Best drivers for GeForce 260M

What's the best driver for the 260M in a Sager np8662? I had the latest nVidia drivers installed and got 9765 in 3dmark06, but the other day I uninstalled those and installed Dox's 185.85 driver since I'd heard it gave the best performance. Now I'm only getting ~9500.

Not a big difference, and won't really matter in real-world gaming performance, but just out of curiosity - what driver should I install (and what else could I do) to get the absolute best performance out of my card?

 

Dox drivers aren't designed for benchmark optimization so it won't necessarily improve 3DMark scores. They are designed for better performance in game so most people see some improvement with them.

As for the decrease in score, which part decreased? Is it the CPU, SM2, or HDR score?

 

stick with the 185.85 driver. 3dmark06 is just a benchmark.

 

Actually those scores are quite good for your setup, i scored 10500 odd with the stock drivers and after installing 186.03 drivers i went down to 10124 but in game performance increased considerably, so your scores are fine enjoy the machine.

 

Thanks - I haven't actually done any gaming since I installed the Dox driver, but I'll see if I notice any improvement. As for the decrease, all of the scores decreased - not sure how I could explain the CPU score decreasing though.

And thanks for all the help, everyone! I guess I'll stick with the Dox drivers for now, unless anyone else has anything to add.

 

If you want the biggest numbers in benchmarks, go with the 179 drivers. If you want the most performance stability in games, go with Dox 185.85 or 186.03 WHQL.

 

Dox 185.85 gives me the best performance in gaming, even better than the official Nvidia 190.XX series.

 

First off never look to a synthetic benchmark program like 3dmark to tell you which driver has the best performance. That will only tell you which driver has the best performance in 3dmark NOT in real games which you should care about WAY more than how your 3dmark runs. My advice is get rid of 3dmark all together and bench in your games as lots of them have benchmarks built in. I remember when I was playing FarCry 2 that a driver I was using that gave me about 3 more fps on average killed my 3dmark score about 400 points from the last drivers and I said to myself, "why the hell am I benching in 3dmark?".

Grab the 190.56 as they are just kicking so much for me and bench away in some of your games; a few to note with internal benchmarks would be : Company of Heroes, Unreal Tournament 3, Half Life 2, FarCry 2, Dawn of War II, Trackmania United Forever, Lost Planet Extreme Condition and much more I just can't think of right now.

Also to note I found the DOX drivers were fantastic when he kept them up to date, but now since they are fairly dated if you plan on playing current games I get better FPS out of the 190.56 than any of the DOX because they are designed and tweaked around the newer games and the old DOX drivers don't have those optimizations and bug fixes needed for the best current games experience. For example I could not push 29 FPS in the FarCry 2 benchmark with any of the DOX drivers with my favoured settings and the new 190.56 gives me 31FPS which I realize is not a huge difference, but hey its something! Also with your newer 260m card you should only use they newest drivers because with each driver they will understand and optimize them for your card as it is new; old drivers should be shunned with newer hardware as they don't have the code and optimizations required for the best gaming experience with your new card.

Hope that helps!

 

I have the GTX 260M and I am running Dox Optimised 185.85. I have Far Cry 2 at 1680 X 1050 resolutions, high settings, medium shadows and I ran the benchmark just now. My average fps was 48.55, highest was 66 fps and the minimum was 36.78. Those Dox drivers perform fine and when I tried the newer 190.XX, I got stuttering in GTA IV and little if any noticeable performance increases in other games.

What are your favored settings in Far Cry 2?

The Dox drivers are still fantastic and he keeps them up to date but he has just stopped updating them for XP as far as I know.

 

get the latest 186.03 official drivers from nvidia HERE

 

I know this thread is 4 months old, but hate to create a new thread for same topic.

So are the 185.85 DOX optimized still king?

Will be receiving a Sager NP8662 in a couple days, specs: 260m, P9700 2.8, 4GB, and Windows 7 64-bit will be installed.

 

This question should have been posted in here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=258626

Thanks . . .