Graphics Card Trouble, Please Help

[Dyne]

A few days ago, I bought an nVidia GeForce 7600 GS. The 512MB AGP card. I'm still fighting with the drivers. The problem is as such: everytime I try to play video, no matter what program I use, the processor hits 100% usage, and stays there until I manage to close down the offending program. In some cases, the reboots the machine.

So, I'm not really sure what to do at this point, well, other than to pack up the card and its belongings, and promptly return it to Best Buy for a different card (preferrably something WITHOUT this problem).

Any suggestions?

[The Coop]

Which version drivers are you using, and what's your OS?

[Dyne]

Sorry, should've put that up in the first place...

Driver version 93.71
Operating System is Windows XP Professional, 32-bit.

[The Coop]

And everything else runs fine? Games play normally, graphics software (like Lightwave) aren't affected, etc? Also, did you have an ATI card installed before this one?

[Dyne]

Actually no. I had another nVidia GeForce card, a 5500 FX, installed.

Everything else has been running smoothly, save for anything that runs video files.

[The Coop]

Well, try this just to get it out of the way...

- Download the previous version of the drivers (91.47 (http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_91.47.html))
- Download Driver Cleaner (http://www.download3k.com/Install-Driver-Cleaner-Professional.html) (be patient, as the Planet Mirror site's a bit slow)
- Follow Driver Cleaner's instructions carefully to completely uninstall the current drivers
- After the needed reboot, install the slightly older drivers you downloaded, and see if that helps with the videos

[Dyne]

Thanks Coop.

By the way...I'm having trouble downloading Driver Cleaner...any suggestions?

Nevermind, got it!

[The Coop]

Thanks Coop.

By the way...I'm having trouble downloading Driver Cleaner...any suggestions?

Nevermind, got it!

Yeah, that PM site takes a good 5-10 seconds before it starts coming up. Not sure why, it does.

[Pyrion]

The 93.71's suck. I switched to beta 97.73 and they're the best drivers I've ever used. No problems whatsoever.

[The Coop]

The 93.71's suck. I switched to beta 97.73 and they're the best drivers I've ever used. No problems whatsoever.

Sadly, they're also stupidly old. Seems Nvidia's decided to ignore those of us with XP, and a 7000 series card for over six months, with only one new driver in getting close to a year.

As for me, I'm using DHZer0point 0.8466, a user modified version of the Forceware 84.66 driver, and it's the best one I've found (though in truth, I haven't tried their 0.9291 driver). It has all the stability of the official driver, with a noticeable improvement in performance for the higher end stuff like The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and Black & White 2 (especially the latter), without taking a noticeable hit in graphics. I'm using this driver, because Nvidia's official drivers haven't done much of anything to improve performance for a long time. Sure, they focus on adding the new cards, and trying to make things more compatible, but in terms of actual fps gains, I've seen nothing in over a year.

I don't know what they're doing, or why they're taking so long to make new drivers for us non-Vista folk, but it's extremely disappointing.

[dsx100]

Since my question is on a similar topic, I thought it would be ok to just but it here.

I am having performance issues with my BFG Nvidia 7800 256 OC AGP graphics card. For some reason I get horrible performance from it. I got better performance from my old Nvidia MX4000. I am running of 84.21 drivers on Windows XP professional. The games I am trying to run are WarCraft III, Unreal 2004, Doom 3, Nights of the Old Republic, Quake 3, and Age of Mythology. I did call customer service and so far everything they told me to do only improved performance mildly. First it was get a new powersupply, then update bios, then get older drivers and finally they didn't have a solution.

Can you guys help me out or is the card defective?

[Dyne]

Well, problem is solved...for now, I hope... according to someone who posted a reply to me on one of the nVidia forums, I needed to upgrade my mobo drivers, which worked, now videos are back, and card is better.

Hopefully this will be the last of the problems...