Please check this out:
http://images.autodesk.com/adsk/files/autodesk_vista_wp.v5(lowres).pdf
Regretfully it comes from a leading first-class 3D software developer.
Now OpenGL is no longer suitable? How come? Do they get paid to say that? What about Mac, Linux, and SGI workstations? MS wants to just kill every non-Vista machine out there, and every non-Direct3D WHQL compliant card?
Did u get my point dude? Read page 15 of the link I gave.
I agree that D3D is more stable and reliable nowadays with the recent versions 9 & 10, and wit the new hardware commitment to D3D, but should that rule out OpenGL? Why don;t we do some architectural change on the driver side, not the specification?
Regretfully it comes from a leading first-class 3D software developer.
First class? I can’t speak for Autodesk’s other products, but 3dsmax is one of the buggiest software I have ever used. I doubt I’m the first nor the last to dump it for that reason. Maybe they should re-brand it again. 
If Autodesk teams up with MS, well good for them. They decide to jump into the Vista hellhole, good riddance.
I’m not all that worried. As long as there are non-MS platforms, there will always be place for OpenGL, even if it takes another few years for the next spec. You can’t beat ‘cross platform’.
I am worried about what MS may be doing behind the scenes to disturb GL progress (think IP). Those are just rumors, but given extends of the ISO MSOOXML corruption scandal, it seems not that unlikely at all. That and MS being a tried and convicted criminal monopolist organization…
Well, if the guys can’t code…
What D3D10 offers now is a pretty much similar to what OpenGL has been since version 1.4. It’s converging to OpenGL, and with the IHVs support, or lets say easier to write to drivers, it’s dominating only and only Windows “Vista.” I had to worry about writing two rendering paths, GL and D3D9, now add to the list D3D10…just to support Vista. The problem is that new hardware is measured against D3D10, or lets say standardized to it, so we cannot use it unless we downgrade to Vista.
I stick to OpenGL, and if it does not work then it’s IHVs’ not OpenGL.
One responsibility we should take is changing the way IHVs write their OpenGL drivers, so they write drivers not implementation. This can be achieved by a unified/standard GL context interface similar to what Mac does.
TicTacToe!
So does this mean openGL will have to introduce bold new ideas in order to compete? i am voting for raytracing in openGL 3.2, even if it runs in software mode.
But i will have to agree that releasing 3.0 and 3.1 sooner rather than later will be a big step in stopping the DX10 expansion all but dead in it’s tracks.
The 3.x versions (and possibly 4.0 too) will be based on the same fresh new toolset and that has to be worth something.
Even if the release GL 5.0 it will not help the situation, if not making it worse, because the IHVs have to write more decent and comprehensive drivers…First lets get the GL Context/Windowing system interface/manager unified and driver-based, instead of implementation then we can talk about competition. Otherwise if this is the situation, myself will be switching to D3D for everything…in the end we need stability and something working consistently. I could write my own Golden solid API specification and implement all the functions as empty (void), and say this is the standard but we need good implementation, so what the heck? We need somthin workin.
"OpenGL graphics standard has served the industry for many years, it is no longer the dominant player. "
pfft. At least they ADMIT to ownage after MS faked benchmarks, etc. Same old tricks.
“Direct3D graphics hardware has a wide price range, starting as low as $25. In contrast, OpenGL requires expensive workstation hardware with prices beginning at $500.”
What??
I notice the word “reliable” is never used. 
I’ve never ever ever seen OGL cause a BSOD, but that has been a display mode feature of DX9. THE debug path.
SOMEbody got some payola.
Nonetheless after I had a go on D3D10, it’s amazingly funny how they move the API…it looks to me none-sense, what about Caps bits they took out? Do we expect the HW to just support what D3D10 has access to, and if the HW offers more, then we cannot because D3D10 cannot?
And what a big change? The just re-worded phrases and the way we pass parameters…
Now to the topic, cannot we just make OpenGL more reliable?
With the latest GF7x00 drivers, published a month ago, my OpenGL code runs at 1/3 FPS than before, DX9 games at 50-75%. Has happened to me before on ATi cards, when I was coding DX9 stuff mostly. So I don’t really trust 3D API benchmarks. I only trust the general approach of 2 FIFOs vs ring0-transition.
I’ve also read artists complain about drivers breaking other opengl2-accelerated 3D modelers besides 3dsmax.
But just last night happened on a review of nv8800 vs ati2900 running LostPlanet in DX10, where on one card thousands of polygons were just missing from the screen, and on the other - post-processing effects were gone.
And anyway, I think ATi is to blame for their negligence on OpenGL. If they had on-par support in winXP, I think gamedevs wouldn’t all jump into DX9 [which concentrated all support onto DX].
Anyway being an GF user and not having to support Rxxx, I’m a happy camper with my research into HP graphics with OpenGL :). Even if the API is huge and looks cluttered.
From DirectX SDK:
Use of DirectDraw is no longer recommended. With the release of Direct3D 9.0, all two-dimensional functionality is contained within Direct3D and its associated helper functions in D3DX. However, the DirectDraw documentation is still available and can be viewed on MSDN at DirectDraw.
DirectMusic will maintain its current status until new technology in these areas is made available. DirectMusic documentation can be found at: (SDK Root)\Documentation\DirectX9.
DirectPlay is deprecated, and Microsoft strongly recommends against using it to develop new applications. Game developers should use Windows Sockets (see Windows Sockets) and the Windows Firewall APIs (see Windows Firewall for Game Developers).
DirectShow is no longer recommended for game development. All the
DirectShow components (headers, libraries, utilities, tools, and samples) were removed from the DirectX SDK in the April 2005 release. DirectShow is available in the latest Platform SDK Install.
Now what’s next? Those game developers addicted to using DirectX should expect something like this in the near future:
Direct3D is deprecated and no longer supported. We recommend using OpenGL instead
DirectSound is deprecated and no longer supported. We recommend using OpenAL instead
DirectInput…same…use Win32 API system calls, they just work fine
The same gonna happen with .NET, remember this!
No, DirectX is being replaced with the XBox API (no idea how it’s called). And DirectInput is already replaced by XInput, and it’s there just to support legacy devices.
That’s the way the new Direct3D “Tech level“ system works. If you can create a device for a tech level (currently 10 and 10.1) anything that is part of this level will work.
It’s right that you lose some flexibility with this approach. But you can be more certain that your software works with the available hardware. With the caps system you could never be sure that a new card will provide the caps you need.
It’s a little bit more.
The resource management is somewhat changed and the state management get’s a total rework. That’s one of the reasons why Direct3D 9 engines that are simply ported to 10 doesn’t work that well.
That’s unlikely as Direct3D is Microsoft’s way to access GPUs. Maybe they will rename it in the future if GPGPU becomes more poplar.
DirectSound functionality is already mostly replaced with XACT and XAudio.
For mouse and keyboard events it is already recommend using Win32 functions. On Windows NT based systems DirectInput use these functions internal, too. DirectInput is only recommend for gamepads, joysticks,… that are not compatible with the common controller standard (XBox 360). For this kind of controllers you should use XInput.
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