Pvt. Ryan Posted January 5, 2002 Share Posted January 5, 2002 Ever since I started updating the drivers on my 64MB GeForce 2 GTS my computer's graphics performance has decreased. I can still play CM and stuff, but the frame rate has really taken a hit. I get a much better frame rate on my office computer which is a Dell PII 450 with a 16 MB Voodoo 3 than I do on my Dell PIII 933 system. Both are running Win98SE. I suspect the problem may be that I have a Dell and the NVidia reference drivers may not be fully compatible with Dell's version of the GeForce 2. I am currently running the very latest version of NVidia's driver (from their site) and I am considering replacing it with the old 6.34 driver on Dell's site, since i never had any problems with the original driver. One question is can you go back to an older video driver, and another questions is should I even bother trying this? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted January 5, 2002 Share Posted January 5, 2002 I wouldn't imagine that you would have to run an older OEM driver. To my knowledge there probably isn't anything special about it other than having some Dell-organized tabs. The code should almost be completely the same. How are you comparing the speed between the Voodoo 3 and the GeForce2 ? It's possible that the Voodoo 3 may have better 2D performance (and visual quality). However in 3D performance the GeForce should be significantly faster. Perhaps the 'home' machine needs a clean up. If you've got too many programs/drivers/utilities loaded up along with additional hardware devices you're going to see a slow down. Sometimes a lean, older machine can outperform a faster computer that is loaded with too much 'junk' of one sort or another. You may want to update your video BIOS on your GeForce2. I'd guess that the Dell card just has Dell's name dropped into the BIOS with hardly any other differences from a reference BIOS. Here's a site to download BIOS's for different cards, though I'd suggest sticking to the Reference BIOS's. I couldn't guarantee that it would really offer much for you in terms of performance, but you may never know (be very careful when flashing since you could end up with a corrupted video BIOS and no video if you do it incorrectly). Admittedly the newer drivers aren't always faster than the older ones. But performance is one of the things that gets tweaked, especially with NVidia drivers. There may be other things about your setup that are robbing performance from your home computer that you may be inaccurately blaming on the video card. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pvt. Ryan Posted January 5, 2002 Author Share Posted January 5, 2002 Thanks for the response. The application that confirmed my suspicion of a slowdown is a 3D aquarium screen saver, which can be found at http://www.serenescreen.com/ It can be used as a screensaver, but I run it as an .exe instead, which is how most people use it. It has a fps meter which can be toggled on and off. My home computer gets a fps of 30 at 1024x768 while my office computer get a fps of 70 at the same resolution. With a fully modded CM I used to get a fps of 100 or more, while I now get about 70. I'm not going to try any risky tweaks that might screw up my computer. The only harware I have added to my computer is a USB flash memory card reader, which I don't think should be causing any trouble. It could be that I have too much stuff loaded on my computer. I've had it since August of 2000 and I should probably reinstall Windows 98, but I've never done that before and it sounds like a pain to do. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted January 5, 2002 Share Posted January 5, 2002 If you have FSAA enabled (especially 4X) that will cause a very considerable slow down (and the Voodoo 3 doesn't have anything like it). NVidia only seems to offer 'mip-map' quality levels rather than specific filters, maybe your quality setting is eating up some FPS (though I have no idea what use the benchmark makes of mip-mapping). 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pvt. Ryan Posted January 5, 2002 Author Share Posted January 5, 2002 <blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Schrullenhaft: If you have FSAA enabled (especially 4X) that will cause a very considerable slow down.<hr></blockquote> Bingo. Turned FSAA off and now I have 130 fps in the fish screensaver. Once again you are correct. Thanks! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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