DirectX backwards compatible ?

Rather embarrasing for me. A neighbour wanted me to install a flight simulator on his wife's laptop running Windows 7 with DirectX 11.
He currently has it installed on Windows XP with DirectX 9.0c. After installing from cd to the Windows 7 laptop, the program refused to launch as it was looking for a DirectX 9.0c .dll
I then installed DirectX 9.0c but dxdiag still shows DirectX 11, and needless to say the program still wouldn't launch.
I assume the program will not work with anything but DirectX 9.0c but always thought that that there was backwards compatibility ?
The following from their website support page:-

So, is there no way to get the thing to work on Windows7 ?

 

Did you try to run it in compatibility mode for XP? It may not help but couldn't hurt. What kind of graphics adapter does this laptop have?

 

Thanks, I forgot all about compatibility mode. Will give it a try. Graphics is Intel integated HD, as far as I recall. It runs on the XP desktop without 3D, but of course topographical and other features are not available.

 

Might be the problem.

Anyway, did you install the June 2010 Redist? Might try it if you haven't:
hxxp://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8109

Not sure if this helps, but...
hxxp://www.sevenforums.com/software/192934-there-way-switch-my-directx-version.html