Mr. Fox's GeForce 345.20 Desktop Driver Mod for Alienware and Clevo Mobile GPUs

Thank you for your response!

I assume you mean by EVGA the software that allows a user to manually adjust fans' speed, voltage etc? If so, then I never used anything other than NVIDIA inspector.
As I said, installing newer drivers is a problem, because neither my m18xr2 nor nvidia drivers recognize the video card and the only drivers I've been able to install were your two. I assume I need to manually edit the driver installation settings or something, but I'm a complete noob in this thing, so I've been wondering if there's an instruction on this forum for doing that?

 

What you need to do is to mod your nvaci.inf file to include your GPU string. I made a guide how to do that here at the end of the first post.

BTW @Mr. Fox I figured out why my clocks are stuck at 3D clocks. It happens only when I set the global "Power Management Mode" in the Nvidia Control panel to "Prefer Maximum Performance" instead of the default, "Adaptive".

I have no idea why, but I can work around it by selecting "Prefer Maximum Performance" on a per game Profile level instead of using it globally.

 

The NVACI.INF is for another brand, not Alienware. Maybe ASUS or Acer? NVDMI.INF is for Dell/Alienware, NVCVI.INF for Clevo. I actually prefer using the NV_DISPI.INF for desktop driver installation. It doesn't really matter which one you use. The desktop INF mod skips adding garbage registry entries for notebooks and eliminates the need to implement the on-the-fly-SLI mod since desktop drivers do not use the RmDynamicSLI registry key.

@sirana - some kind of background process (service or task) is boosting your GPUs into 3D mode. Using adaptive performance mode can hurt your overall performance. Launch MSCONFIG and disable all non-Microsoft services and reboot. If your GPU runs in 2D mode when it is supposed to, start re-enabling services a couple at a time and reboot. This will help you figure out what is causing it. When you find the service that is causing it you can tweak it. If it is not a service, then repeat the same process with Task Manager. @Matrix Leader was having trouble with this recently as well, and I cannot remember what we disabled to fix it. It might have been hardware acceleration in his web browser configuration.

 

All we did was press FN + 1 on my Phoenix to revert the fans back to auto mode profile rather than full blast but browser hardware acceleration was another culprit of he high GPU usage and it is mostly sucky drivers that cause this. The latest nCRAPIA driver fixed this recently but not for the poor desktop users with a 120 or 144hz display. Lower refresh rates are not affected anymore by this bug

 

I just tried, and unselected all non-microsoft services. After rebooting the clock was still stuck @3D clocks directly after reboot. Just another proof of how crappy the driver support is. Now I'll try modding NVCVI.INF as I always used NVACI.INF, and I'll use DDU to get rid of all registry keys... maybe it will do something.

Because, I just tried using a recent Witcher 3 profile via nvinspector in 345.20 and 347.88, the problem is that there is no GPU profile at all. The card does not throttle anymore, but also heats up indefinitely haha! So strange. Eventually when the card heated up to 87°C and I heard no GPU fan I just hit FN+F1 and killed the game.

 

Be sure to remove your hardware ID from the NVACI.INF file first if you are using the same driver package. If you have matching hardware ID is two INF files it can create strange behavior when installing drivers.

Did you check Windows Tasks also? There could be a startup Task that is causing it.

 

Yeah I did remove it from NVACI, thought there can only be one INF file containing my string.

So far I did not try to disable windows services, but I guess most other users manage to run this maximum performance mode without having to screw with windows services. There is something seriously wrong with w10 nvidia drivers... I will try later to find out with services are safe to disable and check it if changes anything. Thanks for your advice!

 

Thanks Mr Fox. Am glad I found this thread. I have an M17x R3 with a 2960xm and GTX 780M. The latter decided to start throttling to 350 Mhz core clocks recently after a driver update. This coincided with me starting to play Batman Arkham Knight, which is a horribly optimised game on PC. I therefore blamed the game incorrectly. I installed several drivers with no success (modifying my own .inf in mobile version drivers) but never thought to go as far back as this one. I even did a fresh windows install to see if that fixes it and nothing. Now using this driver with no issues.

 

Sweet! Thanks for letting us know. It's the newest driver that I can get to function correctly and it's almost a year old now. Very sad that the nvidiots have abandoned Kepler owners. 780M is still an amazing GPU and they've more or less turned it to a pile of crap with their cancer drivers. It might be incompetence on their part, but most likely they either did it on purpose. Causing Kepler to malfunction is probably part of their business plan to sell Maxwell.

 

Yes, I was very close to just buying a new laptop as I thought the 780M was dead/dying. So you saved me a load of money . I think Nvidia must be doing this on purpose to move sales on the Maxwell+. Very below the belt but this and not the first time they have done it. Back in the days of 320.18 drivers the issues were so bad that many GTX 570s and 580s simply died with that driver set.

 

@Mr. Fox please update the link to mega in OP as the OP link i gave you is dead and i've uploaded a new one:

https://mega.nz/#!zMAiWAoa!1ai4HyFQB-8gBxMEoCIOPWox_a-Nhrr6i7TcdYh95YM

 

Hey Guys, maybe one of you can help me out...
I bought a second hand msi notebook with an gtx860m and found out later on, that the graphic card was exchanged, because i had problems with installing the nvidia drivers. (Win10)
Luckily i found this page, because the drivers of Mr. Fox worked perfectly.
The only problem is, Far Cry 4 doesnt start with this driver, it only starts if I use my intel onboard GPU...
So i tried to install newer drivers, but i really cant figure out how to install them.
I spent hours of reading threads in Laptopvideo2go and other pages and copied these lines in the inf file of all :

NVIDIA_DEV.119A = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 860M"
%NVIDIA_DEV.119A% = Section154, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_119A

(by the way, is the Section number of any importance??)

but the driver installation always fails

what is the difference here to the laptopvideo2go drivers or my modded inf file? And do you have any suggestions what i could do to install newer nvidia drivers or get far cry4 running?
Sorry for my bad english

 

Look, under Windows 10 you have to disable the driver signature enforcement. This is the main reason why modded drivers fail to install.

To disable driver signature enforcement, just run CMD as administrator and copy paste

bcdedit.exe -set loadoptions DDISABLE_INTEGRITY_CHECKS

then press Enter and copy paste this

bcdedit.exe -set TESTSIGNING ON

Enter and reboot the PC. Then you are allowed to install modded drivers, you will be asked during the driver installation if you really want to install the driver from "an untrusted source".

After installation, you can run

bcdedit.exe -set TESTSIGNING OFF

which makes the "Test Mode" watermark in the lower right corner disappear.

 

Thanks for your reply, but I already deactivated the driver signature enforcement.. That's how I could install mr fox driver
But I can not install any newer driver even if I add these 2 lines to the .inf file.. Or is there anything more I have to do?
Best regards and thanks

 

You need to type that in a command line with administrator rights... Not in a Inf...
You shouldn't even be installing these drivers if you don't even know how to handle basic stuff like a command line...

Enviado do meu SM-N9005 através de Tapatalk

 

I know how to disable the driver signature

I copied these two lines to the inf file:
NVIDIA_DEV.119A = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 860M"

%NVIDIA_DEV.119A% = Section154, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_119A

 

Try this. It works and I just recently discovered the command.

Open an elevated command prompt and run the syntax below. Reboot, and DSE should be disabled for good. No need to temporarily disable DSE the old way.

Code:

bcdedit.exe /set nointegritychecks on

I am now able to install modded drivers without having to boot with DSE temporarily disabled. Works on the Sky X9 and Panther with W10 TH2. I've done it probably a dozen time in the past two weeks.

 

Again, disabling the DSE is Not! My problem and I can install mr fox driver,
But i wanted to use a newer nvidua driver so I tried to mod the inf file on my own with this tutorial:
http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=377158

This is what I paste in the STRINGS section of the drivers .inf file:
NVIDIA_DEV.119A = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 860M"

And this in the ntam section
%NVIDIA_DEV.119A% = Section154, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_119A

But the driver installation then always fails:/
Is there any other way ?

 

What is the error message?

Something like could not detect compatible hardware? Or which error message?

 

It gets even past the DSE, but then it just says driver installation failed...
So my own modded drivers dont work


BUT:
1 hour ago I was really lucky because I could install the newest Laptopvideo2Go driver (359.23 ; http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/topic/31260-35923-geforce-msi-mobile/)

Aaaand Far Cry 4 worked now..

Then I tried to run CS GO, which worked with the 345 driver and it doesnt work now....

so CS GO only works with Nvidia 345.20 but Far Cry doesnt
And Far Cry only works with 359.23 but CS GO does not ...

Any suggestions?

Id be so thankful!

 

Until you find a better solution, you could use nvidia inspector to export the CS GO driver profile of 345.20 and import it when running 359.23.

1. install 345.20
2. download invidia inspector
3. export the game profile for CS GO with nv inspector
4. install 359.23
5. import CS GO profile with nv inspector

See if that works. This fixed Witcher 3 for me.
Alternatively, you could do the other way around, getting the Far Cry 4 profile from 359.23 and importing it into 345.20.

 

Sorry for my late reply
I could solve the problem: I took the INF file from Laptopvideo2go and just overwrote the inf file from the newest official Nvidia Driver, so I could install this and now it works

 

Are you using fairly recent drivers? If so, 780M SLI is going to run like crap in an Alienware thanks to NVIDIA's cancer drivers.

Try this if you haven't already: Mr. Fox's GeForce 345.20 Desktop Driver Mod for Alienware and Clevo Mobile GPUs

NVIDIA doesn't care and I think it is safe to say they're never going to fix it. I'm pretty sure they did it on purpose to create the appearance of a wider performance gap to make 980M seem better than it actually is. Between their worthless overclock-blocking cancer drivers and throttlemaster driver crap, they might as well just release drivers that brick every GPU that isn't based on Maxwell. It is interesting that Alienware seems to be the brand most affected, so maybe they paid NVIDIA to screw things up to help them sell new laptops. Whatever the case may be, NVIDIA has to be a pretty slimy outfit to leave their stuff broken for so long.

The million dollar question is, how much longer until they do the same thing with drivers to kill 980M performance and make the next newest GPU seem better. This is what I call "digital genocide" because they are systematically killing their own.

 

@Mr. Fox how does the new Clevo P870DM handles the 980? You use the latest drivers on it? Does it cripple the performance too? I've heard of nvidia throttling the performance via vBios but never read nothing about it.. Wondering if you know anything?

 

Hi joluke. Happy Sunday.

The Sky X9 does not have any kind of GPU throttling problems even with the newest drivers.

 

Gonna send ya a PM that will make you happy (hope so at least lol eheh)

 

What should be done for the new games that require parts from new driver updates? can you make update for 345 to fix performance in newer games? by exporting profiles from newer driver i still loose around 10 fps on fallout 4 by playing on 345

 

Can't we use nvidia inspector to export new profiles, remove the drivers with DDU and re-import them with nvidia inspector with 345.20? Just asking cause i don't use nvidia inspector that often

Or use this tool?

http://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2625/kw/Profile

 

Mr. Fox,

I upgraded my Dell m6800 from a quadro k3100 to a 880m gtx-- your drivers are wonderful-- thank you. The only glitch I have-- is that I've lost ability to pass sound over display port-- I think this is because these packages do not install the HD driver as part of the checklist. I have no visible audio controller for the display port-- only the native laptop speakers. Do you know how I could modify this package or the cfg file to offer to install these? any advice would be appreciated. thanks

 

Disregard-- I got it working-- not sure if it was a driver package tweek-- or when I reassembled my laptop again-- that a cable that mattered got put in the right spot.

thanks again.

 

Hey a fellow M6800 user! The only different your system and mine is I have a 980M GTX!

 

I actually bought the 980m--- I was about to put it in-- but the heatsink did not match it perfectly-- I was not gonna risk mod'ing my heatsink for an upgrade I wasn't sure would work-- esp since you generally can't return these cards after you use them (and 980m is $800- upgrade monkey). so I went with the 880m where I was more likely to be successful BTW-- do you have this hdmi sound issue? it seems my dell won't recognize the hdmi audio device and load the drivers-- on a regular boot. but when I resume from hibernation -- it loads perfectly. easy work around-- so I haven't really looked into it much more. but still curious and would fix if it were easy. I tweaked the driver loading priorities in the registry some-- but did not affect it at all.

 

Haven't tried the HDMI sound, might give it a go later on and see what happens. Yes, you are right about the HSF. It's either you mod your existing HSF or get a version that's already ready to go.

It seems like Dell did produce a different HSF for Nvidia gfx cards for the M6800, but not sure why they never used it or perhaps they did deploy it to the later M6800. Link below.

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Free...Heatsink-For-M6800-CN-0K6D33/32378430617.html

I bought one and it worked for the 980m, no mods needed except you need to remind the seller to include the thick heat pads that is required to reach the small VRMs in the middle.

 

Hello Guys,

I have a question. I'm not going to overclock my GPU's , in that scenario, what are going to be the benefits of installing these video drivers? I'm currently using 361.75 video drivers.

 

Ok, I am not sure what I am doing wrong. I followed the original post and my install continues to fail. I have an AW18 with 780M SLi on Windows 10. I used DDU in safe mode as well as the DSE command. The 344.75 modded driver also fails.


Update:
One more dig yielded then information I needed. Driver is installed now

 

I'll answer to myself. I just installed these driver mod, and so far I noticed:

* I can switch from single GPU to SLI without the need of restart the system.
* 3DMark 11 went from P13826 to P13985

What else is diferent from these driver mod and lastest nvidia drivers?

 

Newer drivers throttle like a son of a biscuit-eater because NVIDIA botched them up super bad for 780M and 880M somehow. If you try to overclock, the throttling is absolutely insane, dropping to 400MHz on core and memory under heavy load.

This mod includes @j95 tweak to enable CUDA encoding, which NVIDIA did away with some time ago. None of the newer drivers have that awesome feature.

I used the desktop driver package and a modded desktop INF for installation. That eliminates the need for finding a model-specific notebook hardware ID and cuts out some of the worthless extra registry crap that desktop GPUs do not use and laptops do not need.

As noted in the opening post...

 

Hi Mr. Fox,
I've seen many of your posts and I'm using your 345.20 modded drivers on my AW M18x R1 with dual 780ms for some time. My question is... Is there any newer driver without throttling problem? I've overclocked my cards before recent reinstall of Windows (+110 Core, +200 Mem, +25mV), but I'm at stock right now, so I would like to know if newer drivers have throttling issue even on stock clocks.

Thanks for reply.

 

I am not aware of any newer drivers that behave correctly. I haven't tested any recently, as my M18xR2 is for sale on eBay and I am not really working with that machine much any more.

 

Hello Mr Fox!
I have one question:
Recently i installed a Nvidia Geforce GTX 880M on my Alienware M17X R4 following step by step your indications.
the GPU was succesful installed, but when i play a game, by moments the fps down to 10~20, so i check that and i discovered that the memory bus clock down from 1250 MHz to 400 MHz, and after few seconds goes up to 1250 MHz again.
Do you know what is happening?

 

Yes. It is power throttling because NVIDIA only produces cancer drivers that ruin Kepler performance for almost a year now. It should not be doing that with this driver. My 780M SLI does the same thing on both core and memory using all drivers newer than this one. Try my other driver mod (344.75) and see if it helps. If you are running the stock vBIOS try the SVL7 vBIOS mod or the 880M vBIOS (stock but different version) that @GodlikeRU provided. Also check in NVIDIA Control Panel and verify your drivers are configured for maximum performance (not adaptive) power management mode. You need to override this driver setting and not choose let the 3D application decide.

 

Not sure if I can add any value here but with my 880's, I actually went bad to stock bios and vbios. Flashed to bios a12 DDU'd and Ccleanered old drivers, installed stock 353.06. I then went into NVIDIA control panel and chose prefer max performance in global settings and then went into program settings and applied that setting for each game individually. Then the PC state setting, power management I sometimes used a high performance profile.

my 880's would throttle but never below 963. Other than that they stayed at max boost except during cutscenes and non gaming moments. After a long time with these cards I ended up quite happy with their performance.

 

Could only get 12k on 3Dmark11 with the 18. I think that is because something keeps knocking my OC off. The fans don't start screaming up, the system hangs and then picks back up but with no OC.

Edit: Display driver keeps dropping out.

 

Hello sir. Fox , I tried the other driver , and performs better than the latest driver , thanks for your help, i will try to modified the bios as you recomended me

 

Kepler cards are throttling on all drivers on all platforms or only on alien?

 

Some Clevo, ASUS and MSI owners have reported similar behavior, but it varies by model and by driver version. It is not consistent, and it seems to be most common with dual GPU systems. I think it is something screwed up with drivers having to do with GPU power management. There seems to be at least a casual connection with drivers released with new code providing Windows 10 support.

 

Hey Mr. Fox,
What is the difference between these drivers '345.20' and the GeForce 353.00 PEG MOD from J95 ?
https://www.techinferno.com/index.p...er-support-modded-inf/&page=12#comment-118520

 

353.00 PEG MOD from @j95 doesn't do anything to correct the 780M SLI throttling. It's probably a more complex mod, too... geared for Maxwell. The magic @j95 does to the drivers needs to stay out of public knowledge or the NVIDIOTS will take steps to make changes to drivers that we don't want them to take. Sometimes it is best to keep secrets a secret for the good of everyone involved.

But, I have tried it and 780M SLI is still broken and unusable with any driver newer than 345.20 for me.

 

Back to 345.20 then !

 

@Mr. Fox, now with Vulkan and VR I feel that sitting on the old 344 or 345 won't work for me anymore. Any plans for a mod of one of the newer drivers?