Great read, I read 3D Math Primer for Graphics and Game Development (Wordware Game Math Library) along with this book to cover the math portion in greater depth.

Excellent introduction to DirectX 9.0c. Material is explained very clearly. You need to have at least an intermediate knowledge of C++. What is good about this book is that it also improves your knowledge of C++. I consider myself an average C++ programmer because I only use it occasionally for my work projects but this book has also improved my C++. Strongly recommended as an intro text to Direct3D. Keep a reference book like Deitel's C how to program or Horton's Visual C++ 2008 at hand in case you get lost and you are golden as far as how much you will learn.

This is a very good book for DirectX. The author uses a Framework for all of his examples. I have always been against using Frameworks when learning a new subject, but Luna does a good job presenting it. You must know the ins-and-outs of object oriented programming to fully understand this book.

As far as the code. The code was written for Visual Studio 2005, but you can use it in VS2003 by opening up the .vcproj file in a text editor, (like Notepad), and changing the number at the top of the file from 8.00 to 7.10 (7.00 for VS 2002). Then open the .vcproj (not the .sln file) file in VS200X and re-save everything and your ready to go.

In terms of learning Direct3D and HLSL, this book is absolutely fantastic, 5 stars, can't fault it.
However.
The title is somewhat misleading. This book isn't really about 3D game programming. It's about 3D graphics programming, in a games context. As some others have written, it lacks detailed info on things like how to structure your whole game to bring it all together, how to construct a proper scene graph, or how to implement other important things for a game like collision detection etc etc.
That said, you can't expect to get everything out of one book, no matter what some books try to sell themselves as. So don't let my criticism put you off getting this wonderful text! This is still my number one recommendation for anyone looking to get a D3D book! Just be aware that you're going to need other resources for things beyond the graphical side of your game. But with the amount of books and tutorials specifically for things like AI, game physics etc, and websites like gamedev.net, this is hardly an issue.
In short, buy this book, you won't regret it!

I've been programming for two years now and have relied on online tutorials and sample code for "learning" how to do graphics programming with directX. I needed a basic knowledge of 2D graphics programming for a class, but after a semester of blindly using the directX sprite drawing funtions, I decided to stop, step back, and actually understand directX from the bottom, up.

I purchased this book recently and have been working through the chapters (currently up to the first shader and effects content). I find this book to be a great way to learn to be comfortable with using directX for graphics programming (and some game programming in general with very handy sections on win32 programming for games, input, etc). Like a previous reviewer said, this book is by no means meant to be all about shaders. Instead, this book will give you a strong foundation on graphics with the API with a little taste of shaders. Im sure you could learn all of this content if you got lucky enough to find all the right well writen tutorials, but its very convenient for me to have everything I need in one book.

Recommended if:
- You have never done graphics and wish to take a directX method
- You have done graphics before and want to learn the API (makes a great reference)
- You want a complete 'beginners guide' to graphics for games and game programming with the API

Not if:
- You do not meet the author's prerequesits
- You want a book on shaders