HP Nvidia Geforce Driver 2.00A?

I was browsing the HP downloads page today and came across this new one: NVIDIA GeForce Series Video Driver Version 2.00 A (2008-01-18) (for Vista 32).

My question is: what is it? Is this just a refresh of their 98.15 driver from last summer? Is it built on a newer Nvidia driver, by any chance? Does it provide any other stability benefits besides "Fixes a system compatibility issue with some newly released High-Definition (HD) DVD titles, which causes the HD DVD playback to be corrupted by green blocks"?

I'd test it out myself, but my video driver is working perfectly right now and I don't want to mess with it. I looked around here for information, but no luck. Has anyone installed it yet?

 

i have no clue... hahaha... if you want to test new nvidia drivers, go to www.laptopvideo2go.com

 

i check the inf, and the driver version on the inside is 167.43

compatible devices
NVIDIA_C51.DEV_0244.3 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150"
NVIDIA_C51.DEV_0244.4 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150 "
NVIDIA_C51.DEV_0247.2 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 6100"
NVIDIA_C67.DEV_0531.2 = "NVIDIA GeForce 7150M / nForce 630M"
NVIDIA_C67.DEV_0533.1 = "NVIDIA GeForce 7000M / nForce 610M"
NVIDIA_G72.DEV_01D6.1 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 7200"
NVIDIA_G72.DEV_01D7.1 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 7300"
NVIDIA_G72.DEV_01D8.1 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 7400"
NVIDIA_G72.DEV_01D8.2 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 7400 "
NVIDIA_G73.DEV_0398.1 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600"
NVIDIA_G73.DEV_0398.2 = "NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600 "
NVIDIA_G86.DEV_0425.2 = "NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS"
NVIDIA_G86.DEV_0427.2 = "NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS"
NVIDIA_G86.DEV_0427.3 = "NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS "

 

Huh. So it is a recent, decent HP driver. I might have to install it. Anyone with a dv9000t willing to report their GPU temp with this driver?

 

I installed it and see no diffrence. What does it fix or add?

 

Probably nothing, but one always hopes for slightly smoother performance from a newer video driver. Have you noticed any differences in the behavior of your graphic-intensive apps? Do you have any games that seem to run better (or worse) with this driver? Do you how it affected your GPU temps?

If it is an "official" HP version of 167.43, I may install it myself when I have a spare moment. I can report on how it works then (including temps), but it won't be for a few days.

Anyone else?

 

Okay, late last night, I decided to answer my own question and download this new driver from HP. My verdict: it's awesome, download it now.

Actually, dinapoli is right in that it doesn't do much. My temps stayed the same as before, I can't see any real differences in the desktop performance (though I could swear that some programs, like Outlook, open a little faster), and my Windows Experience score actually went down from 3.3 to 3.2! I haven't noticed any smoother performance (or new problems) playing games, either, but I've really only tried Supreme Commander on medium fidelity at this point. But here are two things that are improved:

- DVD playback seems a little smoother, especially using Windows Media Player, both windowed and fullscreen. (Playback in Media Center seems about the same.) To me, this is a big improvement, because I always felt that DVD playback in Media Player was so choppy as to make the whole program useless for DVDs (especially since Media Center worked so much better).

That might be entirely subjective, but here's the big, non-subjective improvement:

- We finally have a full Nvidia Control Panel! Well, mostly full, anyway. Finally, for the first time in an HP-sanctioned Vista video driver, we have the opportunity to change flat panel scaling, among other things, in the Control Panel! I've been waiting for this for a year, and though some laptopvideo2go drivers had it, those were less-than-ideal solutions for me.

The added scaling option was worth the download alone, to me. It's a big package, but it auto-extracts and installs without having to uninstall your existing Nvidia driver. And unlike some hacked drivers, it has yet to cause me any unexpected problems. Way to go HP!