Windows 7 graphics cards

[Izzie Castea]

My family is going to convert over to Windows 7, and the graphics card we have does not meet the specs for the Aero? Any recommends for graphic cards that do meet the specs for the Windows 7 Aero theme?

[trezoid]

pick a currently available graphics card. that will support aero. if you want to game or something like that, you will need to be more specific as to what games.

[Minion4Hire]

Ideally you'd be looking for a DirectX 11 compatible graphics card. There aren't many available at the moment, but the Radeon 5750 is the least expensive option right now. Of course if you don't intend to do much of anything as far as gaming goes, most any graphics card released in the last year will be fine. You really don't need much just to run Aero.

[Crucible of Man]

You should only look for a DX11 GPU if you are planning on playing high end games. Just aim for a PCI Express graphics card with at least 128mb of ram, you'll be able to run windows 7 fine. An nVidia GeForce 7800 or newer, or ATI HD 2000 or newer should more than suffice. However if you are planning on playing graphics, what the retard who suggested a DX11 card didn't tell you, you'll need PCI Express 2.0 slot, which means odds are you'll have to upgrade your motherboard. And the DX11 cards are so buggy and expensive right now, you should wait at least 6 months. Especially because they are already working on DX11 updates, which current DX11 cards will not support.

Futhermore, There are only 2 DX11 games out right now... and not many coming out in the future. Look at the list see if you're interested in any of them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_DirectX_11_support

Only one that looks interesting in my eyes so far is Crysis 2 and it's not even going to be released until mid to late 2010 or early 2011... So really, what's the point?

[Minion4Hire]

Illusive Consensus

what the retard who suggested a DX11 card didn't tell you, you'll need PCI Express 2.0 slot, which means odds are you'll have to upgrade your motherboard. And the DX11 cards are so buggy and expensive right now, you should wait at least 6 months. Especially because they are already working on DX11 updates, which current DX11 cards will not support.

.......go away.

He doesn't NEED PCIe 2.0 as 2.0 cards are compatible with 1.x slots and vice-versa. ATI's 5xxx series cards are NOT buggy, and there has NEVER been a card which was designed for one revision of DirectX that met all of the requirements of the revision to follow it. The GPU manufacturer would need omniscience to pull that off.

Just.... shut up and leave. Please.

[Minion4Hire]

Illusive Consensus

Futhermore, There are only 2 DX11 games out right now... and not many coming out in the future. Look at the list see if you're interested in any of them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_DirectX_11_support

Only one that looks interesting in my eyes so far is Crysis 2 and it's not even going to be released until mid to late 2010 or early 2011... So really, what's the point?

You're bitching about the fact that a DirectX standard which is VERY new hasn't had games released which supports it? WTF are you on? Of course there aren't games for it yet; it's a NEW standard.

DX11 has a lot of advantages over DX10, the most prominent being increased CPU parallelism, tesselation, and the compute shader. Look it up. Learn yourself some knowledge.

[Crucible of Man]

Minion4Hire

Illusive Consensus

Futhermore, There are only 2 DX11 games out right now... and not many coming out in the future. Look at the list see if you're interested in any of them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_DirectX_11_support

Only one that looks interesting in my eyes so far is Crysis 2 and it's not even going to be released until mid to late 2010 or early 2011... So really, what's the point?

You're bitching about the fact that a DirectX standard which is VERY new hasn't had games released which supports it? WTF are you on? Of course there aren't games for it yet; it's a NEW standard.

DX11 has a lot of advantages over DX10, the most prominent being increased CPU parallelism, tesselation, and the compute shader. Look it up. Learn yourself some knowledge.

You are arguing over semantics. Not everyone needs a super mega powerful machine. I am not arguing rather it was standardized, in fact I agreed with you buy suggesting he get it if he's a gamer, if he's not it's completely unnessesary. What you fail to realize, is that not everybody can afford a 400 dollar video card (go on run to newegg and find me a cheaper one, I'm sure there are plenty I just threw out a number) All he wants to do is run Aero, he doesn't need a PCI-E 2.0 card for that. If he's a gamer, sure, go for it. But why waste a large sum of money on a card he might not ever even use. Even if his computer can't support it. Furhtermore, how do you know what kind of motherboard and ram he has? if he wants to spend all that money on a bad a** video card, he should be able to back it up with the ram and processor. If you know how the hardware works instead of just the basics, "what is good" then you'd know that the GPU can only go as fast as the processor allows, especially when divided between the north and south bridge chipsets.

So please, don't preach to me and act all high and mighty like you've been in the business for 13 years like I have. Because frankly, all he wants to do is get aero running. If he can run DX11 games, then he should get a DX11 card. But I sure hope the rest of his hardware can support the games as well. If he's running a simple Core 2 duo, or equal or lesser AMD processor, then he needs to upgrade to an i7 because hey, 4 cores that are hyper threaded are better than two cores right? Oh, and of course he needs DDR3, because hey, it's about a million times faster. And why stop at one video card, when he could get a mobo that supports three in SLI/Cross Fire, shoot, lets go ahead and build a 10,000 dollar computer so he can just run Aero.

[Crucible of Man]

Minion4Hire

Illusive Consensus

what the retard who suggested a DX11 card didn't tell you, you'll need PCI Express 2.0 slot, which means odds are you'll have to upgrade your motherboard. And the DX11 cards are so buggy and expensive right now, you should wait at least 6 months. Especially because they are already working on DX11 updates, which current DX11 cards will not support.

.......go away.

He doesn't NEED PCIe 2.0 as 2.0 cards are compatible with 1.x slots and vice-versa. ATI's 5xxx series cards are NOT buggy, and there has NEVER been a card which was designed for one revision of DirectX that met all of the requirements of the revision to follow it. The GPU manufacturer would need omniscience to pull that off.

Just.... shut up and leave. Please.

It is backward compatible, sure. But you also have to remember, what is the point of having a DX11 card if you can't even use all the common DX11 commands? The card has to be able to communicate directly to the chipset to use the functionality or else it will only be half speed, making the point moot.

[Minion4Hire]

Illusive Consensus

Minion4Hire

Illusive Consensus

Futhermore, There are only 2 DX11 games out right now... and not many coming out in the future. Look at the list see if you're interested in any of them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_DirectX_11_support

Only one that looks interesting in my eyes so far is Crysis 2 and it's not even going to be released until mid to late 2010 or early 2011... So really, what's the point?

You're bitching about the fact that a DirectX standard which is VERY new hasn't had games released which supports it? WTF are you on? Of course there aren't games for it yet; it's a NEW standard.

DX11 has a lot of advantages over DX10, the most prominent being increased CPU parallelism, tesselation, and the compute shader. Look it up. Learn yourself some knowledge.

You are arguing over semantics. Not everyone needs a super mega powerful machine. I am not arguing rather it was standardized, in fact I agreed with you buy suggesting he get it if he's a gamer, if he's not it's completely unnessesary. What you fail to realize, is that not everybody can afford a 400 dollar video card (go on run to newegg and find me a cheaper one, I'm sure there are plenty I just threw out a number) All he wants to do is run Aero, he doesn't need a PCI-E 2.0 card for that. If he's a gamer, sure, go for it. But why waste a large sum of money on a card he might not ever even use. Even if his computer can't support it. Furhtermore, how do you know what kind of motherboard and ram he has? if he wants to spend all that money on a bad a** video card, he should be able to back it up with the ram and processor. If you know how the hardware works instead of just the basics, "what is good" then you'd know that the GPU can only go as fast as the processor allows, especially when divided between the north and south bridge chipsets.

You clearly have only the slightest clue of what you're talking about.

First off, I recommended a DX11 card if he's a gamer. If he's not, I literally said "most any graphics card" would be fine.

Second, gaming performance is GPU dependent. It all comes down to graphics. Your processor can play a part, but the VAST majority of the time you will be bottlenecked by your graphics card long before your processor. Memory doesn't really play into it. Moving from 1066MHz DDR3 to 2000MHz DDR3 will generally net you a 3% performance improvement when it comes to gaming. Games simply aren't sensitive to memory latency or bandwidth because MOST of the work is being done on the graphics card, and unless its frame buffer is retardedly small memory simply won't be tapped. And I don't know why the ******** you're bringing south bridge anything into the discussion. The only purpose the south bridge serves these days is to add additional I/O and will not have any real impact on any level of performance.

Illusive Consensus

So please, don't preach to me and act all high and mighty like you've been in the business for 13 years like I have.

Fun, cause.. I have been....

Illusive Consensus

Because frankly, all he wants to do is get aero running. If he can run DX11 games, then he should get a DX11 card. But I sure hope the rest of his hardware can support the games as well. If he's running a simple Core 2 duo, or equal or lesser AMD processor, then he needs to upgrade to an i7 because hey, 4 cores that are hyper threaded are better than two cores right? Oh, and of course he needs DDR3, because hey, it's about a million times faster. And why stop at one video card, when he could get a mobo that suppors three in SLI/Cross Fire, shoot, lets go ahead and build a 10,000 dollar computer so he can just run Aero.

A $150 graphics card is not obscene, especially when it taps into a wide array of features that is surely to be heavily utilized in the future. He needs a new graphics card; why not buy something that will not only last a while but improve his overall feature set?

Illusive Consensus

It is backward compatible, sure. But you also have to remember, what is the point of having a DX11 card if you can't even use all the common DX11 commands? The card has to be able to communicate directly to the chipset to use the functionality or else it will only be half speed, making the point moot.

????

Again, what are you on? Communicate with the chipset? The only real difference between PCIe 1.x and 2.0 is bandwidth. Bandwidth that he won't need unless he purchases some ridiculously high end cards. Which the 5750 isn't.

[The Last Rydian]

Illusive Consensus

So please, don't preach to me and act all high and mighty like you've been in the business for 13 years like I have.

When you're dealing with the idiots in positions above you at work, tossing out things like that may impress them, but when it comes to actually solving an issue and giving good advice, what ACTUALLY MATTERS is whether you're right or not.

[Sensorium139]

Illusive Consensus

You should only look for a DX11 GPU if you are planning on playing high end games. Just aim for a PCI Express graphics card with at least 128mb of ram, you'll be able to run windows 7 fine. An nVidia GeForce 7800 or newer, or ATI HD 2000 or newer should more than suffice. However if you are planning on playing graphics, what the retard who suggested a DX11 card didn't tell you, you'll need PCI Express 2.0 slot, which means odds are you'll have to upgrade your motherboard. And the DX11 cards are so buggy and expensive right now, you should wait at least 6 months. Especially because they are already working on DX11 updates, which current DX11 cards will not support.

Futhermore, There are only 2 DX11 games out right now... and not many coming out in the future. Look at the list see if you're interested in any of them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_DirectX_11_support

Only one that looks interesting in my eyes so far is Crysis 2 and it's not even going to be released until mid to late 2010 or early 2011... So really, what's the point?

Ok, I'm not kidding, you listen to good music (dude we both have user names with songs from the same band...) , but you're really not sure what you're talking about.

PCIE x16 is the most recent, ok? And if this person has new enough mobos and good enough psus it'd be in their best interest to get DX 11 graphics cards neutral .

In case you forgot, Windows 7 hasn't been out long enough for many games to be made that use DX11 .

[iashleyxt]

nerd, JKAY!