[Michael Marley]

Many people seem to have some of the same questions about enabling PhysX support on their GeForce graphics cards, so I have decided to write this FAQ.

What graphics cards are supported by GeForce PhysX?
As of PhysX version 8.08.01, all GeForce 8, 9, and GTX cards with 256 megabytes or more of dedicated graphics ram are supported. Therefore, cards with lower amounts of memory, including all integrated cards, do not support PhysX.

What driver version must I run in order to enable GeForce PhysX?

Theoretically, any driver supporting CUDA 2.0 Beta will work. I recommend using 177.xx.

Wait! Even though I have a 177.xx driver and the latest version of PhysX, it still says "No AGEIA PhysX Processor Installed"! What the heck!?

This message simply means that there is no AGEIA PhysX PPU in your system (See the screenshot on the left). It has absolutely no relation to GeForce PhysX support. If, on the "Settings" tab of the PhysX Properties applet the GeForce PhysX option is enabled, as the right screenshot, then PhysX hardware acceleration is enabled. If the GeForce PhysX option is grayed out, then PhysX is not enabled.




Even though I have GeForce PhysX enabled and working, I still cannot enable PhysX in Cell Factor: Revolution.

Some games do not support GeForce PhysX yet. They may be updated in the future in order to take advantage of this technology. For now, if you are looking for something to flex your GPU's PhysX muscles, try the demos in the PhysX SDK.

I use Windows XP and if I run a demo or a game a few times, hardware acceleration quits working! What's up with this?

This appears to be a known issue in CUDA 2 Beta support for Windows XP 32-bit and 64-bit. The only driver that does not have this problem (I think) is 177.85. However, if you are adventurous and want to use a newer driver, you can copy the CUDA DLLs from 177.85 to whichever driver you like and install it.

[Jose Villaro]

Hey man, thanks for starting this thread.

I really don't know if anybody else is having this problem but I just intalled the 177.83 drivers with the modded INF on this page.
But It doesn't install the Physx driver and/or control panel for it. I tried installing it directly but I get and error. Unexpected error is what it says.
Has anybody had the same thing?

I have an ASUS G1Sn Laptop with a Geforce 9500M GS 512mb running on Vista 64 bit.

Thanx in advance for any help.

[Michael Marley]

I am not familiar with this error, but in the past I have tried installing PhysX on a Vista 64 system and it had no error. Have you ever installed any previous PhysX version?

[olive]

I installed 178.13 and it comes with PhysX. But either I select 'No Acceleration' or 'GeForce PhysX', I see no difference in terms of CPU usage when running PgysX demos, it's always ~52%. Does this mean PhysX doesn't work?
My system is a PD930, with a Asus 8800GT 512M display card.

[Michael Marley]

In alot of the demos, you will not see a noticeable decrease in CPU. Try running the CPU tests in 3DMark Vantage. My score was exponentially higher with PhysX enabled than without.

[zipper]

And the total score gained about 10% using PhysX on Quadro FX1600M (=8700M GT).

[melon]

Does anyone know how phsyx impact game performance in real world i.e. when playing crysis with and without physx?

[Papa Midnight]

Your actual frame rate will be reduced.

This post has been edited by Darmdorf: 16 November 2008 - 07:33 AM
Reason for edit: Removed quote of previous post

[dreadlord369]

Not true because crysis does not use the nvidia physx engine. Maybe in games like warmonger or something that actually uses nvidia physx, you might gain some fps with physx on.

[Michael Marley]

This is absolutely correct. If PhysX is not being used, it does not result in any decrease in graphics performance. Usually it results in an increase in performance even if it is being used simply because the GPU is better at processing physics than the CPU. And, you are also correct that Crysis does not use PhysX.

[Al_Jourgensen]

Hello
I need some help here

I have a notebool ASUS M50Vn, Gforce 9650MGT (1g dedicated), and a T9400 core duo 2.53mghz.

I tryed to install all of your drivers from 180.xxx up and all of them with the physx enable on the game mirror´s edge the game in certain partss frezze.

I don´t have a GPU processor, and i run Physx with the components that are in my notebook. any knows why this is happening? i tryed to unistall the to. but still freeze in certain parts. if i disable it i can finish normaly the game.

i don´t undertstand why because it doesn´t frezzes all times in the same place, allways frezzes in diferent parts.

can someone help me please

thnks and keep up the good work, sorry of my writting mystakes i´m from Portugal

[Michael Marley]

Sounds to me like PhysX or game bugs. Just make sure you have the latest version of the PhysX drivers and the latest patch for the game.

[Faalagorn]

Hi, I have a question that always made me curious.

In theory, when I have PhysX disabled, then CPU does all the work and if you have PhysX enabled in NVIDIA Control Panel, then GPU takes all (part of? - rectify me please) the work.

So, here's the situation - I have a HP Pavilion dv5 1070-ew laptop/notebook, with (IMO) quite good CPU and relatively slow GPU (that way, games are running 3-5x faster on my friend's PC, just because he have a (lot) better (but older) GPU, even with slower and older CPU and less RAM (tho mine's slower). [b]So[b] In my case, what is more beneficial - to have PhysX disabled (to move the physics stress onto CPU) or have it enabled anyway? I assume that I'm playing the games that use PhysX in it (namely: Fallen Earth or Entropia Universe).

I attached screenshots from CPU-Z and GPU-Z.


Thanks in advance for the reply. It's also my first post here, so... welcome .

[mando]

@Juan: Your card is not supported, it's fake info. You must have 32 stream processors on card to get physX working. In GF9M series 9600m gt/gs and up support PhysX.

Faalagorn, on 04 July 2009 - 06:01 PM, said:

Hi, I have a question that always made me curious.

In theory, when I have PhysX disabled, then CPU does all the work and if you have PhysX enabled in NVIDIA Control Panel, then GPU takes all (part of? - rectify me please) the work.

So, here's the situation - I have a HP Pavilion dv5 1070-ew laptop/notebook, with (IMO) quite good CPU and relatively slow GPU (that way, games are running 3-5x faster on my friend's PC, just because he have a (lot) better (but older) GPU, even with slower and older CPU and less RAM (tho mine's slower). [b]So[b] In my case, what is more beneficial - to have PhysX disabled (to move the physics stress onto CPU) or have it enabled anyway? I assume that I'm playing the games that use PhysX in it (namely: Fallen Earth or Entropia Universe).

I attached screenshots from CPU-Z and GPU-Z.
cpuz.png gpuz.png

Thanks in advance for the reply. It's also my first post here, so... welcome .

9600m gt is like desktop 9500 GT, so it's to weak to get high detail (even on low/med in many games you will see a drop in performance) + physX. The best option to play with physX enabled is to have 2 cards in SLI mode, one for graphics, second for physx. So use CPU for physics, you will see noticeably better performance without PhysX enabled on your card :- )

ps. Na dole masz forum po Polsku :-) Olej PhysX w grach za słaba karta

This post has been edited by mando: 18 January 2010 - 08:04 PM

[mando]

Listen, you can use PhysX but... not on your gpu.

This post has been edited by mando: 22 January 2010 - 04:42 PM