New (beta) Nvidia driver 301.42 - 05/22/12

[TechguyMaxC 516]

Nvidia has new drivers up this morning, get em while they're hot. Haven't had a chance to test yet but will try tonight when I get home. http://www.geforce.com/drivers/results/44967

[Guest firehawk44]

Thanks for the HU. They are WHQL, not Beta.

 

Best regards,

Jim

[TechguyMaxC 516]

My mistake. There is also a beta 301.34 driver that was released a few weeks ago, but unless the WHQL driver code actually predates that driver, it only makes sense to use the WHQL driver.

[ohsirus 241]

Cant wait to see if they fixed the Nvidia Surround XPX issue.

[TechguyMaxC 516]

Cant wait to see if they fixed the Nvidia Surround XPX issue.

 

Let us hope. I'm still waiting on my other two 1440P monitors though, so it's not as big a deal for me yet, though I hope they've fixed it for others' sake.

[TechguyMaxC 516]

Some possible good news from the release notes on the new drivers:

 

"NVIDIA Central Display Acceleration: Play single-screen games at full speed on Surround setups."

[ohsirus 241]

Let us hope. I'm still waiting on my other two 1440P monitors though, so it's not as big a deal for me yet, though I hope they've fixed it for others' sake.

 

Negative, still stuck at world init screen :(

[kcmo 2]

do i still need to uninstall my old drivers before installing the new ones?

 

Edit: never mind, i found the nvidia "procedure", which is do NOT uninstall...

[SpiritFlyer 987]

Really like this driver!

[ronski 1]

hi kcmo,

 

actually, Nvidia now have gone back to the old method, ie, uninstall old drivers first from programs and features ( in win 7) or Add remove programs in XP. as detailed in the release notes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Uninstalling the NVIDIA Display Driver Software

Note: It is highly recommended that you follow the steps in this section to completely uninstall

the NVIDIA Display Driver software before updating to a new version of the software.

To uninstall the nView software, follow these steps:

1 From the Windows taskbar, click Start > Settings > Control Panel to open the Control

Panel window.

2 Double‐click the Add/Remove Programs item. ( or programs and features in win 7 )

3 Click the NVIDIA Display Driver item from the list.

4 Click Change/Remove.

5 Click Yes to continue.

A prompt appears asking whether you want to delete all of the saved nView profiles.

• If you click Yes, all of the nView software and all of your saved profiles will be

deleted.

• If you click No, the nView software is removed, but the profile files are saved in the

Windows\nView directory on your hard disk.

 

Your system now restarts.

 

Then select Custom and 'clean' install, unchecking those items you may not need, like 3D or updates etc.

 

Ron.

[Barnstormer1 0]

So what the difference in the driver. I see very little if any over 301.24?

[Iceman2 110]

I see non whatsoever using the 680.

 

 

 

IM

[Guest firehawk44]

The drivers are working well with my 580 but I'm not totally satisfied with the performance even though the release notes say there is a performance increase even for my 580. After installing new drivers, I always run the 3DMark11 beachmark to check out the increase. Normally the score goes up. This time I went from a composite score of 6877 (with the 296.10 drivers) down to 6841. But I see on the 3DMark11 website that my currently installed 301.42 drivers are "not official" meaning, they have not validated the drivers yet (too new). Perhaps when things settle down with the installation of the new drivers, the score will go higher. It is rare when the score decreases though. Back when I first tested my current system with 3DMark11 in April 2011, I had a score of 3977 with the 266.58 drivers. With a high score of 6877, that's a plus of 2900 points or about a 75% increase in performance (with 3dMark11 anyway)! I might add I also lowered my overclock from 48 GHz in April 2011 to the current 44 GHz overclock. Still the score is much higher. It proves to me there are some major improvements with driver upgrades and the techs over at Nvidia are making things better for us with each update.

 

Best regards,

Jim

[TechguyMaxC 516]

The drivers are working well with my 580 but I'm not totally satisfied with the performance even though the release notes say there is a performance increase even for my 580. After installing new drivers, I always run the 3DMark11 beachmark to check out the increase. Normally the score goes up. This time I went from a composite score of 6877 (with the 296.10 drivers) down to 6841. But I see on the 3DMark11 website that my currently installed 301.42 drivers are "not official" meaning, they have not validated the drivers yet (too new). Perhaps when things settle down with the installation of the new drivers, the score will go higher. It is rare when the score decreases though. Back when I first tested my current system with 3DMark11 in April 2011, I had a score of 3977 with the 266.58 drivers. With a high score of 6877, that's a plus of 2900 points or about a 75% increase in performance (with 3dMark11 anyway)! I might add I also lowered my overclock from 48 GHz in April 2011 to the current 44 GHz overclock. Still the score is much higher. It proves to me there are some major improvements with driver upgrades and the techs over at Nvidia are making things better for us with each update.

 

Best regards,

Jim

 

Performance gains by new drivers are almost always relegated to specific programs. If you don't see 3dmark11 listed in the release notes, don't expect any meaningful change there. A 30 point change is not meaningful, in either direction.

[kcmo 2]

actually, Nvidia now have gone back to the old method

 

damn, i guess i'll do it right next time, thanks