Intel Arc feature

Intel’s ARC GPUs will not natively support DirectX 9


Intel has revealed that its upcoming ARC discrete GPUs will not natively support DirectX 9. Instead, the blue team will rely on Microsoft’s D3D9On12 interface in order to emulate DX9 games.

As Intel noted:

“12th generation Intel processor’s integrated GPU and Arc discrete GPU no longer support D3D9 natively. Applications and games based on DirectX 9 can still work through Microsoft* D3D9On12 interface.

The integrated GPU on 11th generation and older Intel processors supports DX9 natively, but they can be combined with Arc graphics cards. If so, rendering is likely to be handled by the card and not the iGPU (unless the card is disabled). Thus, the system will be using DX9On12 instead of DX9.”

Since DX9 games are really old, the upcoming ARC GPUs won’t likely have any performance issues with them. However, there might be some bugs or visual glitches due to the Microsoft D3D9On12 interface.

Intel suggests players use Microsoft Support for troubleshooting DX9 apps and games issues. So yeah, the blue team will be basically shifting the blaming to Microsoft.