New PC , do install DirectX 11 and 9 or just 11 ?

[s8n]

hi RB members , i ordered a custom PC today from my local shop and the Video Card supports DirectX 11.

When the PC is finished and i pick it up do i install DirectX 11 only or do i need to install DirectX 9 as well ?

btw i will be using Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit as the OS


any tips help

s8n

[dsheinem]

Unless I am mistaken, any newer version of DirectX always includes everything needed from previous releases. You should be fine with just 11.

[isiolia]

It's actually fairly common to have DirectX 9c installed along with DX11. Versions past 9 are a lot less "universal", so 9c kinda stands in as the backwards compatibility. Even then you may run into games that look for specific files, but that's more something to look at if it becomes an issue.

Most of the time newer games will verify or install DirectX as part of their install process though. Or the latest version will get installed/updated as part of Windows. I think the main time you might need to worry about manually installing DirectX 9 yourself (from here if you need) would be if you're going from fresh install to trying to play an older game.

[Hobie-wan]

I don't use W7 so I'm not sure about the stuff Isiola says about them being being a little separate past 9, but Windows 7 should have everything you need short of whatever DX 11 updates you get from Windows Updates.

[DinnerX]

It's actually fairly common to have DirectX 9c installed along with DX11. Versions past 9 are a lot less "universal", so 9c kinda stands in as the backwards compatibility. Even then you may run into games that look for specific files, but that's more something to look at if it becomes an issue.

Most of the time newer games will verify or install DirectX as part of their install process though. Or the latest version will get installed/updated as part of Windows. I think the main time you might need to worry about manually installing DirectX 9 yourself (from here if you need) would be if you're going from fresh install to trying to play an older game.

Yeah, I've got win7 64bit and you really need 9c installed for older games.

EDIT: I strongly recommend installing directx 9c first, before any old games. Directx 9c does include support for all the previous versions of directx. You can end up with a mess if you install a bunch of old versions on top of one another, which is what you'll get if you install whatever versions came with various old games.

EDIT: Directx 11 comes installed with win7.

[Cronozilla]

To be frank, games you install are going to install the version of DirectX they want ... regardless if you already have it or not. So, don't worry about it. There's no trick to getting DX11 materials working or anything.

[emwearz]

Unless I am mistaken, any newer version of DirectX always includes everything needed from previous releases. You should be fine with just 11.

This, just install the latest version of the Direct X, you can not just have DX9 unless you plan on using XP.

Some games that use DX11/10 allow you to select DX9 which will generally run faster, DX9 games will run fine with the latest build of DX.