There are some drawbacks to this approach.

(OpenGL is the 3-D Application Programming Interface (API) that Macs use to display graphics.) Windows DirectSound audio is translated to Core Audio, the technology Macs use to produce audio effects.

Windows-specific DirectX graphics, for example, are rendered as OpenGL objects. To that end, the Cider translation layer takes Windows-specific instructions for rendering graphics, sound and other information and provides a Mac equivalent.