Direct3D D3DX DLLs

There have been issues with DirectX since way back in the February 2005 update relating to the D3DX dll library files. Since then you can not distributes apps without the DirectX runtime and expect them to work.

Windows XP users who keep their machines up to date should all have DirectX 9.0c installed but not the D3DX dlls so will get errors about missing d3dx9_xx.dll (where xx is from 24 for the February 2005 update to the latest listed below). In addition XINPUT dlls may be missing (this is the Xbox controller system) and Direct3D 10 dlls from April 2007. Unfortunately the end user is not automatically downloading the new dlls. The best solution is to distribute the DirectX runtime with your app. however if you are providing your app. as a download this will increase the download size significantly. From the June 2005 release Microsoft solved these problems somewhat by allowing the developer to create a minimal installer that just updates the D3DX dll. You could also of course just include the dll. although this is against the agreement (EULA). Another solution is to forward users to the Microsoft DirectX end user runtime download via the Microsoft Web Installer.

Download the missing DLLs

Note: these installers will not install DirectX 9.0c, they will only install the missing dlls from the SDK updates. Most people should have DirectX 9.0c as part of Windows XP SP2 but if you do not you can get it here: DirectX 9.0c. You can also use the online Microsoft update page here: Microsoft Web Installer

Name	Installs DLL	Download sites
February 2005 Update	d3dx9_24.dll	gamedev ,threelights
April 2005 Update	d3dx9_25.dll	gamedev ,threelights
June 2005 Update	d3dx9_26.dll	gamedev ,threelights
August 2005 Update	d3dx9_27.dll	gamedev ,threelights
October 2005 Update	No change
December 2005 Update	d3dx9_28.dll	threelights
February 2006 Update	d3dx9_29.dll	threelights
April 2006 Update	d3dx9_30.dll xinput1_1.dll	threelights
June 2006 Update	No change	threelights
August 2006 Update	xinput1_2.dll	threelights
October 2006 Update	d3dx9_31.dll xinput1_3.dll	threelights
December 2006 Update	d3dx9_32.dll	threelights
February 2007 Update	No change	threelights
April 2007 Update	d3dx9_33.dl d3dx10_33.dlll	Microsoft Web Installer
June 2007 Update	d3dx9_34.dll d3dx10_34.dll	Microsoft Web Installer
August 2007 Update	d3dx9_35.dll d3dx10_35.dll	Microsoft Web Installer
November 2007 Update	d3dx9_36.dll d3dx10_36.dll	Microsoft Web Installer
March 2008 Update	d3dx9_37.dll d3dx10_36.dll	Microsoft Web Installer
August 2008 Update		Scheduled release
November 2008 Update		Scheduled release

Matthias Langer of ThreeLights has kindly combined the downloads into one making it very easy to install. See his site to download.

Note: if you are missing d3dx9d_xx.dll files e.g. d3dx9d_35.dll these files are debug versions of the libraries for development purposes only. Nobody should be distributing these in an application. To use these you need the full DirectX SDK.

The xinput dlls are for the Microsoft common controller library and are used for things like the Xbox 360 common controller. The d3dx10 dlls are Vista dlls for DirectX 10.