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DirectX 11.1, the next version of Microsoft's set of multimedia application programming interfaces, is exclusive to Windows 8, according to a forum post from a Microsoft employee, reports Neowin.
Windows 8 launched on Oct. 26 with DirectX 11.1. In response to a question from a software developer, Microsoft employee Daniel Moth said, "At this point there is no plan for DirectX 11.1 to be made available on Windows 7." DirectX 11.0 was native to Windows 7 when that operating system launched in 2009, but Microsoft later made it available on the previous OS, Windows Vista.
DirectX 11.1 includes a number of new features, the most significant of which appears to be native support for stereoscopic 3D in games.
