This guy mainly plays with trainsims, but addresses similar problems - games written for DX8 or DX9 and operating systems that don't come with them by default.
http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showt...-of-20-03-2012
This one is supposed to be an automatic fixer for VISTA and later;
http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showt...stallHelper%29