*********FREEZING BUG HAS BEEN FIXED FOR TORLAN AND GATEWAY LEVELS*********
This really needs to be stickied and needs to stay near the top of the first page because of the large number of people who have been affected by a very nasty bug that has now been resolved.
I usually stay away from Beta drivers but thanks to Flak bringing the issue up to me to try these other people reported that they noticed that the strange freezing bug that happens primarily on Gateway and Torlan Maps was gone when they started using these new Beta drivers.
People who have the 8800GT know this saga all too well. We couldn't use the 163.75 drivers so we had to deal with this strange, infuriating bug until now. The good thing was that even a couple of weeks ago Epic and Nvidia were aware of the bug and had been working on it.
However, AA is broken in these drivers and there were questions as to whether or not SLI worked properly because the profiles display erroneous information. So this is why I had been reluctant to switch from 169.13. Anyway I did install them and checked the SLI profiles (once I enabled SLI) and sure enough all the main apps said the SLI setting was set at Single GPU application controlled. So the first thing I did was run 3DMark06 to see if this was indeed the case ... well when I got my numbers back I knew that SLI was indeed working after all, not quite as efficiently based on my numbers but definitely working so that made me pretty happy.
Next I started up UT3 with the SLI indicator enabled and sure enough throughout my gaming sessions there was plenty of activity so I can definitely and confidently report that SLI still works as it should ... although I don't which SLI setting will yield optimal results ... perhaps someone else has figured that out and can add that information to this thread. I did notice that my performance was just a little off ... so it may be that there is some rudimentary AA is enabled through the driver, though visually you just won't see a noticeable difference as you should if you have 4xFSAA enabled. The drop in SLI performance wouldn't make sense imo if AA was also completely broken as was the case in earlier drivers.
At this point though for all practical purposes I would say forget about real AA for good if you are an XP user ... sorry but this is the truth ... there are plenty of technical articles about this on the net but the explanation that usually accompanies Gears of Wars explanation of why FSAA works under Vista but NO AA at all can work under XP is the clearest one to understand. Once UT3 is patched with actual DX10 code then just as in Gears fully working 4xFSAA should work properly and then the Multisample setting in UTEngine.ini will actually have some bearing if you change the values.
Okay so we have established some basic things here and now I was ready to see if the problem was really fixed or if some other people just got lucky or really had a different problem in the first place. The great news is YES it worked!!! And it worked flawlessly. I played Gateway and a Torlan map back to back for about 40-45 minutes and I did not have ONE single freeze up ... not even for a split second let alone 10-20 seconds. I had not been able to enjoy either of those levels fully until today and I know that if this worked for me then it will work for other Vista users who have the 8800GT and new GTS GPUs. It may work fine for XP ... I would expect it to but since I don't use XP I can't say for certain. Again maybe someone else can add info to this thread.
So yes folks once again Epic comes through with the help of Nvidia this time but yep all the major issues have been or are soon to be resolved. For me this solves all my problems and I sure hope other people get the results I and a few others who have taken the plunge with these newest betas. It is confusing about the SLI profiles but at least SLI definitely works as is and can probably be improved upon once someone determines which of the Alternate Frame rendering works the best.
Every 8800GT owner needs to know about this. It works and now Torlan is yours for the conqueroring. Man now Gateway is actually one of my favorite levels. Having a solution that really works is fantastic. Thanks so much Epic ... once again you have come through when it counts.
Now sticky this so noone misses this and everyone can play those two great maps without getting constantly frustrated.
And thanks again Flak for bringing this to my attention ... if you had not done that I would still be avoiding those two maps and still be a tiny bit upset with Epic.
This really needs to be stickied and needs to stay near the top of the first page because of the large number of people who have been affected by a very nasty bug that has now been resolved.
I usually stay away from Beta drivers but thanks to Flak bringing the issue up to me to try these other people reported that they noticed that the strange freezing bug that happens primarily on Gateway and Torlan Maps was gone when they started using these new Beta drivers.
People who have the 8800GT know this saga all too well. We couldn't use the 163.75 drivers so we had to deal with this strange, infuriating bug until now. The good thing was that even a couple of weeks ago Epic and Nvidia were aware of the bug and had been working on it.
However, AA is broken in these drivers and there were questions as to whether or not SLI worked properly because the profiles display erroneous information. So this is why I had been reluctant to switch from 169.13. Anyway I did install them and checked the SLI profiles (once I enabled SLI) and sure enough all the main apps said the SLI setting was set at Single GPU application controlled. So the first thing I did was run 3DMark06 to see if this was indeed the case ... well when I got my numbers back I knew that SLI was indeed working after all, not quite as efficiently based on my numbers but definitely working so that made me pretty happy.
Next I started up UT3 with the SLI indicator enabled and sure enough throughout my gaming sessions there was plenty of activity so I can definitely and confidently report that SLI still works as it should ... although I don't which SLI setting will yield optimal results ... perhaps someone else has figured that out and can add that information to this thread. I did notice that my performance was just a little off ... so it may be that there is some rudimentary AA is enabled through the driver, though visually you just won't see a noticeable difference as you should if you have 4xFSAA enabled. The drop in SLI performance wouldn't make sense imo if AA was also completely broken as was the case in earlier drivers.
At this point though for all practical purposes I would say forget about real AA for good if you are an XP user ... sorry but this is the truth ... there are plenty of technical articles about this on the net but the explanation that usually accompanies Gears of Wars explanation of why FSAA works under Vista but NO AA at all can work under XP is the clearest one to understand. Once UT3 is patched with actual DX10 code then just as in Gears fully working 4xFSAA should work properly and then the Multisample setting in UTEngine.ini will actually have some bearing if you change the values.
Okay so we have established some basic things here and now I was ready to see if the problem was really fixed or if some other people just got lucky or really had a different problem in the first place. The great news is YES it worked!!! And it worked flawlessly. I played Gateway and a Torlan map back to back for about 40-45 minutes and I did not have ONE single freeze up ... not even for a split second let alone 10-20 seconds. I had not been able to enjoy either of those levels fully until today and I know that if this worked for me then it will work for other Vista users who have the 8800GT and new GTS GPUs. It may work fine for XP ... I would expect it to but since I don't use XP I can't say for certain. Again maybe someone else can add info to this thread.
So yes folks once again Epic comes through with the help of Nvidia this time but yep all the major issues have been or are soon to be resolved. For me this solves all my problems and I sure hope other people get the results I and a few others who have taken the plunge with these newest betas. It is confusing about the SLI profiles but at least SLI definitely works as is and can probably be improved upon once someone determines which of the Alternate Frame rendering works the best.
Every 8800GT owner needs to know about this. It works and now Torlan is yours for the conqueroring. Man now Gateway is actually one of my favorite levels. Having a solution that really works is fantastic. Thanks so much Epic ... once again you have come through when it counts.
Now sticky this so noone misses this and everyone can play those two great maps without getting constantly frustrated.And thanks again Flak for bringing this to my attention ... if you had not done that I would still be avoiding those two maps and still be a tiny bit upset with Epic.
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