gamers."The lotof us would like to know if gaming on the default Vista Supplemental drivers would mean loss of graphics quality compared to using up to date drivers on a XP OS. For example, I installed Vista and then installed my trusty game, Battlefield 2. I tried using the new nvidia Vista drivers but the game kept crashing when I start it up. So I reinstalled the Vista Supplemental drivers and it happened to work. Quite interesting. I am able to run the game on default vista drivers and not the nvidia vista drivers. Coming to conclusion,would using the vista drivers result in loss of quality and graphics compared to using up to date drivers on a XP system? Or you can also rephrase it; Would gaming be better on the Vista Beta or XP?

Does anyone know if SLI works on Vista?

Well from what I've been hearing, the 'Ultimate' or final version of Vista is going to have the ability to unload *All* (Although I'm not sure) of the system processes, allowing the game to run in DOS which would make gameplay alot smoother, I myself noticed that battlefield 2 ran just as well as XP if not better...& in such an early stage of devolpment that's impressive, I'm really keeping an eye out for microsoft and some of the new software.

I have heard that you must have a video card which supports DirectX8 or greater. Any truth to that?

I beleave that they said the next DirectX release will drop all legacy support and only support DX8 and up, which would kind of make sense to make room for more improvements. So if thats true then yes, Vista will have the latest DirectX meaning you'll need a GFX card that supports atleast DX8. Once I get Beta 2 I'll start tests with games and such.

I am looking to buy a laptop and the best ones I can find come w/ a Radeon 9600 64Mb, anyone know if that supports DirectX8?

Yes it supports the DirectX8, but I think if you can than buy a faster laptop, with ATI RADEON MOBILITY with 128 MB RAM. Its faster and you don't have to change the laptop in a year.

Yeah but the thing is I want a small latop, and the small ones never really pack a big punch and usually have integrated video.

Aha, so than trie to find a Sony Vaio. I think its the best on market. Fast good, small...

Ya those are expensive tho. I really like Averatec laptops they are kinda new to the markey and some are really sweet, you can even get a hardcore one w/ a P4 3.0Ghz HT and Radeon 9600 in it.

Huhh... it sounds good. Maybe the best is if you have a fast PC at home, and to use a small and slower Sub-Notebook, for works on the "road".