14 DAY TRIAL // Intel Corporation announced on Wednesday that original equipment manufacturers and software developers would receive pre-production Windows 7 drivers for its graphics engines. Intel positions itself among the first graphics card suppliers to make available drivers for the next-to-come operating system from Microsoft.
“Intel is making available for testing its preproduction WDDM1.1 graphics driver, enabling the full Windows 7 experience. The driver is the result of an ongoing collaboration with Microsoft to provide OEMs and developers with drivers that deliver all of the required WDDM1.1 features for Windows 7. As a result of the collaboration, OEMs and beta users can stay in step with Windows 7 prereleases for smooth product development,” the announcement on Intel’s web site says.
According to Microsoft, its next-generation Windows 7 operating system will come with Windows Vista similar driver model, which is meant to ease the development of compatible drivers. Even so, the noticeable fact is that Intel said it was making the drivers available long before the OS' announced launch date.
Many of you may know that the software giant already released a pre-beta Windows 7 in late October. The operating system was made available to Microsoft's partners so that they could start testing their hardware and software on Windows 7 as soon as they got their hands on it. Microsoft heavily emphasizes the driver support for its upcoming OS, and so do hardware manufacturers.
Intel released the pre-production Windows 7 driver for its graphics solutions, the WDDM 1.1, stressing on the importance of high-quality graphics drivers. The Santa Clara, California-based chip maker's release is not expected to feature full support for its next generation, code named Larrabee, discrete graphics processors, and there are also some voices that say it will probably only support modern built-in graphics cores.