[Question]: Intermittent Direct3D device creation failures(?) on headless Windows Server 2022 with VDD?

[markoburcul]

What is your question?

I’m using VDD on a headless Windows Server (tested both with and without a physical GPU) to run GUI tests on an application. I’ve observed inconsistent behavior:

• Sometimes the tests succeed, and the VDD logs show that an adapter was found and a Direct3D device was successfully created.
• Other times, all tests fail because the logs indicate that no adapter was found and the Direct3D device could not be created.

This seems to happen nondeterministically between test runs.

Question:
Is this behavior something inherent to VDD, or could it be related to the underlying Windows Server / Direct3D environment? Specifically:

• Under what conditions does VDD expect to find a Direct3D adapter?
• Are there system-level factors (e.g., GPU availability, driver state, session type) that could cause device creation to succeed or fail intermittently?

Environment:

• Windows Server 2022 (headless)
• Tested with GPU and without GPU
• Running GUI application tests through Jenkins agent

Additional information

My tests are successful when VDD shows these logs:

[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [COMPANION] Reloading the driver
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] HDRPlus is disabled.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] SDR10bit is disabled.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] CustomEdid is enabled.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] HardwareCursor is enabled.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] PreventSpoof is disabled.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] EdidCeaOverride is disabled.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Driver Starting
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] VDD Path: C:\VirtualDisplayDriver
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] IDDCX Version: 0x1701
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [PIPE] Starting Pipe
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [PIPE] Pipe created
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Using vdd_settings.xml
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Attempting to Load GPU from adapter.txt
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] ASSIGNED GPU: Microsoft Basic Render Driver (LUID: 37622-0)
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Attempting to use user Edid
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Using custom edid
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Applied Adapter configs.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Creating Monitor: 1
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [WARNING] Buffer too small. Input count: 0, Required: 6
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [WARNING] Input buffer too small. Required: 6, Provided: 0
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Finished Setting up adapter.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Adapter found: 00000019771FC3C0 (Vendor ID: 5140, Device ID: 140)
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Direct3D device created successfully. Feature Level: 45312
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Adapter found: 00000019771FC3C0 (Vendor ID: 5140, Device ID: 140)
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Direct3D device created successfully. Feature Level: 45312
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Unasigning Swapchain. Processing will be stopped.
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Adapter found: 00000019771FC3C0 (Vendor ID: 5140, Device ID: 140)
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Direct3D device created successfully. Feature Level: 45312
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Adapter found: 00000019771FC3C0 (Vendor ID: 5140, Device ID: 140)
[2025-09-22 18:22:55] [INFO] Direct3D device created successfully. Feature Level: 45312
[2025-09-22 18:22:56] [PIPE] Client Connected
[2025-09-22 18:22:56] [PIPE] Client Handling Enabled

My tests fail when VDD shows these logs:

[2025-09-23 09:29:56] [COMPANION] Reloading the driver
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] HDRPlus is disabled.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] SDR10bit is disabled.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] CustomEdid is enabled.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] HardwareCursor is enabled.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] PreventSpoof is disabled.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] EdidCeaOverride is disabled.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Driver Starting
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] VDD Path: C:\VirtualDisplayDriver
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] IDDCX Version: 0x1701
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [PIPE] Starting Pipe
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [PIPE] Pipe created
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Using vdd_settings.xml
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Attempting to Load GPU from adapter.txt
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] ASSIGNED GPU: Microsoft Basic Render Driver (LUID: 37622-0)
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Attempting to use user Edid
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Using custom edid
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Applied Adapter configs.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Creating Monitor: 1
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [WARNING] Buffer too small. Input count: 0, Required: 6
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [WARNING] Input buffer too small. Required: 6, Provided: 0
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [INFO] Finished Setting up adapter.
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [PIPE] Client Connected
[2025-09-23 09:29:57] [PIPE] Client Handling Enabled

Contact Details

marko@status.im

[zjoasan]

This is just a stab in the dark, but it might be that iddcx(1.7) version on server 2022 isn't compatible with VDD, but I know Mike is working on a solution. Just unsure how far along he has come.

There might be other reasons though...

[markoburcul]

This is just a stab in the dark, but it might be that iddcx(1.7) version on server 2022 isn't compatible with VDD, but I know Mike is working on a solution. Just unsure how far along he has come.

I'm not able to find the iddcx on the windows 2022 server, could it be that is not shipped with the system by default?

[zjoasan]

no, the server 2022 has v.1.7 as system default, but as I said @itsmikethetech is looking into a solution. And you might be a perfect testcase ?

I don't have the hardware to help with this directly