GeForce 2, Windows 2000, and Dell/Nvidia drivers

[Philippe]

I was very excited when I heard that the new drivers eliminate some of the visual oddities in CM, and have recently upgraded my drivers.

I'm sad to report that it has had no effect. I believe the reason for this is that I'm using a Dell-branded version of the video card, and thought it might not be a bad idea to use a Dell-issued version of the driver. As far as I can tell I'm now probably using a version of the driver that's about six months old, though this is a guess based on my cynical estimate of how long it would take Dell to do whatever it is that they do to drivers before they can call it their own.

The installation, as far as I can tell, was successful. There was a terrifying moment when my drivers were uninstalled and my monitor looked horrible. There was another confusing moment before I realized that all my resolution settings had been changed, but everything looked great. If there has been any increase in frame rate I haven't been keeping close enough tabs on it to notice, but then, I haven't played IL-2 recently.

So where is all this leading ? If I want a more substantial effect than what I got with the Dell driver, I'm assuming I need to use one of the Beta versions. This makes me a bit nervous, admittedly, because the Dell branding camouflages the video card model to a certain extent. If I wanted to play it safe I suppose I could wait six months and, if I don't forget (and I won't), install the driver that people seem to be installing now after Dell gets around to releasing their own version. But if I don't want to wait, what are my options ? Is it safe to slap the latest beta version of a driver onto my system ? How would I know if there were compatability issues ? Can I do damage to my system if I apply the wrong driver ?

[Schrullenhaft]

To fix the issues with Windows 2000/XP you'll need to upgrade to drivers based on the 26.xx and 27.xx or later series (which are still beta). OEMs like Dell are often many versions behind even the official version (which is still 23.11, which DOESN'T fix the problem).

It is usually rare that an OEM like Dell will substatially modify their card to the point that the Reference drivers will not work with (but it does happen on occasion). One of the differences is usually in control panel features and other little pieces of software that aren't standard to the Reference driver.

In your case I would assume that it should be alright to use one of the latest beta drivers (since in this case it actually fixes the problems that CM has). Dell has some Taiwanese company manufacture their video cards and they basically just brand the Dell name in the BIOS. There have been BIOS upgrades to the GeForce (and TNT) families of video cards, but few vendors usually offer them. I have no idea if these video BIOS updates affect anything in the video drivers. Whatever the case may be I would suggest uninstalling your current drivers (beta, Dell, whatever), since it seems either certain .DLLs or registry enteries affect the effectiveness of the new drivers (in other words you won't see the fixes with the latest beta driver if you don't uninstall your current ones).

[CJMello]

Schrullenhaft, I recently upgraded to DirectX 8.1 and then did my soundcard drivers. I was concerned about my video card drivers because I had heard awhile back that when you upgrade Dx it may cause a slight problem with your video drivers.

I have a Geoforce2 GTS 32mb with the detonater drivers 23.11. I though I corrctly did the proceedure to uninstall and reinstall. Here is what I did:

UNinstalled the 23.11 drivers in Add|Remove programs. Ran the detonator destroyer to fully remove the drivers. Then restarted and installed the 23.11 drivers again, restarted, except that nothing happened. Tried again to no avail. So I tried to install the original drivers from the CD that came with it but now I not booting beyond the Win98 screen. I can get that sorted out eventually but what is the correct proceedure to uninstall the detonator drivers and installing.

Thanks,

[ March 03, 2002, 12:20 PM: Message edited by: CJMello ]

[Schrullenhaft]

Uninstalling your video drivers depends on how they were actually installed. If you ran a setup program to install the drivers, then running either an uninstaller or using the Add/Remove Programs control panel to remove it should work. The probelm is if any of these drivers and .INF files are left in Windows, then the device will be redetected and the same drivers will be reloaded. To avoid this involves some time consuming steps.

If you're running Windows 9x/ME, then you can use a utility called Detonator Destroyer, which should remove the offending files completely. You can get it from Guru3D (Videocard Drivers > NVIDIA detonator drivers > it's at the top of the list).

However if you're running Windows 2000 or XP, then you'll have to perform some manual removing. Looking through your Windows directory (WINNT for Win2K/XP) there should be an INF directory. Look in here for any files that may be associated with NVidia, usually they'll be in the OTHER directory, but it is possible that they'll be listed in the main directory (which will involve a lot of manual searching be opening the INF files). By removing the INF file Windows won't be able to reinstall the older drivers automatically. The next thing to do is to remove the drivers themselves. For Win2K/XP go to the SYSTEM32 and SYSTEM32/DRIVERS directories and search for all files starting with NV*.*. This should net you all files that deal with NVidia, but you'll want to check the properties of each one before deleting it to make sure it isn't some other file. With these files deleted you should be able to install a fresh set of drivers. However there may be some Registry editing that could be necessary.

[Trashcan]

So, I have a question on the same sorry topic. I'm running a Dell Laptop, and most of the drivers in discussion here seem to be aimed at desktop systems? Will the 27.42 driver, for example, run on a GeForce2Go system, or should I just hunker down and wait for the offical Dell release ... Sigh.

I'm running the latest Win2K drivers from Dell, but I'm getting the text corruption problem still. I'm reluctant to mess around too much in the system, but the directions provided thus far sound reasonable enough ... assuming, of course, there are drivers available to replacxe those I am going to remove.

Thank you kindly for the help.

Stu

[Harv]

Trashcan,

I'm running the 27.20 drivers on my i8000 w/GF2Go and they work perfectly in CM and IL-2.

I got them from Guru3d and used the Integrated GPU drivers. I haven't worked up the nerve to try the 27.4x and higher yet though as I really hate to ruin a good thing.

Hope this helps.

Harv

[Schrullenhaft]

Edit: Well, I guess I stand amended. I realized that the families were close, but I was afraid that there would be a certain difference which would prevent the desktop drivers from working with the laptop chipset. The above advice might not work for every GeForce2 Go chipset implementation, but it would definitely be worth a try especially if you're running a Dell apparently.

You can go to the Guru3D site listed above to download drivers for the Go video chipset. They are different from the desktop drivers which you can't use with that chipset. Unfortunately what is posted there may be what you're already using (21.83 - which ironically comes from a Dell source). I'm not sure what the 16.30 driver will do for you.

I'd guess that the Go drivers are very close to their desktop cousins in terms of fixes and performance increases. If that is the case you'll have to wait until NVidia releases one of the 27.xx series drivers as WHQL/Official and then Dell will probably release a Go driver update within a few months.

[ March 04, 2002, 12:49 PM: Message edited by: Schrullenhaft ]

[CJMello]

Schrullenhaft, I pretty much did as you said including the detonator destroyer from guru3D.com. Its just when I went to reinstall nothing happened.

[Trashcan]

Thanks very much folks. I'll probably give one of the .42 drivers a go and see if they work. That failing, I'll just hold out for the new official drivers ...

Much appreciated.

Trashcan

[Schrullenhaft]

CJMello, when you say you 'go to reinstall and nothing happens' what do you mean ? Is there a setup program that you run, it completes and you reboot and you still have the same generic driver or something (i.e. - your drivers don't get updated) ? Which driver are you attempting to install ?

[CJMello]

Originally posted by Schrullenhaft:

CJMello, when you say you 'go to reinstall and nothing happens' what do you mean ? Is there a setup program that you run, it completes and you reboot and you still have the same generic driver or something (i.e. - your drivers don't get updated) ? Which driver are you attempting to install ?

What I did was to reinstall the drivers. So I removed 23.11 via add|remove programs and then used the detonator.

Booted and reloaded the drivers via the program for 23.11 and booted.

Nothing has changed and my screen is as if no divers are loaded.

Anyway back to the original ones now but want to get back to 23.11 without problems.

[Schrullenhaft]

CJMello, how come you're removing and then reinstalling the same drivers ? What OS are you running, Windows 2000 or XP ? Basically the 'transparent white' problem will remain until you upgrade to a 26.xx or 27.xx series driver.

When you reinstalled the drivers, did the process look like it was actually doing something ? I assume that your 23.11 drivers have their own installer/setup program ?

[CJMello]

Originally posted by Schrullenhaft:

CJMello, how come you're removing and then reinstalling the same drivers ? What OS are you running, Windows 2000 or XP ? Basically the 'transparent white' problem will remain until you upgrade to a 26.xx or 27.xx series driver.

When you reinstalled the drivers, did the process look like it was actually doing something ? I assume that your 23.11 drivers have their own installer/setup program ?

OK, my OS in Win98. I had installed the 23.11 over the very old drivers via the program (2311) downloaded from guru3d.com. The reason I wanted to reinstall the drivers was I had updated DirectX to 8.1 from 8.0 and had heard it was best to reinstall after updating DirectX. Anyway I noticed some stuttering in a 3D game. True or not I uninstalled 23.11 and used the detonator destroyer and booted. Then applied 23.11 again and booted and still had the white screen.

I then attempted to use the disk that came with the card (screwed it up somehow and lock up my system-fixed by a pro:() and now I am back to very old drivers (0533)I plan to do the 2311 again but wanted to be sure of the uninstal process when I want to upgrade from 2311 to better drivers.

To answer your other question when I installed the 2311 drivers it didn't appear to do anything at all and I was left with white screen.

BTW, thanks for your effort.

OS Win98

PIII 1,000

512RAM

[ March 05, 2002, 10:36 PM: Message edited by: CJMello ]

[Philippe]

Now that Winter Wonderland is essentially finished and off to the testers I've decided that it actually is time to update my drivers. I'm embarassed to admit that a couple of weeks ago I knew where to look for the Beta versions of these drivers, but now it escapes me (add this to a growing list), even after using the search engine.

I could have sworn MadMatt had a thread on this on the non-technical board, but for some reason I can't find it. Could you tell me where I can download these from ?

[This is really embarassing. I've even been to that site and actually started to download them about six weeks ago before I chickened out.]

[Tanks a Lot]

Originally posted by Philippe:

Now that Winter Wonderland is essentially finished and off to the testers I've decided that it actually is time to update my drivers. I'm embarassed to admit that a couple of weeks ago I knew where to look for the Beta versions of these drivers, but now it escapes me (add this to a growing list), even after using the search engine.

I could have sworn MadMatt had a thread on this on the non-technical board, but for some reason I can't find it. Could you tell me where I can download these from ?

[This is really embarassing. I've even been to that site and actually started to download them about six weeks ago before I chickened out.]

You should be able to find them here Guru 3d

[Philippe]

Still not having any luck, or rather, still tending towards the cowardly side. What I found on that Guru site was a bunch of Detonator drivers, which looked very close to what I need, but I wasn't sure.

Is Guru3d the best site for what I want, or should I be looking elsewhere. The funny thing is is that it doesn't like the site that I remember visiting when I first heard about the drivers.

[Tanks a Lot]

Originally posted by Philippe:

Still not having any luck, or rather, still tending towards the cowardly side. What I found on that Guru site was a bunch of Detonator drivers, which looked very close to what I need, but I wasn't sure.

Is Guru3d the best site for what I want, or should I be looking elsewhere. The funny thing is is that it doesn't like the site that I remember visiting when I first heard about the drivers.

Reactor Critical may be the site you remember.

Reactor Critical

I've been using the 27.10 drivers without any problems. There are newer ones out that should also work fine. It doesn't matter which site you download them from.