Dell/AW Beta Driver 197.31 (DPC Fix - Driver) - Game Performance Related Discussion

The driver can be found here:
http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/format.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R266107

From notes on the driver download page -

Please post game related questions/NV CP 3D Profile questions in this thread.

The DPC Latency thread should be free of these posts. Posts concerning install of this driver can and should be posted in the DPC Latency thread however specific game related performance issues need to go here.

Typically, driver specifc threads belong in the Side Topics sub forum, however since this is an AW/Dell issued driver and given the reason for its release I am leaving this thread in the Main AW forum.

Some of you may notice with this driver one GPU is not downclocking after exiting a game. Here is what I have found -

Since NV changed the control panel to include the 'Power Management Mode' selection in 3D profiles, there has been a bug where one GPU will not downclock after exiting a 3D application/game. I remember first seeing this in the 195.55 release last November. NV did not fix this bug in 195.62, 195.81 or the 196.86 driver - basically every driver released under the Verde Project.

After looking into this further today, the workaround is to leave the Power Management Mode in Global settings/3D custom Profile set to "Adaptive". Do not set it to 'Prefer Maximum Performance'. If you do, you will see one GPU locked at 3D clocks even after terminating the app. This will persist until system reboot. As far as I can tell, there is no change in game performance from Adaptive to Prefer Maximum Performance settings.

(Thanks to Kade Storm for helping to confirm on his two systems)

 

might want to turn on SLI Indicators in the NV Control Panel. I have not checked Just Cause 2 with this driver as I uninstalled the trial copy of JC2. It could be this driver does not have a valid SLI profile for JC2. Not sure.

You are seeing 80c on both GPUs? What about other games? Same issue or temps are fine?

 

erm both gpus are about 80-90 and i find in general the fans are not right up as high as in 186.xx the fps seems good, occasional latency lag but not too much, but just the temps are hot compared to b4

warhammer online is hitting 70, on both, before i updated it would be 55-63 ish. are those temps ok to play with?

 

temps and framerate are good for me the only issue so far is that I can't run crysis warhead because it crashes instantly

 

what temps you getting? have you tried just cause 2?

 

So what exactly is this? Does this apply to the newer Alienware M17x-R2? Because I dont get any of the problems on my system that it says it fixes.

 

Jared, this is an NVIDIA driver for NV discrete GPUs on the M17x (R1). It does not apply to the R2.

 

mm im getting 104 and 94 now on my 280s with this driver on just cause 2 =/ very worrying lol

 

That is very high, what does your surroundings in reference to your m17x look like..i.e. closed off desk, no ventilation. My m17x at the most only goes as high as 60c with this driver and thats with both gpus full throttle.

 

Agreed - although I have only conducted limited testing in-game, my GPU temps are on par with 186.82. GPUs have yet to exceed 65c.

 

I haven't tried just cause 2 but I'm geting between 58/60 in assassins creed 2 , 60/62 in metro 2033 , pretty much those temps in all games

 

60/62 in metro?what settings are you using.

 

Mmmmm maybe thats why one of my cards in my Area 51 M17x fried???? I was running the newest 197.xx driver that Nividia recomend I use for my 9800s. Should I use this driver instead? How do you tell if one of your cards ar enot down clocking?

 

you can monitor the clocks with gpu-z

http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/SysInfo/GPU-Z/

 

My computer knowledge has many holes in it. What should I be looking for? I have the NVIDIA system monitor that shows temps etc.

 

working great so far with heroes of newerth, on my gtx280m sli

38c idle
36c idle
qx9300 @ 3.06ghz

integrated disabled
sli enabled

no point in trying crysis i guess :/

 

Just Cause 2 Demo is crashing out (App Hang) at various points. FPS seems a bit lower than what I remember when running JC2 with the 186.82 driver.

 

native resolution , medium settings ,dx 10 , strange thing is that with the older drivers my temps were around 67 and also I used to get like 10 frames more since I switched drivers temps are a lot lower but it also lost some framerate still good though

 

no nothins behind my comp, 2 feet from the wall, on a wooden desk! player warhammer the 280s are on 60 degreess but just cause it hits 82 on both! and 64 on the 9400! what u think is up? im not sure i downloaded the latency lag 197 thing, and installed that. should i uninstall drivers via control panel just the display ones, install 186.82, and then the latency fix drivers? help =/

 

Adrian, I think for your situation you should go back to the previous driver. Check temps again - if the same, you know its not the driver.

I dont believe your temps are related to the driver. I'm seeing a max of 64c on both 280s and a max of 56c on the 9400.

Might want to check the intakes and give it a compressed air blast.

 

oki thanks BB, ill uninstall the 197.31 and install 186.82 via ur blog, and check it on just cause

 

just installed 182.82 again, fps gain alot in just cause, but my temps are still really hot, 66 on 9400, and 82 on 280's, lucky i used xbox because the awsd keys are hot to play with =/ i had this issue a while ago and i installed the drivers again n eventually they went back to normal when pllaying cod mw2. what do you suggest BB?

 

i'd sugest cleaning your system with compressed air, if that doesnt help contact support

 

ive checked vents theres not really any dust there. tried fallout 3 on 186.82 and its running 79, and still 85 ish on just cause 2. installed drivers again n again countless, even unintalled my 280's and reinstalled them from afresh and driver sweap! duno whats up! The fans seems loudish but they dont kick in, e.g when u do a bio update the vans rev up! is there any software to kick the fans up? i know for my mac book i used a fan software to kick them up constant

 

adrian, its time to contact support. its not the driver. stay away from third party fan control apps.

 

oki BB i shall phone them tomorrow thnx again for youre help? any idea of a diagnostic which u think is the prob?

 

When you call, discuss current temps and how you are monitoring them. The numbers you posted here are a bit high - they will most likely walk you through their diag process to determine what is going on with your system. They may find the temps are within range. Just talk to the rep and see what they are able to come up with.

I would also take another look at your setup (placement of the system, etc.). You mentioned the intakes and exhaust are clean... Be sure you are allowing for unobstructed free air flow (both intake and exhaust).

 

I'm curious about something...

ever since i installed the beta drivers from Dell i got bad performance in Borderlands (when elemental damage kicks in, most of the time).

Now i have the 197.44 WHQL installed and Borderlands is running flawlessly.

The previous beta drivers messed up some textures in trackmania too...

Anybody else noticed this?

 

I have TM installed, I'll check it out and post back in a bit.

 

Maybe i should give you more details about TM then

you should try a map that has dirt in sunset or night setting. Everything appears to be fine during plain day.

if you could check the grass in nightsetting too.

Let me explain: if i load a replay, TM will first work on the shadows (yellow loading bar). Until then, everything looks fine. Once the loading finishes, the textures (the dirt or the grass) are messed up.

Oh and i run the game with high quality, not very high (dunno if this changes anything).

 

Moving on, played Mirrors Edge to the end, and I used this driver(197.31) towards the end of the game and the performance was alot better my temps held a low 60C, Steam just finished patching Dawn of War 2 so as soon as work is finished im going to run the bench on that game.

 

Played Dawn of War 2 last night, settings on high, gameplay was great on 1200p I also turned off physics. there was some upclocking issues when opening the game from a cold start for example frame stutter but it only happens when the gpus are upclocking but other than that no audio or dpc distoration.

 

Anyone seeing the RE5 benchmark issue with Scene 4? Scene 4 is back to bottoming out FPS - seeing an average of 45 FPS during this scene. On consecutive runs FPS drops down to 30-35 for Area 1. Very odd.

With 186.82 I was hitting 85-86 AVG FPS for the benchmark run, with 197.31 its down in the 70ish range.

Trackmania is fine - no issues with textures.

EDIT: Forgot to mention, I had TM settings maxed out.

 

OK thanks for testing BB!

 

Bat, I got the same bottom out on RE5 section 4 bench, currently playing through the game right now and I have yet to reach the actual scene in the game, so we will see what happens.

 

Team Fortress 2 crashes on load (Vista Ultimate x64)

 

many of my games crashed during load ,strange enough the solution was to start the game from the main folder not from the shortcut (or creating new shortcut) that worked with my games I really don't know why , by the way is it me or gpu2 seems like 2 to 3 degrees hotter than gpu 1 ?

 

does it works with m15x(first gen) 8800GTX?

 

They were certainly right about Crysis with this driver! I get stutters, lag and lower framerates compared with the previous WHQL driver.

Crysis Warhead is even worse, I was getting hard lockups and "video memory manager" bsods after 5 minutes or so of playing it. I've gone back to the last driver and all is good even after 1 hour running it.

I'll just put up with the downclocking stutters for now until "hopefully" they bring a new driver out.

 

I'm getting really bad fps with the 197.31 driver with RE5 fixed benchmark..46 average with P8700 OC 3ghz and Sli Gtx280m.. i wonder whats wrong with it? Does it has something to do with my directX 10 version? I'm running this on Windows 7 64 bit 1920 x 1200 with all high settings at 8XAA. Thanks in advance for the help.

 

I'm running these drivers (197.31) on an M15x GTX 260M and for the most part it fixes all stuttering and other DPC related issues.

I have only had issues with Crysis but everything else seems to work so far. Thanks!!

Before this driver I was considering sending the machine back.

 

I played call of duty modern warfare 2 special ops missions and the market place area had alot of micro stuttering, after a while it was unplayable every ten to twenty seconds it was very annoying.

 

Hi All,

I have a Alienware m17x R1 with Windows 7 (64-bit). I been having the stuttering problems and installed the latest nvidia drivers for the 9400. It has helped stuttering but does not totally eliminate it.

In addition, the HDMI does not work. If I try to connect my external monitor to the laptop, the screen goes blank and the computer freezes. Another thing I noticed, is that when I try to access the NVIDIA Control Panel it pops up a message saying:

"The NVIDIA Display Panel extension cannot be created."

Can anyone help? My warranty expires in 3 weeks...

SupraTT

 

You May want to consider extending your warranty

 

Yes, I may consider doing that. Does anyone else have these issues after installing the beta drivers?

 

Colour me stupid, but exactly what is this driver for? The 260M or the other GPU used for power saver? (9600 i believe)

Thanks

 

anyone know?

 

The driver is for the 260M/280M and the integrated GPU (9600). The DPC issue most people experienced was encountered when the system swapped from the integrated GPU to the 260M/280M.

I experienced no issues after installing this driver, I simply upgraded to this one from the last "safe" WHQL listed on the m17x blog.

 

When I installed this Beta Driver, my wireless Internet connection was not working. Its almost as if it was disabled (which it wasnt).

Any solutions?

I tried reinstalling the driver with no luck. Right now I'm running the windows graphics driver (just formated).

Thanks