Topic: FBA Default Video Blitter and Windows 10

[Amoebe]

Just a small remark on FBA:

When running on (the latest version of) Windows 10, the default video blitter DirectX option for FBA is version 7, which is no longer available on Windows 10 systems (but a higher version is), which resulted in the following error message :

Couldn't intialise 'DirectDraw7 / Direct3D7 Enhanced video output' module. Try installing the Direct X End User runtimes (June 2010).

Which isn't really what you need to do for Windows 10: You need to select one of the two available DirectX '9' options. My small remark is that it would be nice if that would be the default on Windows 10 systems (and perhaps others), for which version 7 is not 'just' not installed and you need to do so, but for which version 7 simply is not available anymore and the version 9 option needs to be selected.

End of remark.

[Barry Harris]

Works absolutely fine on Windows 10.

The DX9 blitters do not work out of the box on Windows 10 however, and require installation of the DirectX Runtimes, as per the error message they give.

[dink]

Which isn't really what you need to do for Windows 10: You need to select one of the two available DirectX '9' options. My small remark is that it would be nice if that would be the default on Windows 10 systems (and perhaps others), for which version 7 is not 'just' not installed and you need to do so, but for which version 7 simply is not available anymore and the version 9 option needs to be selected.

Can you please tell exactly how to select these options?

best regards,
- dink

[Amoebe]

Works absolutely fine on Windows 10.

It worked for me, but only *after* I selected the DirectX 9 blitter.

The DX9 blitters do not work out of the box on Windows 10 however, and require installation of the DirectX Runtimes

I didn't install any DirectX version on Windows 10 myself; It came pre-installed with the installation.

as per the error message they give.

The error message says to install version *7*, which version (7) ins't there on Windows 10.

[Amoebe]

Can you please tell exactly how to select these options?

best regards,
- dink

I just started FBA, and initially got the error message in the first post. Then in the FBA menu I selected 'Video -> Select blitter', and chose on of the two available 'DirectX 9' options; either 'Experimental' or 'Directx 9 Alt'. And the error message on startup was gone.

[Amoebe]

Hrm. I think I have to slightly revise my earlier post: It seems that *only* the Blitter option 'Enhanced (Direct3D 7) gives me the error (and which seems to be the default); the other two DirectX 7 options seem fine.

Guess I was slightly wrong here.
 

[Barry Harris]

Something amiss with your machine then I think. The Enhanced blitter works out of the box on every machine I've tried (that includes 5 or 6 Windows 10 machines)......

[Amoebe]

Something amiss with your machine then I think. The Enhanced blitter works out of the box on every machine I've tried (that includes 5 or 6 Windows 10 machines)......

Could be. Or perhaps it's got something to do with the Windows 10 'Creators Update' (Version 1703 [OS Build 15063.483]). Oh, well. Guess it doesn't really matter; All of the other Blitter options seem fine at first glance. Thanks for all the feedback.

[Barry Harris]

Could be. Or perhaps it's got something to do with the Windows 10 'Creators Update' (Version 1703 [OS Build 15063.483]). Oh, well. Guess it doesn't really matter; All of the other Blitter options seem fine at first glance. Thanks for all the feedback.

A quick Google search tells me there are lots of DX Issues with the Creators Update (most of them seem to driver related). Once the Creators Update becomes generally available I suspect graphics drivers will get better. Until it is generally released there is little point in us looking at it.

[Amoebe]

A quick Google search tells me there are lots of DX Issues with the Creators Update (most of them seem to driver related). Once the Creators Update becomes generally available I suspect graphics drivers will get better. Until it is generally released there is little point in us looking at it.

Could be that there are a lot of DX issues with it. And if you can verify that this particular Blitter works perfectly fine on other Windows 10 systems, I'll fully assume that it is something to do with my system.

Minor note though: The 'Creators Update' *is* generally available, and has been for a while now (I think since April, but I might be mistaken). I think you are referring to the 'Fall Creators Update', which has not been released yet. I was talking about the released 'Creators Update', and not the yet unreleased 'Fall Creators Update'. (And yes, Microsoft really needs to work on those codenames )

[Barry Harris]

Well in that case, there are no issues. All my machines are fully up-to-date. 

[Amoebe]

Well in that case, there are no issues. All my machines are fully up-to-date. 

Sounds reasonable. So let's close this issue then; I'll see if the issue remains after some more GPU driver updates on my end, or if the issue crops up for anyone else. Thanks for the responses, everyone !