GeForce 180.48 driver reviewed

Peter G. 6 Dec, 2008 at 5:14pm ET Article published in Tech

Comments

1. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 8:07pm Leonardo If you are running Folding@Home with Nvidia cards, forget these drivers and go straight to 180.60 of 180.70, both beta, but both very good.
2. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 9:29pm Komete I just downloaded the latest nvidia drivers for my 8800gt. Performance was increased in my cad programs but now I get a ton of jagged edges. Also more segments of my drawings disappear and reappear when I move around the drawing. I had to bump the quality settings up and I still am not getting the quality I was getting with the 16X.XX drivers I was using. I may roll back.
3. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 10:03pm Leonardo Whoa, for CAD, you really need a Quadro. A $100 Quadro from eBay will walk all over the most expensive 4870X2 or 280XYZ for design work.
4. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 10:09pm Komete

   Leonardo wrote:

   Whoa, for CAD, you really need a Quadro. A $100 Quadro from eBay will walk all over the most expensive 4870X2 or 280XYZ for design work.

   
   Will it really make a difference? The only reason I ask is I remember a few years ago reading they use the same chips. There was even a guide on how to convert an ATI 800XTsomething card into a FireGL card.
   
   And for the biggest question. Would I be able to run a Quadro card and a gaming card at the same time? I'd hate to have to swap cards just to play a game.
5. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 11:04pm Leonardo Could you run a Quadro and gaming card at the same time? Yes, but if I am correct, you would need to set the BIOS to boot to one or the other, depending on what you wanted to do.
   
   Yes, there are some hacks you can do to make some Quadros mimic their ordinary cousins. To my knowledge though, you cannot get Quadro performance out of the base, non-quadro card. Yes, they use the same series of GPUs, but the rest of the card and driver compatibility is not the same.
   
   Please, someone check me if my information is wrong.
6. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 11:33pm Komete

   Leonardo wrote:

   Could you run a Quadro and gaming card at the same time? Yes, but if I am correct, you would need to set the BIOS to boot to one or the other, depending on what you wanted to do.
   
   Yes, there are some hacks you can do to make some Quadros mimic their ordinary cousins. To my knowledge though, you cannot get Quadro performance out of the base, non-quadro card. Yes, they use the same series of GPUs, but the rest of the card and driver compatibility is not the same.
   
   Please, someone check me if my information is wrong.

   
   I'm looking into it now. I'm getting conflicting information. But from what I'm reading, if you can do the softmod it'll greatly effect the way cad programs respond. And that is a big time consuming issue I'm having. Getting the zoom and camera to navigate more accurately.
   
   One thing weird that I ran into is that GPUZ is reporting my card to be more of a 9800gt that 8800gt. It lists it as a 8800gt but the gpu is a 9800gt chip.
7. 
   6 Dec 2008 ~ 11:51pm Thrax 9800GT and the 8800GT are identical, except the 9800GT is 55nm and the 8800GT is 65nm. Even so, the 8800GT is about 2-3% faster.
   
   You cannot softmod 8000, 9000 or GTX 200-series cards.
8. 
   7 Dec 2008 ~ 1:04am Komete Well that's what I first came by but then I came across a how to (which I havn't had any luck with) and then I've seen some Mac boys pull it off. I'm going to post in the 3dguru forums and see. I believe they are the ones that made Riva tuner.
   
   http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=539&pgno=0
   http://forum.insanelymac.com/lofiversion/index.php/t134631.html
   
   UPDATE: There is some sort of partial softmod but no complete softmod. Maybe I'll pick up a quadro or fire gl. Bah sorry for takeing this thread way off course.
9. 
   7 Dec 2008 ~ 1:23am Leonardo The thread is not so far off course. The topic is drivers...we're pretty close.
   
   If you do look on eBay for a FireGL or Quadro, I would recommend Quadro. The availability as compared to FireGL is at least 6:1. Also the Nvidia Quadro drivers are outstanding.
10. 
    7 Dec 2008 ~ 1:44am Komete I'll do that after I upgrade my motherboard and cpu. I'm probably expected way too much out of my old AMD64x2. The sketch I'm working with now has about 75 parts, 300 holes, 36 bearings, and plenty of shiny textures. Throw vista on top of all that and lag is justifiable. I did roll back my drivers though. Much better visually.