Managed DirectX as a starting point

Question

I know the difference between manage and unmanaged DirectX. My question is if I decided to do managed directX as a starting point, would it help me to better understand unmanaged DirectX. Honestly, the only thing I see different about the 2 is how you initiate and access resources. Matrix Math is Matrix no matter what so If I learn it in managed, then I should be fine in unmanaged

Answer 1

So long as you stick with Managed DirectX (or SlimDX) and not one of the newer frameworks like XNA then the API translates fairly directly from managed to unmanaged.

I'd recommend using SlimDX as it is a very thin wrapper over the DirectX API. And it is up to date unlike Managed DirectX.

Answer 2

Managed DX is no longer supported by microsoft to my knowledge. SlimDX really is a better choice.

XNA is a pretty good choice as well.

All in though it will teach you how a 3D API works. Most are pretty similar. If you can do stuff with SlimDX or XNA then you should be able to transfer your skills over to unmanaged DirectX pretty easily.