Which driver? gts250

[Kithzaru]

Gah, i hope this doesn't get double posted... the silly "ask the community" from the home page never works for me...

Long story short...

I have a 9600gt, and will be getting a 250gts today. I am currently running 185.xx drivers, but i know new ones have been released. I never updated the drivers because, frankly, the current ones worked just fine.

My question is as follows...

For a gts250 (which i know is a rebranded 9800++) should i...

-use the same 185.xx driver

-use the new 186.18

-use some other like a 92.xx?

I use the computer really just for gaming, and the games are either WoW or the latest FPS. Any input on the drivers would be great!

 

[uncfan_2563]

just download the new one...

 

[B-Unit]

Current ones will work fine, but for best performance always use the newest drivers.

 

[jers]

Current ones will work fine, but for best performance always use the newest drivers.

hahahaha. Sorry, I know this is a bit of an old post but I couldn't help getting my nose into it.. That statement is just so big a misconception... 182.50 are still the best drivers for windows vista and XP, sadly Win7 needs newer drivers to solve some bugs but 186.18 are the most decent for win7 so far. At least, that's my truth; for your hardware, it might change. A diferent manufacturer or motherboard could mean a big difference,

 

[Mousemonkey]

I've been using the 190.62's on Vista and XP and they've been fine. The 182.50 drivers are not the best drivers for Vista and XP in my experience.

 

[Kithzaru]

Thanks guys, even though it's been a while =P

I am using the 186.18, they seem to work fine *shrug*

I'm debating installing my windows 7 rc on the machine now, since it's running XP and XP's been acting up.

 

[OvrClkr]

XP acting up? never seen that happen, but if you say so.....

 

[Kithzaru]

It's been freezing or slowing down a lot.

No virus scan running, no odd programs in the task manager. AVG and Malwarebytes caught nothing (which is normal because i don't browse the net on that machine).

It just randomly chunks out and slows down or freezes. Generally a restart fixes it though, so i've been getting accustomed to just restarting the machine before i decide to do anything with it. Where as before, i would restart it maybe once a week.

 

[OvrClkr]

Have you tried a clean OS install?

 

[Kithzaru]

I've considered it, that's why i'm debating doing win7 rc now or just waiting for the full version.. not like it's going to be that long.

 

[jers]

The Win 7 RTM is everywhere on the net, you should get it if you decide going 7. A fresh install of XP is of course a good choice too, just you won't have DX10.

Both options are good. I usually reinstall XP every 8~10 months when it starts to behave awkwardly, no need for viruses. It just gets slower and capricious, don't know why. However Win7 is a beauty, extremely stable, I felt XP ugly after that Artlike OS hehe

By the way, would you mind guys with a GTS250 doing some benchmarks with the games you have when you change drivers? I usually bench with Far Cry 2 and Trackmania Forever.. FC2 has only got fps drops since 182.50 for me in vista.. But I've heared that FC2 bench is bugged, don't remember where.. I just want to know what benefits does it bring to you since your machines have to be all diferent

 

[jers]

Oh I forgot to tell! Why don't you try having both Just make some partitions, install XP first and then Win 7 so it will make the loader for both.

It's like the best option you have, if you already have the XP license why not using both!

Cheers!

 

[Kithzaru]

jers, yeah i'm the same way, i like to do a clean install at least once a year, just deciding which way to go this year 8)

Unfortunately i don't have any newer games to really bench for you... no CoD, no Crysis, no Far Cry 2... only thing that i think is even installed on the machine with the 250gts is dungeon keeper 2 and WoW lol

 

[OvrClkr]

I don't bench with my games.... But I do have a screenie of 3dmark06 back when my 250 was installed :

Note: Win XP Pro SP3 and the latest drivers 190.XX

 

[Kithzaru]

Is your GPU OC'd at all, OvrClkr?

Here is mine, this is with XPSP3 and the older 186.16 (or was it 186.86..) drivers.

Big difference in the SM2 and 3 score (which is why i asked if the GPU is OC'd or not...) though, the difference could also partially come in because OvrClkr's CPU spanks the hell out of mine.

 

[OvrClkr]

That GPU (BFG GTS 250) is the 1GB version and yes I did overclock the GPU quite a bit..... note: the reason why I got over 15k was due to my CPU @ 3.765Ghz......here are some more screenshots :

Here the GPU was NOT overclocked at all, but the CPU was @ 3.860 ......

Stressing the CPU @ 3.6Ghz for over 30min, temps never exceeded 38c at LOAD.....

My personal best score using a "dual core" and a GTX 260 slightly overclocked 655/1175 :

 

[jers]

It has come to a funny change, now it is a bench thread
It's cool to see your results and OCs but I can't make much sense of them as it would be only seeing if your pc or mine is faster in this or that hahah

My original intention was to see if you had indeed performance advantages out of newer drivers. I remember when the 185 driver got out claiming a performance gain in both Crysis Warhead and FC2; that turner out to be a performance loss!

I wonder if these gains are because of a better cpu usage or something like that, so, comparing drivers in different machines would be sweet, like TOM's on our own

I'm running an E5200@3.8ghz and an EVGA GTS250 sc 512mb..

I have benched so many times FC2 that I can tell the results by heart lol

Fully maxed, exept shadows in very high, 1024x768 4xAA "Ranch Medium"

182.50 Vista
Min. 42
Max. 85~105 (I bench with vsync so it's a frame that always scapes)
Avg. 62

All newer drivers in win 7 give a lower minimum of 31~38 and Avg of 55~59 being 186.18 the most decent. I had high hopes in Win 7 as it beats Vista in some RAM and CPU tests and all the supposed performance optimizations.

I'd like you to inform me of tests on actual games with different drivers so we all may guess what's the progress they are making cause I don't see any except support for their new stuff like ION. whomever wants to join with any card is welcome so we have different results ^^,

It's like Tom's user based silly tests
No really, I'd like some serious tom's article on a plethora of drivers in current most popular cards!

 

[OvrClkr]

Well I was just showing the OP different screenies so he can get an idea of what numbers he can compare to using the latest drivers.

Do you bench with 3dmark06? If so try posting some screenies and driver info and we might be able compare our PC's performance-wise..... IMO the lastet Nvidia drivers will give you the best performance possible in win XP and Vista....Don't know about Win 7 since I do not use that OS as of yet (soon)....

 

[Kithzaru]

OvrClkr,

We both have (or had i guess now =P ) the GTS250 1gig,

No GPU OC, you hit
Sm2 = 7.2k
Sm3 = 7k

That was with the 190.xx drivers and XPSP3



I hit, with the same card,
Sm2: 5.2k
Sm3: 5.7k

With 186.xx drivers and XPSP3



That is a huge difference, but i would imagine there is more here going on than just drivers.... i mean, there would have to be..

 

[OvrClkr]

Yea I still have the card, its just in another PC ATM...

As far as the numbers go, I am thinking it has to do with the CPU just like you pointed out... If your mobo is AM3 compatible then you are in luck since all you have to do is upgrade the CPU....

Back in April I was using a Kuma 7750 and I was getting more or less the same numbers as you. Once I upgraded the CPU I saw a drastic improvement in overall performance... Not bad for a 99.99$ CPU....

 

[Kithzaru]

Yeah... sadly i'm stick with just an AM2 board (not even +). I've got a little money saved up but am waiting for the i3 and i5's to come out in hopes that the current stuff drops in price a bit. *shrug*

As always, thanks for the input man 8)



jers, i will try to remember to DL the latest drivers tonight and rerun 3dmark and get something up ^^

 

[OvrClkr]

Well Newegg has many different mobo/CPU combos at a great price.. you can even upgrade both for as little as 150.00$....Let me know if you need any other info....

Yes, next week the i5 will drop and the current prices should be significantly lower...

 

[jers]

I don't use synthetic benchs but I see the dramatic perf difference for you!
Meanwhile I decided to give 190.62 another try since I changed win 7 rc for the RTM a day ago, the sensless performance drop of some old titles is gone, God knows what was happening there :S
Vsync is not working (never did in this driver for me) but the rest is just fine.

FC2 and TrackMania Nations Forever stayed the same as in 186.18.

And what motivated me trying... Darkest of Days Demo, coming out soon. The game has some physX that really put the card to work and 190's log says it's got improvements for the title, they are right :lol:

All maxed, AA 4x AF 16x PhysX medium settings

186.18:
38.4822 avg.

190.62
38.4977 avg.

Marginal gains, but there you go. They shut my mouth hahaha. Now, imagine what the PhysX in High will do to the system performance. Oddly enough AA settings didn't do much. Graphically, this'll be a normal game, but God those PhysX, what do they have to be so demanding?!

 

[Kithzaru]

Hey jers,

I downloaded the new 190.xx drivers last night and re-ran 3dmark06, i actually got slightly lower scores. I forgot to upload it to Photobucket but,

186.xx
sm2: 5.2k
sm3: 5.7k

190.xx
sm2: 4.9
sm3: 5.5


*shrug* this is on XPSP3. I could probably run the bench again today and get a different number. It's really close either way. I played WoW last night, can't say I noticed an increase or a decrease either way.

 

[jers]

Hey back Kithzaru,

Thanks for testing, I'm downloading 3dmark06 and after that I'll get 190.62 drivers and compare it to whatever results 182.50 give. Nice finding, now I know it's not me alone whining at nvidia drivers while everybody get more performance out of their hardware month by month

I'll guys let you know when I get those results. For now in windows 7 186 and 190 have no big difference except that vsync is gone in 190s.