This is the kind of question I have never had a clear answer
What's the problem for the graphic card manufactures to support both API's ?
Does it entail also an heavy modification of the hardware itself ?
Well afaik ATI didn't drop the development of OpenGL stuff but wanted to wait for 3.0 because it initially promised incredible advances from the programmer's point of view. Unfortunately this didn't happen and so you still have this API that's been growing for like 15 years with lots of different ways to do the same thing with only little of them being a good idea in the end...
With that said it's not about the hardware (DirectX declares what new features there have to be anyway nowadays) but the driver development is the problem. I now also have the point of view that it's not like ATI or Intel having bad drivers but more NVIDIA being the only one actually actively supporting OpenGL. Well ATI started to have a bigger focus on OpenGL and so even without what was promised for version 3.0 we might see some nice new drivers coming...
Enjoy your meal
Toast
