Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry Enterprise suited for games?

SlackerITGuy

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So stay with me here guys, I know this is kind of a weird question.

So yesterday at work I came across a PC that was running this OS (Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry Enterprise) and upon further inspection (services.msc, gpedit.msc, dxdiag, etc), it seemed to me like this OS is actually the same (to the naked eye) as Windows 8.1 Pro but without much of the fluff that comes with 8.1 Pro (Modern UI apps, etc).

So my question is:

Would this OS be suited for gaming? Would it have problems running DirectX 11.1 and Mantle games?

Thanks!.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    CPU
    Intel Core i5-2500K
    Motherboard
    ASRock Z77 Extreme4
    Memory
    8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 RAM
    Graphics Card(s)
    Sapphire Radeon HD 7970 GHz Vapor-X
    Sound Card
    Realtek ALC898
    Monitor(s) Displays
    BenQ XL2411T
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1080 @ 144Hz
    Hard Drives
    Plextor M3 Pro 128GB SSD
    WD Blue Caviar
    PSU
    Seasonic G Series 650W
    Case
    Corsair Obsidian 650D
    Cooling
    Corsair H60 and Cooler Master MegaFlow 200mm
    Keyboard
    CM Storm QuickFire Rapid (CHERRY MX Blue Switches)
    Mouse
    Corsair Raptor M45
    Browser
    Google Chrome (latest stable build)
    Antivirus
    None
This OS is not a retail product. Embedded operating systems are sold by OEMs for special purposes. This is an Enterprise edition available only to large organizations with volume licensing. Using this OS for home gaming would likely be a violation of the license terms.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 7
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
So my question is:

Would this OS be suited for gaming? Would it have problems running DirectX 11.1 and Mantle games?

Thanks!.

This OS is not a retail product. Embedded operating systems are sold by OEMs for special purposes. This is an Enterprise edition available only to large organizations with volume licensing. Using this OS for home gaming would likely be a violation of the license terms.

Aside from that legalize, yes, I don't see why it wouldn't be able to run games. At it's core it's still Windows 8/8.1, and should still have DX11.1 capabilities. As to the legality of the OS, that's between you, your company, and Microsoft.

Peace :cool:
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Custom built by me
    CPU
    Haswell i7-4770K
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte G1 Sniper 5 (BIOS F9)
    Memory
    Corsair Dominator Platinum 32 gig (1866MHz)
    Graphics Card(s)
    Sapphire R9-280 Vapor X
    Sound Card
    Soundblaster ZXR
    Monitor(s) Displays
    NEC PA242W - 24 inch
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1200
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 512gig 850 Pro SSD (OS), Samsung 256gig 840 Pro SSD (photo editing), Western Digital Caviar Black 2TB HD
    PSU
    EVGA Supernova 1000 G2
    Case
    Cooler Master HAF X
    Cooling
    Corsair H100i Closed Loop Cooler
    Keyboard
    Logitech Wireless Wave
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance MX
    Internet Speed
    High Speed
    Browser
    IE11
    Antivirus
    Norton Security
    Other Info
    RAM Speed: 1866MHZ @ 9-10-10-27-2T, 1.5v
If you were a games developer who wanted to produce a line of arcade machines running your games, which happened to run under Windows, a Windows Embedded platform would be an ideal gaming machine for you. You'd make money, Microsoft would make money...

If you wanted to explore the possibility, there are trial versions of Windows Embedded for Windows 7, 8.x available to download from MS. The Windows Embedded Standard 7 SP1 trial is a little more generous in terms of time before your OS times out than the Windows 8 Embedded.

The core engine is the same for regular and Embedded Windows versions, but the difficulty with some graphics drivers is that their .msi installer may not recognize the embedded version as being a valid Windows OS. In these cases, it may be necessary to unpack the installer and manually install the .inf and .sys files and register any .dlls, or use DISM to force the installation.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    HP COMPAQ Presario CQ57
    CPU
    AMD E- 300 APU with Radion HD Graphics 1.30GHz
    Motherboard
    inbuilt
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    ATI
    Sound Card
    High Definition Audio on-board
    Monitor(s) Displays
    notebook
    Screen Resolution
    1366x768
    Hard Drives
    Seagate ST9500325AS
    Google drive 15GB
    Skydrive 25GB
    BT Cloud
    PSU
    external 20v
    Case
    Laptop
    Cooling
    pretty good
    Keyboard
    inbuilt
    Mouse
    touchpad
    Internet Speed
    BT Infinity Unlimited - 80 up 20 down =70/16 really
    Browser
    Chrome Canary usually
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender and Malwarebytes
    Other Info
    no Start menu modifications
    Upgraded with no issues to 8.0 and to 8.1
This OS is not a retail product. Embedded operating systems are sold by OEMs for special purposes. This is an Enterprise edition available only to large organizations with volume licensing. Using this OS for home gaming would likely be a violation of the license terms.

I actually didn't know that, thank you so much :)

Do you by any chance have a source/link/anything where I could read up on that?

So my question is:

Would this OS be suited for gaming? Would it have problems running DirectX 11.1 and Mantle games?

Thanks!.

This OS is not a retail product. Embedded operating systems are sold by OEMs for special purposes. This is an Enterprise edition available only to large organizations with volume licensing. Using this OS for home gaming would likely be a violation of the license terms.

Aside from that legalize, yes, I don't see why it wouldn't be able to run games. At it's core it's still Windows 8/8.1, and should still have DX11.1 capabilities. As to the legality of the OS, that's between you, your company, and Microsoft.

Peace :cool:

Awesome.

I was actually hearing otherwise on another forum. People saying that Windows 8.1 Embedded didn't have the "subsystems" (I don't know) to run games.

Thanks!.

If you were a games developer who wanted to produce a line of arcade machines running your games, which happened to run under Windows, a Windows Embedded platform would be an ideal gaming machine for you. You'd make money, Microsoft would make money...

If you wanted to explore the possibility, there are trial versions of Windows Embedded for Windows 7, 8.x available to download from MS. The Windows Embedded Standard 7 SP1 trial is a little more generous in terms of time before your OS times out than the Windows 8 Embedded.

The core engine is the same for regular and Embedded Windows versions, but the difficulty with some graphics drivers is that their .msi installer may not recognize the embedded version as being a valid Windows OS. In these cases, it may be necessary to unpack the installer and manually install the .inf and .sys files and register any .dlls, or use DISM to force the installation.

Thanks for replying mate.

And you know what? I'm actually gonna email AMD about this ASAP, they've been pretty good to me so far (answering all of my questions via email).

Rep to all 3.

Awesome.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    CPU
    Intel Core i5-2500K
    Motherboard
    ASRock Z77 Extreme4
    Memory
    8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 RAM
    Graphics Card(s)
    Sapphire Radeon HD 7970 GHz Vapor-X
    Sound Card
    Realtek ALC898
    Monitor(s) Displays
    BenQ XL2411T
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1080 @ 144Hz
    Hard Drives
    Plextor M3 Pro 128GB SSD
    WD Blue Caviar
    PSU
    Seasonic G Series 650W
    Case
    Corsair Obsidian 650D
    Cooling
    Corsair H60 and Cooler Master MegaFlow 200mm
    Keyboard
    CM Storm QuickFire Rapid (CHERRY MX Blue Switches)
    Mouse
    Corsair Raptor M45
    Browser
    Google Chrome (latest stable build)
    Antivirus
    None
Reading fafhrd's post has got me thinking now as he brings up some stuff I hadn't considered...

The core engine is the same for regular and Embedded Windows versions, but the difficulty with some graphics drivers is that their .msi installer may not recognize the embedded version as being a valid Windows OS. In these cases, it may be necessary to unpack the installer and manually install the .inf and .sys files and register any .dlls, or use DISM to force the installation.

Still, I'm of the opinion that it's still possible to game on the OS since, as I said, at its core, it's still Win 8... However you do have to consider fafhrd's point.

Anyway thanks for the rep :)
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Custom built by me
    CPU
    Haswell i7-4770K
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte G1 Sniper 5 (BIOS F9)
    Memory
    Corsair Dominator Platinum 32 gig (1866MHz)
    Graphics Card(s)
    Sapphire R9-280 Vapor X
    Sound Card
    Soundblaster ZXR
    Monitor(s) Displays
    NEC PA242W - 24 inch
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1200
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 512gig 850 Pro SSD (OS), Samsung 256gig 840 Pro SSD (photo editing), Western Digital Caviar Black 2TB HD
    PSU
    EVGA Supernova 1000 G2
    Case
    Cooler Master HAF X
    Cooling
    Corsair H100i Closed Loop Cooler
    Keyboard
    Logitech Wireless Wave
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance MX
    Internet Speed
    High Speed
    Browser
    IE11
    Antivirus
    Norton Security
    Other Info
    RAM Speed: 1866MHZ @ 9-10-10-27-2T, 1.5v
Yea, thanks for the rep.

There's a fair bit of information out there on WES2009, WES7, and WE8x, on MSDN, Technet and specialist sites.
MDL has a dedicated Embedded subforum.
I can point to this specific help for AMD graphics: AMD® WES7 Support Packages, and the site is all about Embedded Windows Training, manuals etc.
Quixant (hardware) says it has full driver support for Windows Embedded and Linux: QX-50: high performance 4K ultra HD gaming platform | Quixant so there must be other Embedded Gamers out there.

AMD have something to say on Embedded Gaming too:
http://www.amd.com/Documents/DigitalGamingApplicationBrief.pdf

Microsoft resources:
Technical Resources | Windows Embedded
Get support for Windows Embedded Standard 7
Windows Embedded Product Downloads | Microsoft

and a case study:
Microsoft Case Study: Windows Embedded Standard 7 - AMI Entertainment Network Inc.

There should be plenty there to get you started. A free Microsoft Live Account is useful to sign into many of the MS free trial pages.

It is also a great feeling to create your very own OS, that nobody else has, or to boot straight into your application without having to go through the usual Windows start screens!
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    HP COMPAQ Presario CQ57
    CPU
    AMD E- 300 APU with Radion HD Graphics 1.30GHz
    Motherboard
    inbuilt
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    ATI
    Sound Card
    High Definition Audio on-board
    Monitor(s) Displays
    notebook
    Screen Resolution
    1366x768
    Hard Drives
    Seagate ST9500325AS
    Google drive 15GB
    Skydrive 25GB
    BT Cloud
    PSU
    external 20v
    Case
    Laptop
    Cooling
    pretty good
    Keyboard
    inbuilt
    Mouse
    touchpad
    Internet Speed
    BT Infinity Unlimited - 80 up 20 down =70/16 really
    Browser
    Chrome Canary usually
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender and Malwarebytes
    Other Info
    no Start menu modifications
    Upgraded with no issues to 8.0 and to 8.1
Lots of great information, thanks guys (looking at those links as I type this fafhdr).

I'm definitely gonna ask for a key at work (maybe they say no? I don't know), I'm somewhat of a stickler for slim/fat free Windows SKUs, and this seems like a great option.

If something goes wrong, hey, at least I tried :)
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    CPU
    Intel Core i5-2500K
    Motherboard
    ASRock Z77 Extreme4
    Memory
    8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 RAM
    Graphics Card(s)
    Sapphire Radeon HD 7970 GHz Vapor-X
    Sound Card
    Realtek ALC898
    Monitor(s) Displays
    BenQ XL2411T
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1080 @ 144Hz
    Hard Drives
    Plextor M3 Pro 128GB SSD
    WD Blue Caviar
    PSU
    Seasonic G Series 650W
    Case
    Corsair Obsidian 650D
    Cooling
    Corsair H60 and Cooler Master MegaFlow 200mm
    Keyboard
    CM Storm QuickFire Rapid (CHERRY MX Blue Switches)
    Mouse
    Corsair Raptor M45
    Browser
    Google Chrome (latest stable build)
    Antivirus
    None
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