05-11-2004, 12:00 AM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Not Everyone Will See Longhorn In Its Full Glory
"The next version of Windows will sport some fancy, three-dimensional graphics, but for those with an older video card, Longhorn will look a lot like Windows 2000. That's because with Longhorn, Microsoft plans to offer three different graphical interfaces, each requiring a different level of graphics card.
...The top-of-the-line interface, code-named "Aero Glass," will have transparency and other advanced three-dimensional shading features but will demand a high-end video card with at least 64MB of video memory. The midlevel "Aero" interface will offer most of the improved graphics abilities and will require just 32MB of video memory. Both Aero and Aero Glass will also require DirectX 9.0 support, AGP 4X for external graphics cards and a Longhorn graphics driver."
Personally, I'll for this - I'd love to be able to take advantage of the powerful 3D card I have in my computer for something other than just playing games. Giving Windows users an enhanced GUI experience if they have the hardware to make it work is a fantastic idea, and the concept of scaling back the GUI for users of less capable machines means no one is left out of using the OS.
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