d3dx9_43.dll is missing

Older games use parts of DirectX that Windows 10 and 11 don’t come with: the D3DX libraries, XInput 1.3, XAudio 2.7 and the 2010 shader compiler. Microsoft’s DirectX End-User Runtime installs them beside the DirectX you have, without changing it, and the game finds them.

Updated 29 October 2026 · Em português

The diver plugging a cable into an old monitor while Ollie waits with a controller

The files it puts back

d3dx9_24.dll to d3dx9_43.dll: D3DX9, the helper library of Direct3D 9 games.
d3dx10_43.dll, d3dx11_43.dll and earlier: D3DX10 and D3DX11, the same for Direct3D 10 and 11 games.
xinput1_3.dll: XInput 1.3, which reads Xbox controllers. Windows has newer XInput files, but games built for 1.3 ask for it by name.
d3dcompiler_43.dll: The shader compiler from June 2010.
xaudio2_7.dll, x3daudio1_7.dll, xapofx1_5.dll: XAudio 2.7 and its 3D sound and effects.

How to install it

Download Microsoft’s DirectX End-User Runtime Web Installer (dxwebsetup.exe) and run it.
Accept the agreement and press Next until it finishes. It needs an internet connection.
No internet on that PC? Microsoft’s offline package, DirectX End-User Runtimes (June 2010), is 95.6 MB: run it, pick a folder to unpack it to, then run DXSETUP.exe from that folder.
Start the game again: the files are now where it looks for them.

Why Windows doesn’t have them

Windows 10 and 11 come with DirectX 12, and DirectX itself is part of Windows. These files are something else: they came with Microsoft’s old DirectX SDK, and games were meant to install them themselves. Microsoft’s package adds them side by side and changes nothing else; Microsoft notes that it can’t be uninstalled.

The diver and Ollie adjusting a brass gauge

Still not starting?

If the error names msvcp140.dll, vcruntime140.dll or msvcr100.dll, the game needs Visual C++ too: see MSVCP140.dll or VCRUNTIME140.dll was not found.
Don’t copy a lone d3dx9_43.dll from a DLL site into the game’s folder: the wrong version or the wrong one of 32-bit and 64-bit stops the game in a new way.

Or let Water do it

Water is a game launcher for Windows. When it installs a game, it runs the runtime installers the game comes with, DirectX’s among them, as Steam does the first time a game starts, on a desktop of its own that you never see. You press Install, then Play.

Download for Windows How Water works

The diver and Ollie at work with a wrench and a screwdriver