By default, Direct3D does not apply any textures to primitives being rendered. When your application selects a texture as the current texture, it instructs the Direct3D device to apply the texture to all primitives that are rendered from that time until the current texture is changed again. If each primitive in a 3-D scene has its own texture, the texture must be set before each primitive is rendered.
The IDirect3D2 interface required the use of texture handles. With the IDirect3D3 interface, textures are created as individual objects. An application accesses the functionality of textures through the IDirect3DTexture2 interface. For information on obtaining a pointer to an IDirect3DTexture2 interface, see Obtaining a Texture Interface Pointer. Your application can use a texture interface pointer to assign up to eight current textures. For more information, see Assigning the Current Textures.
If your application uses texture handles, it must pass the value D3DRENDERSTATE_TEXTUREHANDLE as the first parameter to IDirect3DDevice3::SetRenderState. The second parameter is the handle to the texture.
Applications can disable texturing by passing NULL as the second parameter to the IDirect3DDevice3::SetRenderState method.