D3D9 removal?

[hrydgard]

As of now, the minimum Windows version for PPSSPP is Windows 7.

This version of Windows supports DX11, and therefore, there really isn't much reason to keep around the DirectX 9 backend.

Or is there? Does anyone know something that still works better or faster on DX9?

[anr2me]

Btw, does old GPU that only support up to D3D9 features can works with DX11 library?

[LunaMoo]

Nope. But dx9 was always about old (discontinued?) xbox port and some really ancient integrated intel chips which had support of d3d9, but somehow failed to support open gl at all or was really slow using it.
People that use such outdated hardware (it was already outdated and rare back when d3d9 backend was added many years ago) really doesn't benefit from software updates, often stick to some oudated version that gave them most fps anyway.

Pretty sure if someone would be against removing it, it would only be for some obscure case of using d3d9.dll as the most popular injector for some weird mods or some driver hacks only viable in that outdated api, but even within modding community it's no longer used for anything new since d3d9 is pretty dead, some gpu's (intel I guess) no longer even support it natively.

[wmjb]

why remove it, why not just leave it in unmaintained?

[hrydgard]

why remove it, why not just leave it in unmaintained?

Well, it adds a little extra burden when working on some types of rendering code, to have to update four backends instead of three. Plus, sometimes it needs specific workarounds.

[hrydgard]

Did it as an experiment in #19951, that's quite a lot of deleted code..

[hrydgard]

Holding off until 1.19, but after that it goes in.

Post-1.19 will also drop support for the very oldest Android devices, since we need to build it with a newer SDK to support #19658 .

[jcchikikomori]

I think OpenGL can render better than DX9, and it's more documented than that nowadays..
I have tested that renderer back then and i see no difference of using it, excepts it crashes more often than DX11.

[NABN00B]

As of now, the minimum Windows version for PPSSPP is Windows 7.

Since when exactly? Would be great to document on the website.