DIRECT3D_VERSION

A DirectX display driver must support DirectX 7.0 and earlier versions of the DirectX runtime. To do that, it is necessary to include both old and new DirectX headers, for example d3d.h and d3d8.h. However, this can cause a problem with the definition of the preprocessor symbol DIRECT3D_VERSION. This preprocessor symbol is used in the header files to indicate which structures and functions should be included. If the DIRECT3D_VERSION has not already been defined, the DirectX header files set the value of DIRECT3D_VERSION to the most recent version they were designed for. Thus, d3d.h sets DIRECT3D_VERSION to 0x0700 and d3d8.h sets DIRECT3D_VERSION to 0x0800. If d3d.h is included in your source before d3d8.h, new Direct3D 8.0 features are not defined and compiler errors will result.

To avoid this, define DIRECT3D_VERSION to 0x0800 before including any header files. In order to get all the necessary symbols in header files, include d3d8.h before winddi.h or d3dnthal.h.