Nvidia Beta drivers 266.35 released

at last. new beta drivers.

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whql as soon as possible please nvidia

 

These are almost whql, manuelg said that they didint want to wait for ms to whql them. Certified and passed internal testing as well.
Im using those since a few hours and had some gaming with them too, they work awesome.
Benchmarks up in a minute with my xps in sig.

 

Ok i did some benchmarks.

System used is my old xps m1730
9800m GTX Sli 600/1500/900
X9000 C2DX @ 3,8Ghz
4GB RAM DDR2 667mhz

Mafia II - 1200p - No Physx - Max Settings
266.44 No AA: 46.3
266.44 AA: 32.4
266.35 No AA: 48.6
266.35 AA: 35.4

Crysis Benchmark - 1200p - High Settings - x64 dx10 v1.2.1 - No Tweaks, plain vanilla:
266.44
Island Full Run x3
Max FPS: 43.5 Avg FPS: 28.9

266.35
Island Full Run x3
Max FPS: 45.6 Avg FPS: 34.3

GTAIV EFLC The Ballad Of Gay Tony
AA 16x - Max Settings Possible - Draw Distance 1 (Timecyc.dat tweak) - Detail Draw 50 - Cars 50 - No Vsync - No Clear Image Filter (Blur MSAA ON)

266.44
Avg FPS 21.94

266.35
Avg FPS 22.14

Dirt 2
Ultra Quality - 1200p - 8xCsaa

265.90
Frames, Time (ms), Min, Max, Avg
3409, 80465, 29, 57, 42.366

266.44
Frames, Time (ms), Min, Max, Avg
3869, 84646, 23, 164, 45.708

266.35
Frames, Time (ms), Min, Max, Avg
3880, 84646, 25, 164, 47.516

3dMark06 - Default Settings - 1280x1024

266.44
Score 15.129

266.35
Score 15.232

F1 2010 - Patch 1.01 - 1200p - High Settings - 8xMSAA - No Vsync

265.90
average min_fps="27.655655" av_fps="33.471832" min_fps_ms="36.158970" av_fps_ms="29.875866"

266.44
average min_fps="26.961262" av_fps="30.508467" min_fps_ms="37.090252" av_fps_ms="32.777786"

266.35
average min_fps="25.778444" av_fps="34.022480" min_fps_ms="38.792099" av_fps_ms="29.392332"


--------------------

So yeah. COD BO gpu usage hovers from 67 to 96, AVG fps 45 with 1200p, 8xAA, all max details with no vsync. As long as i drop AA gpu usage also drops, so i didnt took the tests in account. Hope it helps someone.

 

thanks for posting kingpinzero.

lets hope they work for all the 400^ users.

edit report: loads on 460M without any problems

 

^^ no problems on my 460m as well. Brightness works and everything!

 

Loads on my 335m with Optimus just fine

 

yay,looks like nvidia have listened to its customers

anymore cards loading with no problems?

 

i hope these play nice with the M17x R1.

 

Dollars to doughnuts says my 8800gts on my HDX loads fine as always, but experiences random lockups in a variety of programs...most notably IE8. Has happened on every driver since 2xx.xx series started.

Oh well, will see when I get home from work tonite and report back.

 

It works fine with my 280M. 5-10 FPS increase than the previous one.

 

Ya not the only one also a HDX owner, seems to be when the card down-clocks after gaming it locks up the full system..

Let us know how you get on as I cba to change them again just to change them back lol

 

Do i have to install the inf file for these drivers?. I have a Toshiba Qosmio X500 with gtx460m and cant use drivers from Nvidia site, so i wounder if anyone could tell me how to install them?. Now i have the 265.90 from "laptopgo"

Thanks in advance

 

They seem to be 100% the same as 266.44 ??

 

Why can't you use the drivers Audi4ever? Did you try to install them? I'm guessing it's the same thing I had with my XPS 14 where the id strings weren't in the last driver package from Nvidia. Try to install them and if it fails just mod the .inf file and install

 

This is the message from Nvidia site "The manufacturer of this system requires that you download the driver for your GPU from their support site"

Think i wait until they can be downloaded from laptopvideogo

 

Well guys my opinion on the driver now that I've had a chance to test it in benchmarks and games is that this is a major fail on Nvidia's part. The 425m in my signature nets a whopping 50pts more in 3dmark06 than the Dell driver(which is ridiculous), is choppier in games with about the same FPS as the Dell, and makes the card run 4-6 degrees hotter. I'll stick to the modded 266.44 desktop drivers. Major fail Nvidia, major fail.

 

^^ really DaneGRClose? I'm actually getting better performance out of them on my 460m. Weird.... it improved my 3dmark Vantage score by 200 points (over the clevo driver released a day or two ago), and slightly improved my FPS in Black Ops (3 FPS or so better). The temp stays about the same. The thing I'm happiest about is that i can adjust the brightness finally while in Windows!! Maybe my lappy is weird...but just my two cents.

 

50 points in 3dmark06 means nothing but 200 in vantage is quite a jump.
be interesting to get more members feedback on the 400^ cards

 

Audi, have you already tried to install it? I couldn't install 260.99 from nvidia website, it told me same thing. I'm downloading 266.35 right now. I might be wasting my time and it won't install too.

 

You try first and reply later

Anyway we could download them very soon(hopefully) at laptopvideo

 

as far as i know there was problems with 260.99 loading on 300^ cards but so far these betas seem to of rectified the problem but only time will tell when more test them.

 

Audi, yes I just downloaded the driver from Nvidia site, then I downloaded the modified INF from laptopvideo2go.com, I believe it's the modified INF 4.058, the one that's right above the Toshiba 265.89 driver on the homepage of laptopvideo2.go. I then extracted the 266.35 drivers and copied and replaced the nvtd file in the display.driver folder that's found inside the extracted 266.35 folder. After that I double clicked the setup icon that's found in the extracted folder and now it's allowing me to install. I just had a successful install and now I'm gonna see what kind of performance increase/decrease this gives me. The modified INF should allow you to install any Nvidia driver onto the Toshiba notebook.

 

Wow! The only game that taxes my new Toshiba X505 Q892 with an intel i5 and Nvidia GTX 460m is Battlefield Bad Company 2. In multiplayer every level with maxed out settings I get a smooth and playable 30-50 fps, the only levels that upset me because of the choppiness when things get hectic are the snow levels that drop below 26 fps because of the fog and snow effects that take a toll on the already overworked GPU.

These drivers hold my average fps on the problematic snow levels above 26 fps most of the time making the game very smooth even when I have many things happening on screen, since 26 frames per second is the magic number for fooling your eyes into perceiving fluid motion. Anything below that and you'll get lag and choppiness and totally ruin the experience because you break the illusion of being immersed in a virtual world. Anyone that says," 26 fps! yuck!" doesn't understand framerates, because 60 or even 100 fps means nothing if your system can't sustain above 26 fps, the point at which your eyes are already fooled into believing fluid motion, anything above that is just overkill.

Anyway as far as these drivers go, which is my second update from 265.89, are a keeper until a certified one comes out. Oh, I did experience a blank white screen when typing this and I had to ctrl+alt+del to close out BFBC2, but because these drivers are beta, I understand and will stick with it just because of the performance increase. I'm starting to get excited about this Nvidia GTX 460m, BFBC2 all maxed out 32x AA, 16x AF, HBAO on and all settings on High, ever level playable and smooth! and this is only the 2nd unofficial graphics driver I've tried.

 

NOOOOOOOO! I keep on getting the white screen crashes on BFBC2 with these drivers. I don't want to give up the performance increase T_T

 

For those with white screen using bc2, drop your AA.
Nvidia aknowledged that theres a bug in this beta driver that prevents any game to play correctly with AA above 16x. As for bc2,play it with 4xAA.
Besides using 16xAA on a laptop is stupid,theres no room for power even with sli or crossfires setups, not to mention gtx460m (this given the fact youre running at native screen res like 1200p or 900p).

 

nice one jacob. normally nvidia are like busses and as soon as one comes along the next is not far behind so that will be whql.

 

according to my windows 7 control panel, device manager, display driver properties, this is the official Toshiba 265.89 drivers. Hmm, I think Nvidia is building off of that version for an official release for other notebook manufacturers. So if I get another crash from these then I'll install the 265.98 drivers, although they're a lil bit slower than these, and they're not officially from the Toshiba site but from laptopvideo2go.

 

thanks guys, Kingpin can you link me to the site where Nvidia acknowledges the white screen crash with anything above 16x AA, I'd like to read up on it. And thanks again for the info about using to much AA. The only reason I do it is to see if my system can handle all the games I have at maxed out settings. I'll probably take your advice, since I don't see much improvement with having it at 32x AA.

 

You installed with another inf file and not with the original from 266.35!
The inf file contains the information shown in device manager.

 

lol oh that's why? hmm ok then I'll just have to wait for laptopvid2go to upload the drivers and modified inf, but anyway it's still working on my notebook albeit wrong version number.

 

Well, this is what i just posted over on the nVidia forums for bug reporting this driver. Obviously another fail:

Anyone have issues with lockups, particularly in IE8? This has happened with every other driver since 2xx.xx began. I have to stay below 2xx series. The really bad thing is some of the drivers have actually performed very well across all other programs...at least when I take the time to try them out past browser fail.

Anyway, symptoms and hardware are as follows:

Laptop lockup- no blue screens, but I get a little choppiness just prior to lockup. This happens almost exclusively in IE8(Firefox as well, that's what is even more puzzling), although a couple of PDFs have done same thing. Usually happens within a few seconds, but has gone as long as 5 or so minutes before lock-up. If I stay away from browser,machine can run all day, no problems except occasional PDF fail.

Driver- Currently 266.35 BETA, but issue happens across all 2xx.xx series drivers (will be reverting to last, best driver of 197.45).
Laptop- HP HDX Dragon
GPU- 8800m GTS
Device ID- PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_0609&SUBSYS_30D4103C&REV_A2
OS- Win7 64 Premium
CPU- t9300(2.5ghz)
RAM- 4 Meg

Thanks for any insight.

 

maybe because your GPU? I heard somewhere that Nvidia says it's best to stick with drivers that came out at the time when your video card came out. Using drivers after that series won't really increase performance much and may also cause problems and loss of performance.

 

REALLY??? By that logic, I should be back around 167.xx or so. 197.45 and preceeding never gave me any problems, and in fact, improved performance greatly over the drivers available at the time I got my machine. Besides, I'm a firm believer in the old addage that if you say your product can do something, you better dam* well make it happen, and this driver (as have previous 2xx.xx series) says it supports my GPU.

 

It states it supports your gpu but Nvidia is definitely going to gear the actual driver build towards newer cards(4XXm, 3XXm, etc) cards. The newer cards are going to have different tollerances, and different requirements than older cards. Your 8800m is what like 5 or 6 generations back? If Nvidia continued providing absolutely stellar support and constant performance increases on older products a lot of people would never buy the new ones. I would say the future releases are probably only going to get bleaker and bleaker for guys running 8XXXm series and possibly even the 9XXXm series cards, sorry man

 

Not exactly the point. I don't expect to have the performance of a 460m, or even a 260m, and it's not remotely realistic to expect that. I do, however, like to tinker and find the sweet spot for best performance, temps, and what have you. All I'm saying is that if a product says my hardware is supported, it should function properly. If they came out and said "hey, we can't get older GPUs to work properly with newer drivers so we are dropping them from the being supported list", then I would accept that and move on. However, on various forums, other people with different rigs and GPUs as old as mine (8600,8700,etc) are reporting that their setups run fine.

I didn't really post the comment to open a debate, only to post my results and recent history with this series of driver.

 

I'm not going to argue with you on that point hovercraftdriver, unfortunately not all tech companies are fully forth coming with the facts. Most of their sales would be killed if they did.

 

Personally i think the problem lies with that since the 200 series of drivers they include the DPC latency fix, i don't think the HDX agrees with this and thats whats causing the problem, as I can game for hours with the new drivers but as soon as the card clocks down it locks up the full system.

 

can't wait til this driver gets certified. i would love to check them out with my 480m.

 

Did you run DriverSweeper or something similar before install?
Did you already a fresh install of Windows 7?

 

I always do the first one, even though it shouldn't be required if drivers removed correctly, especially with new installer package that offers "clean install".

I have seriously considered clean OS install, but alas, such a pain, too little time, blah, blah...I may get around to it soon. But then I think why, the machine runs great except for this problem.

Thanks for the input.

 

In my case, I decided to stick with the original driver 186.40 which is quite old.

I have tried 186.82, 197.45 and 198.05 as those drivers downclock, which is great for my 260GTX as it runs quite hot. They all worked fine, but I started having some audio pops and cracks problems occasionally.

And then, I tried the latest driver. But, the display setting Fn key function stopped working. I use those keys quite often as I can change the display setting easily and quickly. I use laptop's monitor for gaming. It's just a 1366 x 768 screen, but games looks better on the native resolution than the lowered resolution on my external 1080p monitor. It's also easier on my 260GTX.

Anyway, I'm back to 186.40.

 

Everyone over nvidia forums and guru3d forums are experiencing the same problem, bc2 and alot of other games goes whitescreen with AA @ 32x,16x and 8x. So far the stable is 4x seems.
As for the AA hit over gpu, as i said, its a matter of desktop cards mainly. On mobile cards, the best you can use is 4x imho. First, because the performance hit is reasonable, and second because in conjuction with native res of your panel it nearly kills any aliasing artifacts.
High resolutions=more defined image, so no need for huge AA. As an example, i do run everygame in my m1730 @ 1200p, often the best i can achieve is 4xAA or 2xAA. If i crank up the value theres no visual enhancement of sort, its really hard to spot any differences.
Also try to take advantage of nvidia personal AA system, the xCsaa.
As an example, the 8xCsaa have the same performance hit of 4xAA while keeping the eyecandy effect on par with 8xAA because of its particular AA system which is proprietary (4xAA+4x Coverage Sampling on edges).

 

This beta finally re-enabled 3D Surround for 2xx cards.

Darksiders Tri-Screen Love

 

What's so different from the 266.44 and 266.35? It seems like the 266.35 is slightly better.

 

The leaked was mainly focused on gtx580 cards and seems to be a newer branch than 266.35. Less optimized, more than an experimental driver.

 

I just tried these on my G860 and noticed less performance in the form of increased stuttering. I think the newer Drivers are only good for newer cards so I am going back to Microsoft 198.05 WHQL for my GTX 285M. I doubt I will bother trying out any more new drivers.

 

tbh i stuck with the 186.81 for ages as imo they have been the best nvidia had released so far. still using the 9800GT and like you the latest drivers wont make much difference i dont think.

 

It depends what games you play and how recent they are too. With 186.81 I found I got a lot of stuttering in GTA IV and crashes in Empire Total War as well as artifacts in Battlefield bad Company 2. All of those issues don't occur with older more recent Drivers.