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Forceware 196.75 whql 10.03.02 [Recalled by Nvidia]

Mark Abdey

By Mark Abdey
in Hardware and Tech Talk

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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nVidia has released a new whql set of drivers today, dated 2010.03.02.

Please try at your own risk... but, please report any issues or improvements if you do.

Win7 - Vista 64bit

www.nvidia.com/object/win7_winvista_64bit_196.75_whql.html

Win7 - Vista32bit

www.nvidia.com/object/win7_winvista_32bit_196.75_whql.html

XP 32bit

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_196.75_whql.html

XP 64bit

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp64_196.75_whql.html

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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"FPS are sky high  :o. But i have spikes and stutters - new round with BP and TBM testing..."

Well, here's a funny thing - I am convinced, with these, I have less of the artefacts associated with running a BP of zero  :) - The Friday Harbour flight I did yesterday, did suffer a few more than other flights, probably due to all the water working things harder, but doing it again this morning I've seen maybe 2 or 3 over the course of a 45min flight.  Frame rates are good, but I can't say if they're any better... unlikely with my CPU bound set-up.

No issues with nHancer applying AA with these, and I'm virtually stutter free... so far so good anyway.

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Valcor Senior Member

Valcor

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Thanks for the heads up. 

Although, I just settled in with the 195.62's as my driver of choice for a stutter free FSX experience.  (95.62 are also rock stable in ALL my other games.  The 196.21's caused hitching in some other Steam games.)

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NaveenB Senior Member

NaveenB

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@ Redline, funny I noticed more artifacts with the new drivers with BP=0, black spikes and texture flashes on my test flight.

I switched back to the 195 drivers.

I recently moved my TBM up to 100 to decrease black texture spikes, maybe I'll have to change it again with the new drivers.

Ugh another round of tweaking...

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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I only have two games installed; Oblivion and ArmA II and both of these are running fine, as before.  I took another -near- faultless flight from Darrington today, so I am pleased so far.

I am running XP 32bit however, so these can be considered different drivers to those on 7/Vista I suppose.

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Guest Northwest Pilot

Guest Northwest Pilot

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Hey RedLine, I also just updated my drivers to 196.75. I need a little advice as far as 3D settings. It's recommended that I untick the anti antialiasing in FSX however, I still get jagged pixels when Antialiasing -  Mode is set to "Override any application setting" , Antialiasing - Setting "16xQ" Antialiasing - Transparency "Supersampling"

Would be very appreciative if you could tell me if these are wrong settings and if any other options might need attention. I finally would like to understand what I'm doing.  :-\

Thanks!

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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Hey RedLine, I also just updated my drivers to 196.75. I need a little advice as far as 3D settings. It's recommended that I untick the anti antialiasing in FSX however, I still get jagged pixels when Antialiasing -  Mode is set to "Override any application setting" , Antialiasing - Setting "16xQ" Antialiasing - Transparency "Supersampling"

Would be very appreciative if you could tell me if these are wrong settings and if any other options might need attention. I finally would like to understand what I'm doing.  :-\

Thanks!

Hi - First, I have to leave the FSX 'AA' box ticked, without it I get no AA at all, even though I'm using nHancer to override it.  I use the 'Combined' mode in nHancer, set to '8xS' - all the other 'AA' associated boxes are left un-ticked.  8xS will give fewer jagged edges, as it removes the stepping on paint decal edges, and other surface that are normally left untouched by other AA modes.  It does come with a performance hit, but nothing all modern cards with lots of vram can't cope with.  You do need nHanser to use it, as it is not available through the nV control panel, and it will automatically override the in-game setting...

Hope this is of some help.

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Guest Northwest Pilot

Guest Northwest Pilot

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I've never heard of nHancer but I just downloaded it. I will give that a try. Thanks for taking the time to respond.

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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I've never heard of nHancer but I just downloaded it. I will give that a try. Thanks for taking the time to respond.

Its very easy to use, and does open-up these modes that are unavailable otherwise... if you do need help, just shout.

Leave most of the 'optimisations' on the second tab 'off' unless you have serious performance issues…apart from 'Negative LOD bias' which is best set to Clamp.

Hope you get on ok with it.

:)

Just to add...These modes will not work in windowed mode

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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Just a heads up!

Blue's News, http://www.bluesnews.com , is reporting that the game developer Blizzard has reported that the new round of nVidia drivers are having problems and they will probably (it looks like they already have) be pulled, mostly to do with fan control and overheating issues.

Not what you would expect from a WHQL set  >:( 

Best to remove them if you have any doubts.

I'm running them with a 'fixed' percentage fan speed using Rivatuner, and that is fine... the problem seems to be with 'auto' control.

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Guest

Guest

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Hmmmmm, I loaded these up yesterday morning and they have been running fine ever since, a few hiccups at the start but I tweaked my settings and they hum along...go figure.  ::)

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tennyson Life Member

tennyson

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I gotta agree with you, too, Dale.

I loaded these this morning and have been painting aircraft all day and not had any problems.

The last set of drivers were shutting down CS4 every now and agin, but didn't do it all day with these drivers, so something is right.

I'm gonna stick with them, anyway.

Frank

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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I gotta agree with you, too, Dale.

I loaded these this morning and have been painting aircraft all day and not had any problems.

The last set of drivers were shutting down CS4 every now and agin, but didn't do it all day with these drivers, so something is right.

I'm gonna stick with them, anyway.

Frank

This issue is not affecting everyone, but if it does go unchecked it really could kill your card.  The problem only seems to occur when using 'auto' fan speed control, which most use as its the default setting.

If you using a fixed, or custom fan profile, then your likely to be ok, but keep an eye on temperatures, or for signs of overheating, such as artifacts... or smoke  :o - yes, some are getting that hot.

For most it would be highly sensible to roll back to your previous driver… this is a very serious issue!

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Griphos Life Member

Griphos

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Can't say I'm too happy about this.  I know I used them at my own risk, and broke my "if the drivers I'm using are fine, don't change them" policy, but was lured by the potential for increased FPS, of course.  Installed them, flew ROF online with my buddies, and had serious graphics problems.  Decided to roll back, and my computer had trouble doing that, and had a couple of errors in the process, leaving my desktop dark.  Finally got the 196.21 drivers back and checked temps and my card was at 80C (and this was after cooling down).  My fan, always on auto and always sufficient to keep the temps in the 60s, was at 30%.  I almost killed my card.  Still don't know for sure whether there's damage. 

I REALLY wouldn't expect this from WQHL drivers.  Worse, the issue seems to still exist even with the .21 drivers.  Fan stays at 30% and temps rise, even idle.  I've set a custom fan profile, but that has to load into memory, taking up more precious space, and is noisy to boot. 

Video drivers are the curse!

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tennyson Life Member

tennyson

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I've just run a few tests and even under heavy load my temps only just snuck into 60 degrees C (on both GPU's, which is nowhere near what some are reporting.

I'm running a 295GTX which is SLI, so maybe it doesn't affect the multiple GPU cards as much.

I've got standard settings (fan on auto) and all is performing well, so for now, I'll just keep an eye on the temps and if needs be, I'll roll back to the previous set of drivers.

Thanx for the heads up tho, guys, that's why this is the best forum in town!

Frank

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Griphos Life Member

Griphos

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I'm pretty sure it only affects the older cards, which tend to run hot, like the 8800 and the 9800, which is what I had.  Finished my new build last night, and so am running the GTX 275 now on the 196.21 drivers, and she's cool as a cucumber.

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micgrech Senior Member

micgrech

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I'm pretty sure it only affects the older cards, which tend to run hot, like the 8800 and the 9800, which is what I had.  Finished my new build last night, and so am running the GTX 275 now on the 196.21 drivers, and she's cool as a cucumber.

I downloaded this driver last week and all is working fine on my GTX 285.  PNW is working a treat....

Should I still revert back to the previous driver?  I don't want to damage my video card!!

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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I downloaded this driver last week and all is working fine on my GTX 285.  PNW is working a treat....

Should I still revert back to the previous driver?  I don't want to damage my video card!!

It seems the problem only occurs when restoring from 'Sleep' mode, so if you shut down rather than sleep, the problem should not occur.

If in any doubt though, it would certainly be better to go back to the previous version.

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Griphos Life Member

Griphos

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It does seem that this has affected the older cards more than newer cards, and the older cards just run hotter.  And it seems to be an auto fan control glitch in the new drivers which keeps the fans at the lowest setting regardless of gpu temp.  So, if you have a newer card, AND you set a manual fan profile, then you're probably fine.  But then, why chance it.  If nVidia has pulled the drivers completely, which they have, I feel safest going with whatever set they have out as the latest approved drivers.

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Mark Abdey Life Member

Mark Abdey

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It does seem that this has affected the older cards more than newer cards, and the older cards just run hotter.

That does not seem to be the case 8, 9 & 200 series owners have reported the problem.... and I'm not sure the older cards do run hotter - my 9800gt idles at 40c and reaches no more that 57c under load, which is not that hot.

To avoid further confusion, perhaps it would be best to close the thread, and maybe open a new one when nVidia release an update.

In the mean time, anyone who feels unsure whether these are safe, please remove them and use and older version.

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Griphos Life Member

Griphos

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Well, I'm just going from the many posts on other specialist forums that report much higher temps with the 8800/9800 cards.  From personal experience, I just have the one instance to draw upon.  I know my 9800 ran in the 50s at idle and got up to the mid 80s under load.  That seems pretty hot to me. 

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