New nVidia drivers & NWN

Themicles · Post by **Themicles** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 12:46 pm

Dirk Cutlass wrote:Well I tried it - no detectable effect on my old GeForce video card. I guess if I was clever (and less impatient) I should have checked the fps before and then after to see if it made any improvement! Maybe I'll wind-back to the old version and try it out.

Even if there is no improvement I always like to keep drivers up to date, just in case they've fixed any bugs or something.

You likely wont see any noticeable affect with NWN.
It very much so appears that they did optimizations with certain cards and certain games.
While the driver architecture is unified, each card does differ to some degree. Games can have problems on one card and not the other. Or not perform as well on a specific card, as it should.
For instance... I got a good 5-10 FPS gain in America's Army (Unreal Tournament 2003 engine), but almost no gain in NWN.

-Themicles

CPU · Post by **CPU** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 4:44 pm

I've got an Nvidea GeForce4 Ti 4600, and downloaded the new drivers. Last time I did this with the ver. 52.16, it crashed Windows XP continually on boot-up until I took them out and put the old ones back in.

So far, this new version - no problems. I noticed the dreaded lag bats in the cyrpts on the outskirts of Mikona (by the Bored Gargoyle Inn) are less laggy then before, but still a little laggy. And *only* in NWN, the blue color is more purple/blue. Area transitions are almost purple. Go figure?

_LuCkY_ · Post by **_LuCkY_** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 5:11 pm

The new drivers are helping me a lot. I have a Geforce4 ti4400. Especially when there are a lot of special effects on the screen such as smoke and other consuming effects I have no lag at all now, while previously the screen lagged at those moment!

4x4_Ender · Post by **4x4_Ender** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 5:40 pm

BTW, how do you check your FPS in NWN??

I used to have the 52.17 driver for my GeForce3 TI200, and installed this newest driver (Forceware v56.46) with no problems. I havent done any extensive play since then, but i did login to Avlis last night and it worked just fine.

But, i would also be very interested to see what FPS im getting.

FunkOdyssey · Post by **FunkOdyssey** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 5:46 pm

You just hit tilde to bring up the console and enter the command "fps". That will display your fps at the moment you pushed enter. I think there is a way to have the fps display continually but I'm not sure how to do that.

Dirk Cutlass · Post by **Dirk Cutlass** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 5:48 pm

4x4_Ender wrote:BTW, how do you check your FPS in NWN??

I used to have the 52.17 driver for my GeForce3 TI200, and installed this newest driver (Forceware v56.46) with no problems. I havent done any extensive play since then, but i did login to Avlis last night and it worked just fine.

But, i would also be very interested to see what FPS im getting.

The top-left key on the main part of your keyboard (not the function key row), can be pressed to enter a debug menu (you notice a green cursor at top of screen). It only lasts a few seconds, so you have to be quick. Type fps (IIRC) to get frames per second.

If its not the top-left key it might be somewhere else, I guess it depends on country type of keyboard. On my UK keyboard, the key contains ` and ? and ?

4x4_Ender · Post by **4x4_Ender** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 1:09 am

Checked my FPS in NWN after installing the new 64.46 ---> 45-46 FPS

Reverted back to my old 53.03 driver and checked the FPS in NWN ---> 55-56 FPS

So, my FPS dropped by about 10 with the new driver. This is using a GeForce 3 TI200 64MB. Thanks for nothing nVidia, way to screw over everyone that doesnt have a FX 5700 or better.

*goes to click and drag the new driver into the trash can*

Post by **tindertwiggy** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 1:46 am

Were you in the same area, same location, same camera position, same zoom, same effects, same time of day?

Really the fps it shows is just a slice, and will vary wildly depending on what your card is drawing.

4x4_Ender · Post by **4x4_Ender** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 2:18 am

Same area and nearly the same zoom if not exactly. It was about 10 minutes between each test, so it couldnt have varied too much. I also visibily noticed alot more choopiness and lag with the new driver than i get with the old one. Ive heard from alot of other people too that it has decreaced their performance significantly.