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8700GT SLi driver comparison- Best perfoming driver!


wook

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Results:

driver.jpg

This post is primarily about the 8700 GT in SLi mode. But will also help users with other GPU's and systems make decisions about which driver to choose for highest performance.

My recommendation: 179.28

The general trend seems to be that the higher version numbered driver, the better the results in 3Dmark 06. (not the newer driver by date)

This also seems to be the case in games.

Variables -

All driver versions had the same variables during the tests. They are as follows:

3dmark 06 - Professional Edition: All default settings except the Resolution: 1280 X 800

Game: Company of Heroes performance test

Clock speed

GPU Memory Shader

635 810 1270

Mobility modder available here:

http://www.driverheaven.net/nvmodtool.php

The mobility modder enables your driver to play blu-ray and HD-DVD without issue. Normally any change to a driver will disable this playback. It has also been tweaked to give better performance for the driver being modified.

- For those that are interested, i ran the same tests with Norton Internet security on to see what kind of effect this has on performance.

Norton enabled

CPU score - 2512

3Dmark - 9610

Norton disabled

CPU score - 2556

3Dmark - 9654

Both sharders (2.0 & 3.0) did not change up or down. (as expected)

Results: Unless your system is 2.0 Ghz or below then there is no need to turn your antivirus software off when playing games or running 3D apps.

Edit:

30/09/08: 179.13 added to benchmark list

17/10/08: 178.24 added to benchmark list

17/10/08: 178.26 added to benchmark list

17/10/08: 177.92 added to benchmark list

20/10/08: 180.20 added

22/10/08: 180.42 added

27/10/08: 180.42 (dox inf) added

11/11/08: 179.14 added - Demonstrated a significant improvement in shader 3.0; very impressed, but runs hot

13/11/08: 178.46 added

17/11/08: 180.44 added

19/11/08: 176.75 added

20/11/08: 180.48 added (BEST OF THE 180 SERIES, even though not high as scoring, is more stable)

22/11/08: 180.70 added and working now

09/12/08: 180.84 added: Same performance as 180.44, not worth adding

17/12/08: 181.00 added: Very poor performing!

19/12/08: 179.28 added

08/01/09: 179.29, 181.00, 185.20 added. - Dont bother!

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  • 2 weeks later...
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  • wook

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thanks. keep us updated :) I switched to 179.13 and its better than the others, but for some reason I can't get my 3Dmark06 score over 9250 at your resolution. I guess my 2.4GHz core 2 duo and 2GB RAM are the difference.

Edited by tnad
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hey. this thread is a nice idea.

I got an m9750 with sli 8700gt too.

Im very happy with it.

But i made so many test to get my sli working.

For some resons my sli crashed while playing or benching ( with drivers like 169.XX 171XX etc...old drivers now i know )

The best drivers i used to test was : 174.74.

NO more crash and good performance in game

Now im too affraid to change it :)

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Are these drivers going to make much difference on my dated Go 7900 GS?

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TNAD: The cpu score would probably be a lot higher. check the shader 2 and 3 and they should be the same.

GUIGUI: after i did a clean install the performance of my unit is running way better. will update scores tomorrow when i can install photoshop. Try driver sweep to clean out other drivers in your system.

LEO: Yes the specified driver 179.13 would be fine for your system

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Hey have you tried the 177.92 tweakforce mobile drivers? was wondering if they had some performance ups because ive heard of them making crysis run alot better.

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doesnt seem to change much with benchmarking. but i have noticed that crysis and mass effect dont have any better performance than 179.13, but do run smoother. so may be a better option.

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any of the test drives will work on the XPS. Doc's drivers seem to beslightly higher than Peiters. But i did have some issues installing. (Using SLi)

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I have problems about downclocking. My 8600M GT always goes from 3d to 2d performance after a while. My best result was 2 hours PES2009. It was the driver 177.89

Is there any driver which can do a better job for that problem?

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there are a few things you can do to try and fix this.

First-

Download rivatuner.

go into RivaTuners power user tab and set the value to 1 for Rivatuner\NVIDIA\Overclocking\EnableLowPower3dControl and Rivatuner\NVIDIA\Overclocking\EnablePerfLevelForcing.

Then go back to the overclocking tab,and activate the now revealed "Force Constant Performance Level" command to performance 3D. Go to the top right drop down box and select low power 3d mode, make sure to select enable driver level overclocking. Do this for both standard 2d and performance 3d.

This will put the GPU in high performance mode all the time. and will probably burn itself out if you dont disable this when you are not wanting to run a game.

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Guest Total rc

I use vista32. I like powermizer 'cause i work often on battery mode. I never had this problem with my inspiron (1720). But since i play pes2009 i have this problem.

I tested different drivers, and Dell know the problem. They release a new bios buth this only change the fan speed. My gpu does not go over 75° but it downlcock every time. With the driver 177.89 after 2 hours, with the original driver from Dell (175.95) after 10 minutes.

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Interesting. The 180.10 drivers add around 150-200 points to 3DMark Vantage on my 9800M GTX. Crysis on Very High also gets a boost of about 2-3 fps. Perhaps it is optimized for the higher end cards.

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have not tested that driver. the 180.20 with my own modifications get 10,000k 3d mark points. and runs crysis smoother than before. but not entirely stable. still trying to work out that bug.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Any of you with the 8700 sli playing Fallout 3? The FPS is too low to play beyond medium settings and a 1920x1200 resolution for me.

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yeah i am. max resolution and high detail. (unfortunately ultra high is not playable) except when there is a lot of steam or light effects then it drops to 15-20 FPS est.

farcry 2 also max resolutoin and high details runs real well.

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Guest Mao_@rt

Hi guys

First, thanks wook... Nice job :)

Well, i run on xps 1730 T9500 4Go 8700Gt sli....

Xp lsd sp3

What a paine to find some stable drivers for those cards... and i was quite desapointed by the performances... may invest in a 8800gtx later.... :)

I am currently running with 175.32...

The best so far i have tried.... but still not very stable...

1 h of far cry 2 et boommm...

But , concerning my favorit game COD4, it is a nightmare....

Not possible to play more than 20mins without to reboot...

And , strange thing, i have better stability and same performances without SLI..????

Something wrong no?

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You are welcome. There was nothing on our site concerning the 8700 Gt in SLi so though i'd offer something

Yeah thats a common issue. COD4 is not optimized SLi, in fact you will probably get better performance not using it. Only a few games have SLi running well. eg crysis company of heroes and world in conflict. farcry and fallout 3 also run better with SLi, although using 80-90% processing power to do so. not very good programming.

I'm using 178.26 and have no issues so far. the 180 series is real bad with farcry 2 and fallout 3. REAL BAD! for driver that has been made for farcry 2 its pathetic.

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Guest Mao_@rt
You are welcome. There was nothing on our site concerning the 8700 Gt in SLi so though i'd offer something

Yeah thats a common issue. COD4 is not optimized SLi, in fact you will probably get better performance not using it. Only a few games have SLi running well. eg crysis company of heroes and world in conflict. farcry and fallout 3 also run better with SLi, although using 80-90% processing power to do so. not very good programming.

I'm using 178.26 and have no issues so far. the 180 series is real bad with farcry 2 and fallout 3. REAL BAD! for driver that has been made for farcry 2 its pathetic.

Cheers , I will try the 178.26...

It is a shame for COD4 ....I love this games and i would have enjoy playing it full settings and resolution..... :)

For farcry 2 , i have experienced wired glitch this the last drivers too... Object missing, flickring , crazy textures...

They even offer the games with some cards.... Shame on them :)

^_^

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yeah there are some massive bugs alright. lots of places to get stuck, also sometimes you cant carry on a mission because someone just wont talk to you.., save often and revert back is all you can do.

says have been made for 8700m and 8800m cards. so interesting that the 180.42 driver that was made for this game does have missing textures and objects.

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Guest Mao_@rt

YEAH!!!

Finaly managed to run COD4 whitout crash....

I use the 175.32 .. noy the best but i thing my crashing problem came from some other drivers...

I had wired thing happening when playing like mouse (logitech mx1000) being not precise at all and i kind of jumpy...

Have installed the logitech program and update...

Now it work!!! :)

Not the Sli thou...

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have just done a test with 179.14. Very impressed. Seeing as COD4 uses shader 3.0 it may well be worth the effort.

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The 8800m sli people are getting insane results with the new 176.68 (from microsoft. no modified inf needed). It might be worth trying.

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ok will test and post results..

one moment please caller...

EDIT: still no change to the leader board.

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