http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=081c218f-c845-47d1-b124-71f80bf21638&displaylang=en

You need to be running Vista SP2 for this. Even though this is a beta for the DirectX 11 (Platform Update for Vista SP2), I will try to see if I notice anything on my benchmarks. You have to remove the .remove selection from cmd file. This will tell Windows Update on Vista SP2 that you can install the Platform Update which includes DirectX 11 and other runtimes. Here's a screenshot of computer's screen to show you. "DirectX 11" is boxed in red and my OS is boxed in blue:

Good find! Tell us if there's anything new with this.

Will do I did use the Windows 7 RC that did have "DirectX 11" in it, but the dxdiag showed I still had DirectX 10, however...

The one benchmark I have tried out just now ran flawlessly; it even ran faster than before (it's my FFXI benchmark). I'm going to try out FFXI soon to see if it runs any faster with other characters running around.

EDIT: I ran FFXI and it appears that it runs more smooth and the animations were. There might be more of a graphical update once the DirectX 11 drivers from NVIDIA (which my laptop has) get released.

Isn't ATI the only one right now that have DirectX 11 graphic chipsets at the moment? I heard Nvidia won't have them out until next year.

I think I heard that NVIDIA has their new cards coming out earlier next year, but that doesn't mean that NVIDIA can't release DirectX 11 driver software for current cards.

Yes it does. DirectX 11 needs to be supported in hardware as well as software for it to run, and their current cards don't support many DX11 features in hardware (notably tesselation).

Early next year is when I would put their DX11 cards too, though they may do a paper launch (no real availability) late this year.

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Are you running a 5850 or 5870? Because those are the only cards that will benefit from this Vista DX11 support.

I have read from many places that DirectX 11 should add some features and improve performance of even current DirectX 10 cards. Newer cards benefit more from new features but it doesn't mean older cards can't benefit some too. At least MS have said that they have improved multicore CPU usage (yes, CPU not GPU) with DirectX 11 which might explain better results in many cases. After all DirectX is overall gaming API, it's not just about GPU.

That was said about DX10.1 but the only cards that got performance improvements were AMD's actual DX10.1 cards. Nvidia, who doesn't have any retail DX10.1 cards did not recieve a performance boost in games that were patched for it (e.g. Assassins' Creed was patched to remove DX10.1, which decreased AMD performance).

My second laptop, which got destroyed in a car wreck I was in last year (screen was shattered and the backside got cracked open; had it in my bookbag in the front seat of the car) had an NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS, but strangely HAD DirectX 10.1 after getting SP1 for Vista.

I'm with Soleron on this one. DX11 wouldn't make ANY difference on n nVidia GPU.

Also, DX11 is for both Vista and Windows 7 so it's not really an amazing feat to get it on Vista.

Also I doubt very much that your 8400M said anything about DX10.1.