v71.20, v71.21, v71.22, v71.24, v71.25 XP 32bit | NV,MSI,SPARKLE/LEADTEK

[®®®]

Here's another bug found by JB from TVTool.info.

The original article can be found HERE and it has 2 screenshots.

nVidia - Too dumb to copy?

The context menu feature of TVTool is very popular since it was introduced in version 7.0. With this function it´s possible to start movie playback on the TV by only one mouse click. To make this possible TVTool adds an entry to the context menu of avi and mpeg files called 'TVTool - Play on TV'.

TVTool context menu entry

If this option is selected, TV mode is turned on automatically and the playback of the movie starts in the player application which is defined on the corresponding TVTool tab. Also the function can be configured to start the playback maximized for example. And, if desktop extension is enabled, the player is moved to the extended part of the desktop automatically. By doing this the monitor can be used for writing a letter for example, while the movie is played on the TV.

The context menu feature seems to have impressed nVidia apperently. If you have installed the latest Forceware driver you will probably notice that there is a new menu entry which has almost exactly the same name: 'Play on my TV'. Well, obviously some nVidia guys have used their whole creativity and added the word 'my'! :-)

Menu entry of the driver

So far so good. The problem is that these guys obviously didn´t understand completely what this function does. Because if you select the context menu entry 'Play on my TV', all what happens is that the movie is started in the default movie player. Just as if you make a double click on it. On the TV nothing happens. Great, this is the function everybody has been waiting for! :=)

Unfortunately this thing has a drawback. As soon as you do a right mouse click on any movie file, the driver turns on the overlay fullscreen device option. If this option is enabled overlay windows are shown fullscreen on the secondary display device. This brings the problem that the TV gets black immediately in the moment you do a right click on such a file!!! And another problem: Some player applications are not compatible with this function, so Zoomplayer eats up 99% CPU power but doesn´t start the playback at all if the overlay option is enabled. During the test it was not possible to start any movie playback anymore. I guess this was not intended, the overlay fullscreen option should have been enabled only if the user had selected the 'Play on my TV' option and not already when doing the right click. Also it´s mysterious why this option gets enabled at all. The user can have it activated all time anyway, because it only affects overlay windows. In other words it´s only active when a movie is playing.

Ok, to put an end to this mess I decided to delete the context menu entry of the driver. If you want to do this, too, just delete these keys from the registry:

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AVIFile\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers\PlayOnMyTV

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MPEGFile\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers\PlayOnMyTV

When this is done everything is all right again and movie files can be played properly with the context menu again! :-)

Conclusion

Obviously nVidia found the TVTool feature that interesting that they imitated it simply. But unfortunately one was too dumb to do this correctly. The result is of no use. On the contrary, the bug described before is quite annoying. If copy something, do it right! ;-)

[Sky-Dexter]

###### tryed the 71.24 and counter strike is crashing over and over :)

Getting back to the 71.20 :P

Thanks again for all the modded infs pieter ! :)

[Guest CD 1986]

The 71.24 drivers work really well for me on both my laptop and desktop. However i found that the 30.47P modded .inf caused a conflict with the OpenGL driver nvoglnt.dll and games such as Doom 3 refused to load at all. This happened on an Athlon 64 laptop system. The ordinary 30.47 modded .inf works fine with all games though. :)

The same happened when i tried to go back to the 71.20 drivers with the 30.44P modded .inf. Again the plain 30.44 works fine.

[Sky-Dexter]

Oh ! The 71.24 is working on counter strike now with the 30.50 modded Inf ! :)

Amazing ! :P Thanks a lot pieter ! :)

[®®®]

Why what was wrong ?

[mobilenvidia]

The 71.24 drivers work really well for me on both my laptop and desktop. However i found that the 30.47P modded .inf caused a conflict with the OpenGL driver nvoglnt.dll and games such as Doom 3 refused to load at all. This happened on an Athlon 64 laptop system. The ordinary 30.47 modded .inf works fine with all games though. :)

The same happened when i tried to go back to the 71.20 drivers with the 30.44P modded .inf. Again the plain 30.44 works fine.

Try 30.50 INFs these have quite a few fixes and enhancements.

[Sky-Dexter]

Why what was wrong ?

I don't know but with the old modded INF ( 30.44 if i remember well ) , Counter Strike was crashing at each startup ( not even loading the game ) .... :)

With the 30.50 INF , all is fine and Counter Strike is working again :) .... :P

Now the 71.24 driver is working perfectly ... the 30.50 inf fixed it all it seems :(

[®®®]

A sidenote:

71.24 is also available from Leadtek here http://www.leadtek.com.tw/eng/support/down...?downlineid=116

[ofelas]

And also fron Chaintech here -

http://www.chaintech.com.tw/tw/download/dr...k_xp_V71.24.zip

[mobilenvidia]

Leadtek has just released 71.25

ftp://ftp1.leadtek.com/entertainment_graphics/Drivers/050124/WinXP_2K(71[1].25).exe

Identical to what we already have.