Here we go~!http://dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=4442It seems Nvidia is leading the charge this time with a mid-November release of the first DX10 Video cards. They say it will be a 'hard launch' (whatever that means) as the cards are being manufactured at this moment. We're still going to need Vista to take advantage of the new cards, so the real hurry (right now) might be to hurry up and WAIT. If you are thinking about a new Vcard, the next 2 months might be a very profitable time to do nothing at all.Use the time to save up for a new power supply. These big dogs are going to need 400 watts, just for the card. Up grade a Dell or a 'Box/PS combo' homebuilt . . . and expect an erratically frustrating blue screen'd experience! And it will only happen with the PMDG airplane because this airplane will continue to be the biggest add-on for the sim. Laptop guys, I have it on good authority a mobile DX10 V-chip will be out in the January time frame. Keep that power dry. The new Santa Rosa mobile platform will be out about then too. This new mobile platform will bump the existing 667 mhz FSB to 800 mhz. The current 945 mobile chip set platform was never intended to be more than a stop-gap measure. It was simply the existing mobile Core Duo socket they could just drop in Core 2 Duos. Along with the FSB boost, the biggest deal I see in the Santa Rosa mobile platform is NAND type ram (like your Ipod has). This will be non-volatile ram that will assist with boot, program -- and in-flight scenery? -- load times. The platform will even allow you to plug in a thumb drive to supplement this NAND functionality. Mainstream, solid- state hard drives can't be far off now. Thank goodness! (By the time megascenery loads, my audience is generally soouuuund asleep.)For the desktops, that quad core is scheduled for a mid-November release too. Note that the Aces (FSX) guys were careful not to specify dual core functionality, They always said multi-core functionality. If you only buy a system every 2-3 years like me, wait for the quad. This dual core is also, nothing but a stop-gap. My impression is that 4 cores are going to be the magic number for at least a year, or two, or more. I'm waiting for the mainstream quad core that will be introduced in January. It will be the identical $1000 super-duper, X-treeeeme Quad core they'll pitch in November . . . just with a different speed-rate stamp and a $300-400 price tag. These guys . . . It's always hard to know when to jump in, but the next 3-4 months are going to see more huge leaps. I'm gonna wait, just a little bit longer.

I posted about this in the general forum but here goes again - Quad Core is not going to help you for FSX. FSX only uses multiple cores for a very small part of the engine - terrain loading. It's possible that other games like Crysis or whatever may benefit from more cores, but I think a lot of people are expecting the gains to be far more than they actually will be. I see almost no difference between the single and dual core versions of FarCry or Quake 4 here for instance... This isn't going to be some sort of magic thing that you buy and all your games suddenly run maxed at sky high FPS.Same goes for other supposed tactics like 4GB of RAM, Quad SLI etc... it's all marketing gimmicks at this point because no one is writing software specifically for any of this stuff yet.

True nuf . . for what we have now. However, while a myopic,

That's Intels hype...ACES isn't going to go out of there way to provide better multi-core support. Frankly, there is way too much hype out there already. Especially with Vista, DX10, etc etc, in the end, it just won't be as good as everybody is saying.

any word on a VISTA re-lease date?

As of 3 days ago, Vista for corporate clients was scheduled to be release before the end of the year. The retail version for the masses is currently scheduled for January. There is also much speculation that the delivery dates will be delayed again.Considering that DX10 cards are not compatible with any operating system except VISTA, we are at least 4 or 5 months away from the magic bullet. :)

Wait, DX10 cards won't work on Windows XP? So what youre saying is, these cards released next month are pointless because the OS required won't be out til next year? Are you sure youre not mistaken?

>Wait, DX10 cards won't work on Windows XP? So what youre>saying is, these cards released next month are pointless>because the OS required won't be out til next year? Are you>sure youre not mistaken?The cards will be backwards compatible with XP, however DX10 won't be released until Vista is out. So basically, there is no rush to get these cards, as the advantage of DX10 won't exist until next year.- John

>That's Intels hype...ACES isn't going to go out of there way>to provide better multi-core support. Frankly, there is way>too much hype out there already. Especially with Vista, DX10,>etc etc, in the end, it just won't be as good as everybody is>saying. Actually, I heard at AVSIM with my own two ears the ACES team members talk about improving multi-core support, not in FSXI, but in FSX.Now, multithreaded programming is HARD, particularly when you are trying to do a fairly sychronous task like a simulation, but there are activities in FS (weather modelling, terraing generation, some ATC tasks) that can be coupled more loosely than others. Mission processing, anything connecting via SimConnect (think of the FMC) can all benefit from multiple cores.The general advice to get the best bang for your buck has been, still is, and always will be:Buy the first stable product you can for new technology - you pay a premium but you enjoy it longer; ORBuy only commodity products towards the end of their life, for lowest cost.The first option generally means you spend more per buy but perform fewer buys. The second is less per buy but more buys. Total cost over many years works out relatively equal, but the folks in the first camp seem to have more fun.Best wishes,

Quad Core demo from IDF: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DetnKgOxrSI...related&search=

Thats an awsome video!!!Ron