Direct3D issue

[xenogia]

I have an Intel integrated chipset on my laptop that is capable of doing Directx9 fine, even tried 3dmark05 and it worked.  Anyway whenever I try to put the game in Directx9 mode (under 640x480) I get following error.  Is this a driver issue?

--
There was a problem initializing graphics mode 640 x 480 (32-bit).
(Problem: "Failed to create Direct3D Device: 0x8876086C")

I know I can run the game in Directx5 mode, but I would prefer to run it in an accelerated mode.  Does anyone have any reason for this.

[Gilbert]

Well, most Intel integrated graphics chipsets are known to suck, and they generally provide only barebone functions that make them just work, either because of limited hardware or drivers (most probably BOTH). Support for Direct3D feature sets is limited (especially for newer versions of Direct3D like 9 onwards) and support for OpenGL is mediocre (if it's not non-existent). This office comp. I'm using also has an Intel chip and I get the same problem as you, so it's not surprising.

I think benchmark/testing programmes like 3DMark are designed to work with most hardware so these programmes know what not to use when your system does not support that, but it is possible that the D3D9 engine of AGS requires some features not present in these chipsets or drivers, causing the error.

I've heard that there're software patches/programmes that simulate some of the missing features in these chips, which enable you to launch more demanding and more 'modern' programmes. I haven't tried them but IMO for compatibility's sake it's more preferrable to run your games in DX5 mode, that even if you get them to work somehow in D3D9 mode you cannot gaurantee the games could run flawlessly without glitches. Just for the possible increase in speed (if any) is probably not worth the troubles.

[Layabout]

My old laptop would run most dx9 games (as long as they were shader model 2 or lower) okay, and it was integrated graphics, but ags d3d would not work.

[Pumaman]

D3D is pretty rubbish at reporting errors -- that error just means that something that AGS requested was not supported by the graphics card. It's hard to know what that might be, though there's probably no solution.

You could try upgrading your graphics drivers to the latest versions from the manufacturer's website, that might help.

[xenogia]

Yeah I thought that would have been the case, I did try some modified drivers.  I've been developing my game on an EEEPC 900HA which has a 1.6ghz atom processor and a 160gig hdd.. Great for working on the game on the run.. hehe

Either way it doesn't matter, glad that its most likely a driver or hardware related issue.