Larry's INFs for Dell 5150/5160

[mobilenvidia]

Yes, I know how you feel, the Gateway Solo 9550 was the same.

It became too hard to do much of anything with it.

Still hard to imagine that without the 9550 I would have so much spare time on my hands :)

You still in Vermont ?

Still our plant to head up your way one day.

[LSudlow]

Yes, we're still in Vermont. We'd love to see you if you're ever in our area!

[RetroMan]

98.16 will work fine with Vista. When I started working with W7, I started using 98.16 and left 98.13 behind. 98.16 has a very slight performance improvement and some bug fixes, but I don't think they're noticiable. It's also the very last driver that provides Aero Glass support in Vista and W7.

You can install XP drivers up through the 175.xx versions in both Vista and Windows 7 and they do deliver better gaming performance than 98.16. Unfortunately, they also tend to lock up and/or give you black screens at inopportune times. Of the newer drivers, stick with the 169 series. They give much better performance on the Go5200 than any of the 17x.xx drivers. 169.72 is the newest in that series.

Because of the problems with the XP drivers, I definitely recommend sticking with 98.16. It doesn't crash and does provide Aero Glass, which is more than Microsoft or nVidia think we should have.

Hi there Larry, and others,

I'm back:-)

Still on Dell Inspiron 5150, expanded it to 2 gig of RAM (previous tests were with 512k original RAM), original 40g HD in it.

I took your advice and moved from Vista to Windows 7 build 7600.

Windows 7 has been cleanly installed (no upgrade install, I had Windows 7 setup partitioning the HD) to this machine and no other software has been installed. And that means nothing. After Windows 7 installed I jumped straightaway to the video driver issue.

Whatever I try, I don't get Aero to work. Furthermore, it won't even complete the Windows experience index test. I get the error "The Windows Experience Index for your system could not be completed; could not measure video playback performance".

What I tried so far (and the only two options I could find where people described to get Aero running):

96.85 with the INF from this url:

98.16 with the INF from this url: http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_id=3025

As described before, I always start from scratch, uninstalling old drivers, rebooting before installing new ones, starting from "standard VGA adapter", using "have disk" method, rebooting after installing new ones, ...

I just want Aero glass effects. Nothing more, nothing less. No gaming, no fullscreen video playback, just a fancy desktop.

Can you please point me in the right direction? Thanks SO much.

[LSudlow]

Your installation process sounds fine. Did you delete the old inf that came with the driver? The installer might be recognizing that one instead of mine.

If that's not the problem, we need to dig deeper. When you reboot, what do you see? Do you get to the desktop at all?

[RetroMan]

Your installation process sounds fine. Did you delete the old inf that came with the driver? The installer might be recognizing that one instead of mine.

If that's not the problem, we need to dig deeper. When you reboot, what do you see? Do you get to the desktop at all?

Hi Larry, I renamed the downloaded modified INF to the original name and copied it over the original one before starting the have-disk-method. For 98.16 the file name is ngvm.inf, for 96.85 it was nv_disp.inf .

Drivers 96.85 and 98.16 gave me the same results:

When I reboot after installing the new driver, it starts up in 1600 x 1200 resolution (where on standard VGA adapter it was in 800 x 600, so something apparently did change), 32 bit color depth, Windows 7 Basic theme.

When I want to change to Windows 7 Aero theme, the screen starts flickering and turns black after a minute or so. With the touchpad I still can move the mousepointer, so I bring it a couple inches down and click, whichs blindly brings me back in to Windows 7 Basic theme mode.

With Windows 7 Basic theme, everything seems to work fine. The system is responsive and full screen video (with Windows Media player) is OK.

Can you confirm that you have actually seen Aero glass running on an Inspiron 5150 with Windows 7 and driver 98.16 or 96.85? I'm SO clueless. Please help! ;-)

Edited November 14, 2009 by RetroMan

[LSudlow]

Yes, I definitely can confirm that it works for me. In fact it works immediately after the first boot. Unfortunately, I may know what's different about our setups. Due to my wife's bad eyes, I run W7 at 1024x768 instead of a higher resoulution. Try switching to that before enabling Aero and see if it helps.

Remember our pathetic Go5200 cards only have 64MB VRAM. It may not be enough to run Aero at higher resolutions.

[RetroMan]

Yes, I definitely can confirm that it works for me. In fact it works immediately after the first boot. Unfortunately, I may know what's different about our setups. Due to my wife's bad eyes, I run W7 at 1024x768 instead of a higher resoulution. Try switching to that before enabling Aero and see if it helps.

Remember our pathetic Go5200 cards only have 64MB VRAM. It may not be enough to run Aero at higher resolutions.

Hi Larry,

That did the trick. It seems the max res that works with Aero enabled is 1152 x 864, one step higher and it starts to flicker.

OK, well.... the next question would then be: Which one is better: 98.16 or 96.85? Any comments on that one?

[LSudlow]

The jury is still out on that. I use 98.16, but feel free to try them both and see which works better for you. I'd be interested to hear your experience.

Anyway, I'm glad it's working.

[panama]

Hi Larry - I also have an Inspiron 5150 running W7. I have installed the 98.16 driver with the appropriate inf file. It is an improvement over standard W7 driver but cannot get the resolution above 1024x768. I see that others appear to have no problems with this...any recommendations? THANKS

[LSudlow]

Unfortunately, Aero Glass requires at least 128MB of VRAM to run at higher resolutions. With 64MB cards, we're limited to 1024x768.

By the way, I'm back on XP for now, but I've heard that 156.73 works with FX cards on Windows 7 with Pieter's modded inf. You might want to give it a try. If it works, let me know and I'll create a custom inf for the 5150/5160.

Thanks!

[Guest Matt]

Hi Larry,

First off let me say I've been following this thread and using your modded INFs (and 5160 driver recommendations) since about 2005 or so, as soon as I realized Dell that doesn't care about updating laptop drivers. I've had two computers since (a beefy M1730 that crapped out due to poor build quality on the 8800GTXs and a Macbook that fell off a desk to its death), yet my little old 5160 is still chugging, after years of gaming and several hardware replacements.

I just upgraded the RAM to 2GBs because I'd love to get some Civ IV time in before I go back to school, but I currently don't have a video driver installed. I tried downloading the latest driver and INF from here, but at the end of the install process, I get a message telling me that the device wouldn't start up. It was running fine this morning with some 2008 drivers, but for some reason the the most recent ones (194.something) didn't work: my guess is that it's due to the desktop FX5200 not being supported.

What are the latest drivers that support the 5200? Which ones do you use? Will they work with, say, Civ IV? The NVIDIA website seems to think they're 175.19, but I'm about 90% sure the drivers I had in here before were above 175, maybe in the 180s. I could be wrong though, I didn't check their version before wiping.

Thanks a lot! I can't believe you're still using the 5150--my '60 still works, but it is definitely showing signs of age.

[LSudlow]

Welcome back, Matt - it's been a long time! 169.72 is the driver you're looking for - along with my modded inf in the first post of this thread. You can install drivers up to the 176 series, but none of the 17x.xx drivers perform as well as the 169 drivers.

Good luck with it - Let me know if you have any problems.

[Matt]

Found my old account! It certainly has been a long time--over four years, in fact. It's funny to read my old posts, back when I thought INFs were INIs. Thanks a lot for the recommendation, I'm downloading them now. It's incredible that the 5160, which has been overclocked, fried at least one GPU, hard drive, and motherboard, dropped probably more than once, and gotten heavy gaming use by two different people has lasted this long--outliving two machines generally considered better. I guess they just don't make 'em like they used to.

[LSudlow]

Yeah, I've upgraded to 2GB too. Like you've I've fried just about everything at one time or another, including the LCD. I think the case and keyboard might be the only original components left - and I'm thinking about replacing the keyboard soon. And you're right - for a laptop with a less than stellar reputation, it's got remarkable staying power.

[Guest Mike]

While trying to use any of the 8x.xx INFs on my Toshiba M200(32MB FX5200), the screen goes all crazy when Windows 7 is booting up and does not recover. Is there some option in the INF files that could be causing these graphical abnormalities? Using standard INFs works fine.

[LSudlow]

Hi, Mike...

Yes, there are quite a few tweaks in those infs that are specific to the Inspiron 5150/5160. Not to mention the 8x.xx drivers are much too old for Windows 7. I recommend Vista driver 98.13 from this site, along with its modded inf. You can find both here:

http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/topic/14037-v9813-vista-32bit-sony/

[freality]

Heyo! I'm helping a friend of mine reformat his old Dell Inspiron 5150 (2003 w/ fx go5200) and found this awesome thread. Quick question: He is using XP, and his only concern will be full-screen video playback (youtube, flash, wmv, divx, maybe mkv, etc.) - no games. I'm about to get him going with 169.72 w/ modified INF, but was just curious if that's the best way to go for his specific needs (i.e., will he get gpu-accelerated video, etc.)? I appreciate any input. Thanks!

EDIT: I just read through the thread a bit more, and it does indeed seem like 169.72 should be best for video. Very curious to see how flash performs.

Edited January 23, 2010 by freality

[LSudlow]

Yep, you've got the right driver. I do a lot of video watching myself.

:)

[freality]

I appreciate it! Another question: OK to just do the Nvidia install, or is manually installing adapter via INF better for any reason (or does it matter)?

[LSudlow]

You need to use the "have disk" method. Be sure to remove the original inf, just to make sure the right one installs.

[Guest El Kot]

Hi guys, I hope someone is still reading here. I have a question - does anybody remember, or keep track of, which is the latest driver for the 5150/XP that offers all the the coolbit tweaks (set AGP mode, sideband on/off, set the clocks) like the early ones (50-60 series), but offers, in addition, the brightness/contrast controls like the latest usable 169.xx ones?

I am currently using the 53.06, which works perfectly for my needs - smooth scrolling, video playback, speed. I don't play games, so in that sense I don't need the more advanced interfaces presented by the later drivers. The most demanding video app I run is Google Earth, and that works acceptable (though stuttering a little) with the 53.06; I didn't notice any perceptible improvement with the 169.xx. On the other hand, when running 3dmark01 and 03, I get much better results with the 53.06 than what Larry has posted in the "benchmarking the 5200" topic.

I installed and tried the two recommended 169's, but they were unmitigated disasters. 169.72 scrambled my desktop layout in a very strange way - almost transposed the icon positions, but not quite, and they were not able to be restored, even though I have that utility installed. It was as if desktop addressing changed - very weird. And, at some point I noticed that hibernation and standby capabilities were totally gone, but I can't say which of the drivers did it - I noticed it while in 169.47. The only good thing on these late drivers were, as I said, the brightness/contrast controls, and the fact that they utilize the video hardware better than the earlier ones. For example, running Aquamark, the CPU load is not at 100% all the time, and the fan doesn't blow at full speed all the time, while the results are only a little worse than with the 53.06.

So, to repeat the question - anyone remember which driver still keeps the coolbits tweaks, but offers the newer desktop controls as well? Thanks in advance. :)

El Kot

[LSudlow]

Ah, the memories! I haven't seen those options for years. I'd try either 67.66 or 84.98 and see if one of those has what you need. The infs at the bottom of the first post in this thread enable all the options, so one of those drivers might be what you're looking for.

About performance, you're exactly right. Nvidia drivers have always followed a kind of lopsided bell shaped performance curve. The first drivers for a card are usually poor, then rapidly get better over the next few versions. Then nvidia starts focusing on their next generation cards, and driver performance starts to decline for previous generations, slowly falling off until the card becomes obsolete.

By far, the fastest driver for the FX Go5200 was one of the late 48.xx drivers. Nothing later ever touched it. Unfortunately, it lacked game support for DirectX 9.0b, which dominated gaming for many years. The 5x drivers were indeed faster than 67.66. However, 67.66 was the first full DX9.0b driver without bugs and was my recommended driver for years until games started needing the features of 84.98. But each generation was indeed slower than the previous as nvidia paid less and less attention to the FX series cards.

[Guest El Kot]

Thanks for the response, Larry! I'll probably try 84.98 first, because I already had 66.10 (the last official Dell/M$ update) installed, and I didn't see brightness/contrast controls there. Do you think 67.66 would have a significantly different interface from 66.10 (apart from the fact that it is bug-free, like you say)? In addition, I may try NVTweak on it (I have not tried it until now, because I interpret what's written in its instructions as it won't work on drivers earlier than 55.xx). I probably would have tried it on the 169.xx's, but I was put off by the way they messed up the desktop and the standby/hibernation, and decided they don't deserve a second chance. Good thing system restore works properly!

(In case you're wondering why I ask these questions now, years after the release of these drivers, its simple - I just recently bought the Go5200 on eBay. Before that, I was suffering with a 32M ATI, and when the new higher resolution YouTube videos became unwatchable, finally had to do something. In retrospect, should have been years earlier, but I didn't suspect that a video card for the 5150 with a different brand even existed.)

[LSudlow]

You're right that 67.66 probably isn't much different from 66.10, although my inf should enable brightness, contrast and gamma in both the desktop and overlay video. (Non-overlay video uses the desktop settings.)

Those setting should be available with both drivers, but if not, NVTweak should work fine with both of them. If not, try RivaTuner.

Good luck with it!

[Guest El Kot]

Alright, here's what happened. The 84.98 didn't work - kept crashing and rebooting the computer - had to uninstall it in safe mode. No idea why. The 67.66 worked like a charm - the best of the ones I've tried so far - but argh! that stuttering!

It does not appear to be the same stuttering or choppiness you were discussing in this here topic, before. What you were discussing was problems in video playback; I have exactly the opposite problem. 1280x720p@29.99fps plays beautifully and smoothly - even in VMR, with 100% CPU usage, it is smooth, in any player I tried - BSplayer (my default), WMP, MP Classic. In overlays, it seems it would play even 50fps, it has so much unused resource. Maybe even 1080p - I need to find a video like that to try it. All the game benchmarks run smoothly - 3dmark01 and 03, Aquamark. What is /not/ smooth, and annoying as hell, is simple scrolling - with close to 0% CPU usage. Open a long (hundreds of pages) text file in Firefox, press down arrow, scroll. Every 1 to 2 seconds, it freezes briefly, jerks. Not regular intervals, but always approximately between 1 and 2 seconds. Same thing actually happens here on this forum - when I scroll along a page of topics, it jerks. And playing flash videos with Adobe flash - files, or online - that's jerky too, exactly at the same random 1 to 2 second intervals.

As I mentioned before, I tried several different driver versions. This jerky thing appears, or not, in other drivers too, and I can't really figure out when. At one point I thought that it was because I forgot to turn off vertical sync - but no, it's not that. At another point I thought I might predict if it will happen by looking at the spinning cube in DxDiag - sometimes it spins so fast that I can't read the 'DirectX' on the side, while at other times it spins at about 1 revolution per second, and is clearly readable. ('Sometimes' meaning different drivers - when a driver is installed, it is always the same with the particular driver, and doesn't change.) At yet another point I thought that the bouncing square in the DirectDraw test of DxDiag would be a predictor, and if it jerks - scrolling would jerk too. Unfortunately, no. With 67.66, the cube spins fast, the square bounces smoothly, videos play smoothly, the game tests run fine, and yet scrolling SCROLLING! jerks, as well as any flash video in the Adobe player. (Flash videos in other players, that are able to play them, do not.)

Any suggestions? Observations? Ideas?