NVIDIA 1.88 Detonator Reference Drivers: One User's Experience

Authored by: tapped
Date: 6-6-99

NVIDIA released their 1.88 drivers... WOOHOO! ...but wait. Is this ALL for the better? Well, I've read all sorts of feedback on NVIDIA-related discussion boards, and not all of it is full of praise. In fact, some of it is outright nasty! Why?

Many people with TNT and TNT2 boards have seen what they claim to be massive performance increases. This I won't argue with; myself... I gained a few fps here and there, to be sure. My 3D Mark 99 Max scores went up considerably, as well as my Q2 (and possibly Q3 Test) numbers. (Of course, I had to apply the multitexture hack to the registry to get the speed "above and beyond," but doing so shot me from 39 fps at 1024x768x16 in demo1.dm2 to a whopping 46 fps at the same resolution. Not too shabby.

Unfortunately, I DID experience some trouble with these drivers, most of which I'll share with you, the reader (and hopefully NVIDIA), right here.

After first experiencing this or that glitch, supposed bug, or other anomaly, I decided to do what was, in my mind, the only thing I could do to rule out the possibility that anything BUT the 1.88 drivers were causing the problems: format c:/s. Yes, it was painful, but damn it, NVIDIA IS paying me the big bucks to beta-test... hehe... joking. =)

The following is a work-log of sorts, describing the procedure I followed and the results:

- made coffee
- backed up anything I hadn't backed up previously
- busted out the almighty floppy-o-joy
- rebooted
- format c:/s
- yanked everything from my box but the mobo, CPU, memory, TNT, HD, Zip, CD-Rom, and floppy
- installed Windows 98 (full version, not upgraded from Windows 95)
- installed DirectX 6.1
- installed NVIDIA reference drivers version 1.88
- reboot
- made coffee
- installed Quake 2 (v. 3.20), Q3 Test (v1.05), Need for Speed 3: Hot Pursuit, and 3D Mark 99 Max
- ran the "tests"

With my system configured this way, I feel I pretty-much kept things as "clean" as possible - little to no room for system or application error. Moving right along...

If NVIDIA DOES read this, they might like to know, in detail, what my system consists of (I know YOU don't care... =P). Here's the lo-down on the hardware*:

Abit BH6 - latest BIOS
Intel Celeron 300A @ 450MHz
1 Samsung CAS2 128MB SDRAM
1 Samsung CAS2 64MB SDRAM
STB Velocity 4400 (AGP) Retail w/latest BIOS (NOT overclocked)
Fujitsu 4.3GB UDMA HD - yeah, yeah... I know.... (wanna' make a donation?)

*As I pulled everything else that's pertinent out of my box, I didn't see a need to list anything else.

Now, I'll make this short and sweet, for the most part. Most of the games/apps tested didn't seam to cause too much trouble, so I'll go into more detail regarding those that did.

Next page: Q3 Test