What is the best Nvidia drivers for BF4 and Ghost for a 670 SLI rig? Also FXAA or MSAA settings?

beekermartin

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I am currently using the most current released drivers 331.82. I am playing at 1920x1200, i7 950 at 3.83, 12gb of ram and both cards at a max boost of 1189 memory at 7000.

Both games have been acting odd at times. Also a couple random freezes. I know both games have issues and there are plenty of posts about that.

I am just curious what most people have found to be the best drivers for both games. I don't want to change drivers every time I want to play the other game.

Also, what should I be using FXAA or MSAA?
 
I have a single GTX 670 and have been using 331.82, I only get stutters in poorly optimized games (like GW2), in BF4 and such I get completely smooth gameplay, the random freezes you're experiencing may be related to SLI more than it does anything.

haven't played CoD Ghosts so can't comment on that.
 

beekermartin

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Game play is smooth overall. I meant freeze/lockups. It happened the last time in BF4 when you drive the boat into the back of the other boat. lol

I haven't played multiplayer yet. I always beat the single player versions before playing multiplayer.
 

beekermartin

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Thanks for your help. I usually stick with the most recently released official drivers. Not Beta. I had come across several threads that stated 331.58 was the best driver for BF4. I wanted to confirm what the best driver is for both games and SLI.
 
The 331.65 drivers are marketed as the "Game Ready" drivers for BF4 and COD: Ghosts.
Even so, I would go for the latest beta drivers, 331.93.
The latest drivers are almost always the best for a SLI setup, since you need to make sure that you have the latest game profiles and bug fixes.
 

beekermartin

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Thanks! I will try the 331.93 beta drivers.

Should I use driver sweeper or uninstall all nvidia software before installing the newest drivers? I believe the newest drivers give you an option of a fresh install but I don't know how well that really works.
 

In general, driver sweeper is not really necessary, except as a way to troubleshoot installation problems. I would try to just install using the Clean Install option and see how it goes.

By the way, both of those games are notorious for bugs and SLI problems, so it might not be your drivers. Look forward to any new game patches that come out in the future as well.
 

beekermartin

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I know they are still very new games with issues. I want to make sure that I am using the best drivers available to eliminate that as the issue.

Overall they both play well but not perfect. I didn't expect them to right away. Sad but that seems to be the case now with modern games. There is always issues at release and it takes months to get them worked out.

The second question is should I be using FXAA or MSAA? If MSAA what setting can I use with my rig without hurting performance too much?
 

beekermartin

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I tried to install the beta drivers. I first uninstalled all the Nvidia software in the control panel. I then clicked custom and selected a clean install. While installing the drivers I got a BSOD of 7e! I tried a few times until eventually Windows wouldn't load at all and I needed my windows disk to repair it! Long story short I am now back to 331.82 but it took a lot of restarts and failed installs to get back here. I assume my windows install is beyond screwed up and I should do a fresh install. I really hate when crap like this happens. I don't want to start over but at this point I don't have much of a choice.
 

beekermartin

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I installed 331.82 for now. I am still installing updates and crap. I really hate reinstalling windows but after trying to install the beta drivers and haven't it BSOD so many times I think it was the right thing to do.

This reminds me to buy a new external harddrive only to mirror my existing OS drive once I get everything installed and stable.
 

redeemer

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The game is finished , its the damn net code that's a joke at the moment. SLI is not what it used to be there was a time we got profiles promptly.
 

beekermartin

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I got one BSOD of 0x7e again after a fresh install of windows. I have since installed the chipset drivers, video drivers, etc and it hasn't happened since. It could have been because the chipset drivers weren't installed yet and some random error happened. I will keep an eye on it.

I installed Ghosts and I will install BF4 when I get home.
 

redeemer

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Open your BF4 folder (normally C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Battlefield 4)
In the BF4 folder navigate into _Installer\VC\vc2012Update3\redist

Run vcredist_x86.exe and vcredist_x64.exe
 


Well SLi has been working fine for me but then my entire world doesn't revolve around a couple of games.
 

beekermartin

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I installed the newest drivers,332.21, last night. I installed them because Heaven 4.0 is crashing. Unfortunately even with the newest drivers Heaven is still crashing at my prior stable overclock settings. 3dmark2011 and Furmark both run fine but I can't pass Heaven 4.0. I used Heaven 3.0 prior and that passed just fine. If I back down the overclock it passes but my scores are horrible. I only average like 58 fps with everything set to max and at 1920x1200. I've done some research and it appears 4.0 is a lot more difficult to pass than 3.0.

Regardless I played some BF4 for an hour or so with no crashes and it played very smooth.