Why is my video card not upto snuff?

[YKhan]

ATI has a link to tester applet that accumulates your hardware info and
determines Vista readiness. It has three levels of worthiness: Minimum,
Recommended, and Optimal. Check it out here:

Windows Vista™ - Are You Windows Vista Ready? eula
http://ati.amd.com/technology/windowsvista/AreYouVistaReady.html

Anyways, I ran the applet on a number of my computers, and the only one
really ready to go Vista is my desktop. Not surprisingly, my laptops
are not, one just barely passes by minimum, and other one doesn't even
get that far.

No big deal, I'd only be interested in maybe putting it on my desktop
anyways. Okay, so according to the applet, my desktop breezes by
Minimum & Recommended, but stops just short of Optimal. So I checked
the report out, and the only reason it wasn't passed was because of my
video card (every other component passed, including CPU). The
interesting thing is that the video card passed all of the video card
tests, but it was still rejected. It passed all of the following tests:

(1) video ram (Required - 256MB): yes, 512MB
(2) video card 3D acceleration (Required - yes): yes
(3) video card HW transform & lighting (Required - yes): yes
(4) video card vertex shader ver. (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0
(5) video card pixel shader ver (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0

So it came out to yes on all of the video tests, but still not given an
overall pass on video. Now the video card I have is a Saffire ATI
X1600XT mid-range card. I know that's not the top of the line GPU, but
considering that the program passed my video card in every video test
that it listed, but still failed it overall, I gotta wonder if it's got
some hidden internal hard-coded criteria that says it will not pass any
mid-range cards, no matter what.

I'd be interested in seeing how many of your video cards pass every
test but still get failed.

Yousuf Khan

 

[pigdos]

A 3d accelerator card required for an OS, ridiculous. Absolutely frickin'
ridiculous. Linux just looks better and better.

If Linux had more PC gaming titles I'd dump MS in a second...

--
Doug
ATI has a link to tester applet that accumulates your hardware info and
determines Vista readiness. It has three levels of worthiness: Minimum,
Recommended, and Optimal. Check it out here:

Windows VistaT - Are You Windows Vista Ready? eula
http://ati.amd.com/technology/windowsvista/AreYouVistaReady.html

Anyways, I ran the applet on a number of my computers, and the only one
really ready to go Vista is my desktop. Not surprisingly, my laptops
are not, one just barely passes by minimum, and other one doesn't even
get that far.

No big deal, I'd only be interested in maybe putting it on my desktop
anyways. Okay, so according to the applet, my desktop breezes by
Minimum & Recommended, but stops just short of Optimal. So I checked
the report out, and the only reason it wasn't passed was because of my
video card (every other component passed, including CPU). The
interesting thing is that the video card passed all of the video card
tests, but it was still rejected. It passed all of the following tests:

(1) video ram (Required - 256MB): yes, 512MB
(2) video card 3D acceleration (Required - yes): yes
(3) video card HW transform & lighting (Required - yes): yes
(4) video card vertex shader ver. (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0
(5) video card pixel shader ver (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0

So it came out to yes on all of the video tests, but still not given an
overall pass on video. Now the video card I have is a Saffire ATI
X1600XT mid-range card. I know that's not the top of the line GPU, but
considering that the program passed my video card in every video test
that it listed, but still failed it overall, I gotta wonder if it's got
some hidden internal hard-coded criteria that says it will not pass any
mid-range cards, no matter what.

I'd be interested in seeing how many of your video cards pass every
test but still get failed.

Yousuf Khan

 

[krw]

ATI has a link to tester applet that accumulates your hardware info and
determines Vista readiness. It has three levels of worthiness: Minimum,
Recommended, and Optimal. Check it out here:

Windows Vista? - Are You Windows Vista Ready? eula
http://ati.amd.com/technology/windowsvista/AreYouVistaReady.html

Anyways, I ran the applet on a number of my computers, and the only one
really ready to go Vista is my desktop. Not surprisingly, my laptops
are not, one just barely passes by minimum, and other one doesn't even
get that far.

Not that I have any intention of going to Vista but My ThinkPad
passes everything but the graphics card and memory (512M, though it
claims 510.4MB). I'm not surprised about the memory because 512MB
is really not enough for XP. I'm only waiting for memory to come
back down out of the stratosphere to upgrade.

No big deal, I'd only be interested in maybe putting it on my desktop
anyways. Okay, so according to the applet, my desktop breezes by
Minimum & Recommended, but stops just short of Optimal. So I checked
the report out, and the only reason it wasn't passed was because of my
video card (every other component passed, including CPU). The
interesting thing is that the video card passed all of the video card
tests, but it was still rejected. It passed all of the following tests:

(1) video ram (Required - 256MB): yes, 512MB
(2) video card 3D acceleration (Required - yes): yes
(3) video card HW transform & lighting (Required - yes): yes
(4) video card vertex shader ver. (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0
(5) video card pixel shader ver (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0

Same here.

- Video RAM: Required - 256 MB , You have - 256.0 MB
- Video Card 3D Acceleration: Required - Yes , You have - Yes
- Video HW Transform & Lighting: Required - Yes , You have - Yes
- Vertex Shader Ver.: Required - 3.0 , You have - 3.0
- Pixel Shader Ver.: Required - 3.0 , You have - 3.0

So it came out to yes on all of the video tests, but still not given an
overall pass on video. Now the video card I have is a Saffire ATI
X1600XT mid-range card. I know that's not the top of the line GPU, but
considering that the program passed my video card in every video test
that it listed, but still failed it overall, I gotta wonder if it's got
some hidden internal hard-coded criteria that says it will not pass any
mid-range cards, no matter what.

Mine is an ATI Radeon X1300, which isn't top-end either but it's a
(business) laptop not a gaming system.

 

[Crispy Critter]

ATI has a link to tester applet that accumulates your hardware info and
determines Vista readiness. It has three levels of worthiness: Minimum,
Recommended, and Optimal. Check it out here:

Windows Vista™ - Are You Windows Vista Ready? eula
http://ati.amd.com/technology/windowsvista/AreYouVistaReady.html

Anyways, I ran the applet on a number of my computers, and the only one
really ready to go Vista is my desktop. Not surprisingly, my laptops
are not, one just barely passes by minimum, and other one doesn't even
get that far.

No big deal, I'd only be interested in maybe putting it on my desktop
anyways. Okay, so according to the applet, my desktop breezes by
Minimum & Recommended, but stops just short of Optimal. So I checked
the report out, and the only reason it wasn't passed was because of my
video card (every other component passed, including CPU). The
interesting thing is that the video card passed all of the video card
tests, but it was still rejected. It passed all of the following tests:

(1) video ram (Required - 256MB): yes, 512MB
(2) video card 3D acceleration (Required - yes): yes
(3) video card HW transform & lighting (Required - yes): yes
(4) video card vertex shader ver. (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0
(5) video card pixel shader ver (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0

So it came out to yes on all of the video tests, but still not given an
overall pass on video. Now the video card I have is a Saffire ATI
X1600XT mid-range card. I know that's not the top of the line GPU, but
considering that the program passed my video card in every video test
that it listed, but still failed it overall, I gotta wonder if it's got
some hidden internal hard-coded criteria that says it will not pass any
mid-range cards, no matter what.

I'd be interested in seeing how many of your video cards pass every
test but still get failed.

Yousuf Khan

It's probably because your video card is not Directx10 compliant. DX10 will
use PS 4.0. All newer cards out now only support PS 3.0. This is only
important if you are going to run DX10 games on Vista.

 

[Douglas Bollinger]

A 3d accelerator card required for an OS, ridiculous. Absolutely frickin'
ridiculous. Linux just looks better and better.

You won't need a 3D card to run Vista.

If you use a composition manager like Beryl or Compiz you will need a 3D
card in Linux as well. Oh the horrors!

If Linux had more PC gaming titles I'd dump MS in a second...

Just buy a console and get it over with. Except for a few exceptions like
WoW, most of the big games are being developed for the consoles anyway.

 

[DRS]

ATI has a link to tester applet that accumulates your hardware info
and determines Vista readiness. It has three levels of worthiness:
Minimum, Recommended, and Optimal. Check it out here:

Windows VistaT - Are You Windows Vista Ready? eula
http://ati.amd.com/technology/windowsvista/AreYouVistaReady.html

[...]

It's probably because your video card is not Directx10 compliant.
DX10 will use PS 4.0. All newer cards out now only support PS 3.0.
This is only important if you are going to run DX10 games on Vista.

Given that there are no released DX10 cards then no card could pass, which
is clearly ridiculous.

According to the Microsoft Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor
(http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/upgradeadvisor/default.mspx)
my 7800GT is just fine.

 

[Crispy Critter]

Given that there are no released DX10 cards then no card could pass, which
is clearly ridiculous.

I have a 7900GT and am trying to run the ATI advisor now but the damn thing
just sits there saying downloading and stuck on the first blue box. No data
packets are transferring between my PC and theirs.

 

[Crispy Critter]

I just realized it isn't working for me because I'm running under a limited
user account. I'm not going to lower my security to run it either. My
system ran Vista fine anyway.

 

[YKhan]

Not that I have any intention of going to Vista but My ThinkPad
passes everything but the graphics card and memory (512M, though it
claims 510.4MB). I'm not surprised about the memory because 512MB
is really not enough for XP. I'm only waiting for memory to come
back down out of the stratosphere to upgrade.

Yes, I tested it on my Thinkpad T42, and it was the one laptop that
didn't pass even by minimum requirements. The Thinkpad had an older
non-integrated ATI graphics core, something in the Radeon 9000-series
range.

My Gateway laptop, which has a newer ATI integrated graphics core
(Radeon Express 200M IGP, I think it was equivalent to an X1100 desktop
series) did pass the minimum, but not the recommended nor optimal
levels. The funny thing is my Gateway is marked by a "Vista Ready"
sticker, but it's only minimally ready.

Same here.

- Video RAM: Required - 256 MB , You have - 256.0 MB
- Video Card 3D Acceleration: Required - Yes , You have - Yes
- Video HW Transform & Lighting: Required - Yes , You have - Yes
- Vertex Shader Ver.: Required - 3.0 , You have - 3.0
- Pixel Shader Ver.: Required - 3.0 , You have - 3.0

So I assume that yours didn't pass Optimal on the video tests either?

Yousuf Khan

 

[YKhan]

It's probably because your video card is not Directx10 compliant. DX10 will
use PS 4.0. All newer cards out now only support PS 3.0. This is only
important if you are going to run DX10 games on Vista.

Yeah, but the applet says the Optimum level of shader model is 3.0, not
4.0. There are no cards on the market that do 4.0 yet, not even the
highest ones.

Yousuf Khan

 

[krw]

Yes, I tested it on my Thinkpad T42, and it was the one laptop that
didn't pass even by minimum requirements. The Thinkpad had an older
non-integrated ATI graphics core, something in the Radeon 9000-series
range.

Mine is a T60 (2623), BTW.

My Gateway laptop, which has a newer ATI integrated graphics core
(Radeon Express 200M IGP, I think it was equivalent to an X1100 desktop
series) did pass the minimum, but not the recommended nor optimal
levels. The funny thing is my Gateway is marked by a "Vista Ready"
sticker, but it's only minimally ready.




So I assume that yours didn't pass Optimal on the video tests either?

Correct.

The other thing that kinda got me was the light CPU requirements.

 

[pigdos]

Nothing like posting mis-information. According to
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/capable.mspx:

Windows Vista Capable PC includes at least:
a.. A modern processor (at least 800MHz1).
b.. 512 MB of system memory.
c.. A graphics processor that is DirectX 9 capable.
DirectX 9 capable (translation: a 3d accelerated video card).

 

[DRS]

Nothing like posting mis-information. According to
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/capable.mspx:

Windows Vista Capable PC includes at least:
a.. A modern processor (at least 800MHz1).
b.. 512 MB of system memory.
c.. A graphics processor that is DirectX 9 capable.
DirectX 9 capable (translation: a 3d accelerated video card).

That's true but the requirements for the "Basic user experience" are very
modest, so much so an FX5200 is deemed Vista-ready.

 

[Douglas Bollinger]

Nothing like posting mis-information. According to
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/capable.mspx:

Windows Vista Capable PC includes at least:
a.. A modern processor (at least 800MHz1).
b.. 512 MB of system memory.
c.. A graphics processor that is DirectX 9 capable.
DirectX 9 capable (translation: a 3d accelerated video card).

I don't think you are correct. Here's another page stating all that is
required is a SVGA capable GPU:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/systemrequirements.mspx

And the Wikipedia article here:

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

states:

"Windows Vista's "Basic" and "Classic" interfaces will work with virtually
any graphics hardware that supports Windows XP or 2000; accordingly, most
discussion around Vista's graphics requirements centers on those for the
Windows Aero interface."

Aero might require 3D support, but other display modes are usuable within
Vista. C'mon, even Microsoft won't require a server to have a 3D card.

 

[Victor]

ATI has a link to tester applet that accumulates your hardware info and
determines Vista readiness. It has three levels of worthiness: Minimum,
Recommended, and Optimal. Check it out here:

Windows Vista™ - Are You Windows Vista Ready? eula
http://ati.amd.com/technology/windowsvista/AreYouVistaReady.html

Anyways, I ran the applet on a number of my computers, and the only one
really ready to go Vista is my desktop. Not surprisingly, my laptops
are not, one just barely passes by minimum, and other one doesn't even
get that far.

No big deal, I'd only be interested in maybe putting it on my desktop
anyways. Okay, so according to the applet, my desktop breezes by
Minimum & Recommended, but stops just short of Optimal. So I checked
the report out, and the only reason it wasn't passed was because of my
video card (every other component passed, including CPU). The
interesting thing is that the video card passed all of the video card
tests, but it was still rejected. It passed all of the following tests:

(1) video ram (Required - 256MB): yes, 512MB
(2) video card 3D acceleration (Required - yes): yes
(3) video card HW transform & lighting (Required - yes): yes
(4) video card vertex shader ver. (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0
(5) video card pixel shader ver (Required - 3.0): yes, 3.0

So it came out to yes on all of the video tests, but still not given an
overall pass on video. Now the video card I have is a Saffire ATI
X1600XT mid-range card. I know that's not the top of the line GPU, but
considering that the program passed my video card in every video test
that it listed, but still failed it overall, I gotta wonder if it's got
some hidden internal hard-coded criteria that says it will not pass any
mid-range cards, no matter what.

I'd be interested in seeing how many of your video cards pass every
test but still get failed.

Yousuf Khan

geforce go 7800gtx passed

 

[George Macdonald]

I don't think you are correct. Here's another page stating all that is
required is a SVGA capable GPU:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/systemrequirements.mspx

And the Wikipedia article here:

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

states:

"Windows Vista's "Basic" and "Classic" interfaces will work with virtually
any graphics hardware that supports Windows XP or 2000; accordingly, most
discussion around Vista's graphics requirements centers on those for the
Windows Aero interface."

Yeah well that's why they have Good/Better/Best categories for "readiness".

Aero might require 3D support, but other display modes are usuable within
Vista. C'mon, even Microsoft won't require a server to have a 3D card.

Servers are a different issue - video card mfrs do not provide drivers for
Windows Server 2003(32-bit). In fact I believe M$ does not allow it and
provides all drivers themselves. There are drivers for some pretty low-end
cards, PCI even, for Server and hardware acceleration is disabled by
default in the OS.

 

[krw]

geforce go 7800gtx passed

Cut-n-paste the test results. The plot thickens. ;-)

 

[Victor]

Cut-n-paste the test results. The plot thickens. ;-)

Windows Vista
System Requirements Lab Analysis

Video Card
Good: 32 MB 100% DirectX 9 graphic card with Pixel Shader 2.0 hardware
support (ATI Radeon 9500 series or better)
You Have: NVIDIA GeForce Go 7800 GTX (GeForce Go 7800 GTX) PASS
Video Card Features - Minimum attributes of your Video Card Video
RAM: Required - 32 MB , You have - 256.0 MB
Video Card 3D Acceleration: Required - Yes , You have - Yes
Pixel Shader Ver.: Required - 2.0 , You have - 3.0


DirectX Version
Good: 9.0
You Have: 9.0c PASS
CPU
Good: Pentium 3 or Athlon equivalent
You Have: Intel(R) Pentium(R) M processor 2.00GHz PASS
CPU Speed
Good: 800 MHz
You Have: 2.00 GHz Performance Rated at 2.99 GHz PASS
System RAM
Good: 512 MB
You Have: 2.0 GB PASS
Operating System
You have: Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
FYI: Your operating system is provided here for your information.
Sound Card
Good: Yes
You Have: SigmaTel C-Major Audio PASS
Sound Card Driver Version
Your driver version number is: 5.10.0.4255 FYI: Your sound card
driver version is provided for your information, but it is not part of
this analysis. But proper sound card driver versions are important to
the proper operation of your product.
Free Disk Space
Good: 15 GB
Hard Disk Capacity
Good: 20 GB
You Have: 55.8 GB PASS
CD
Good: Yes
You Have: TSSTcorp DVD+-RW TS-L532B PASS, but the Speed could NOT be
analyzed.