Vista Aero Glass and ati x1300 - any issues running it?

[Tiger]

Bit confused still after reading alot. T60 with 14xga , 1gb ram and ati x1300 64mb - can it run Vista Aero glass w/o any issues ? I ask because Lenovo and the Ati x1300 sites say it can run Aero with a premium experince, yet Microsoft states that if the video card is dedicated then it needs to be 128mb minimum to run Aero. I understand the integrated cards work fine if you have 1gb of ram. Guess I'm just worried about buying on the eve of Vista being released and do not want to regret my choice. Is it correct that a dedicated card has 64 mb of ram but has available another 196mb of system ram to give it a total available ram of 256mb? Can you share your Vista experinces with the Ati x1300 card ? Thanks and Happy New Year everyone!

[RUSH2112]

I run Aero flawlessly on my GMA950, so I would only assume that you would have no problems.

[csioucs]

I haven't run RTM yet, But on both Beta 1 and Beta 2, several builds, no issues so far. Only with the first ATI Beta driver. ...I am going to install Vista later today and I will tell about the experience.

[Lacos]

I own a 15" Flexview T60 with T5600 1,82 GHz Processor and a ATI X1300.. Aero runs on Vista RTM Business (MSDNAA) without any problems an at very very good speed. Don't worry the ATI X1300 64 MB Dedicated takes up to 512 MB from your RAM..

[wallybear]

I can confirm that Vista Aero works fine on a T60 with an X1300.

Here are a few helpful facts and experiences for you:

1- The Windows rating for the X1300 video on my T60 is 2.8. The T2400 CPU (1.83GHz) rates a 3.5.

2- The X1300 can "grab" (i.e., borrow from main RAM) up to 192MB for a "total" available to the GPU of 256MB. One commenter here said that the X1300 can access up to 512MB of RAM. This is NOT correct. The total addressable by the GPU is 256 which is more than enough for Aero (which only requires 128MB). By the way, the X1400 can only borrow up to 128MB to reach the 256 limit because it has 128MB of RAM onboard. This is how the HyperMemory functionality of the GPU was designed. Lenovo has never properly conveyed this information in their product literature. (More about this below.)

3- As far as I have observed, the Aero functionality isn't all that demanding of the GPU. The fact that it works fine on a GMA950 is proof of that. I expect that a faster GPU would rate higher on the Windows Experience index but as for how it would perform in practice, I don't know. I works fine on my T60. The main issues in performance in Vista are main RAM (2GB is equivalent to 1GB in XP) and the hard drive's speed.

I hope this info is helpful to you. I had the same concerns about my T60 and its X1300. That's the main reason I installed the RC1 when it was available. Oh, and one final point. Windows XP incorrectly reports the amount of RAM available to the GPU (it reports 512). This is a known issue in XP (verified by Lenovo's Tech Support. I know because I opened a service request with them on the issue.)

[ghosh9691]

The Windows Aero feature really needs a GPU that supports a hardware based Pixel Shader 2.0 and DirectX 9.0c. The Intel GMA950 and both ATI cards (X1300 and X1400) have this support. Microsoft actually recommends 128 MB as the minimum amount of memory available to the GPU. This may or may not be on-board.

The ATI cards are HyperMemory enabled. The X1300 comes with 64MB on-board and reserves upto 192 MB from the System RAM for a total of 256 MB GPU addressable memory. The X1400 comes with 128 MB on-board and can reserve upto 128 MB of System RAM, again for a total of 256 MB. The ATI FireGL card, on the other hand, can have a max of 512 MB RAM for the GPU to play with.

The Intel GMA950 uses System RAM upto a max of 224 MB.

Therefore, in a nut-shell, all three video solutions can support the Windows Aero interface as long as the appropriate WDDM drivers are available. As of this writing, ATI has WDDM drivers for Vista, and the GMA950 driver is part of the Vista CD itself.

Note: I have a Z61m with the X1400 running Windows Vista Business, an HP desktop with nVidia GeForce 5500 FX running Windows Vista Ultimate, and a Sony TR3A with Intel GMA850 running Windows Vista Basic.

[Tiger]

Thanks for the replies. Lenovo states http://www.pc.ibm.com/ca/microsoft/vista/sysreq.html Note asterik 1 in vista premium. "Adequate graphics memory
64 MB of graphics memory to support a single monitor at 1,310,720 pixels or less
128 MB of graphics memory to support a single monitor at resolutions 2,304,000 pixels or less
256 MB of graphics memory to support a single monitor at resolutions higher than 2,304,000 pixels
meets graphics memory bandwidth requirements, as assessed by Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor "
Then Ati states http://ati.amd.com/products/RadeonX1300/features.html that" ATI recommends the Radeon X1300 as a suitable graphics card for Windows Vista. It meets the requirements of image-intensive features such as Aeroglass, and enhances Vista’s gaming, digital photo, and multimedia applications."

Then Microsoft states http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/g ... pable.mspx Support for DirectX 9 graphics with a WDDM driver, 128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)2, Pixel Shader 2.0 and 32 bits per pixel.
If the GPU uses shared memory, then no additional graphics memory is required beyond the 1 GB system memory requirement; If the GPU uses dedicated memory then 128MB is required.
Hence my confusion.

Space For Rent

[kulivontot]

I run dual-monitors with Aero and an x1300 without a problem. When I burned out my gpu, the interface was noticably sluggish, so the graphics hardware does have to be somewhat powerful in order to provide a good experience. Regardless, you should be fine, even GMA950 users should be fine. I think the biggest hurdle is directx 9.0 support and pixel shader 2.0 support, both of which are supported.

[Lacos]

Please take a look at my screenshot. My X1300 Card gets up to 827 MB Ram from my System (Lenovo T60 2 GB RAM)..