Here is yet another chance to increase your framerate and/or your game texture quality. The most prominate feature is better SLI AA support (it's easier to enable), instructions for enabling it are below (taken from here. (http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_78.01.html))


Step 1. If you already have Coolbits installed, you can skip to Step 2. Otherwise, click on your Start Menu in the Windows Task Bar and select Run. When the command box opens, type "regedit" (without the quotes) and press OK. With the registry editor open (shown below), go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \SOFTWARE \NVIDIA Corporation \Global \NVTweak (expand the menu using the "+" expansion buttons to locate this menu item). Click on "NVTweak" in the menu. Next, right-click on the empty space inside right window and choose "New>DWORD value". Name the value "Coolbits" (without the quotes).

Step 2. Within the Registry Editor, right click on Coolbits and choose Modify. Change the Value data to "8" (without the quotes) and click OK. Exit the Registry Editor.

Step 3. In the NVIDIA Display Control Panel under Performance & Quality Settings, you now have the option within Advanced Settings to change the SLI rendering mode to "SLI Antialiasing".

Step 4. Once you select and apply the SLI Antialiasing mode (either globally or for a specific game profile), you then have the option to select either SLI8x or SLI16x under 'Antialiasing settings'.

Step 5. Select the desired antialiasing setting and click "Apply". SLI Antialiasing is now ready for use!

Now some of the computer-savvy reading this may be thinking that SLI AA was available in the last driver release, you're right, but only for certain cards, this version works for all cards. The quality of the game is improved vastly (particularly the textures and lighting, metals look far brighter for instance), but only when you look closely can you notice the how smooth the drawn-in shadows are.

The overclocking features are improved a lot as well, automatic-OCing in this release gets you maybe 10-20 mhz. And before someone says anything, I know these drivers have been official since mid-August, but since no one's mentioned it I thought I'd bring it up :)

***Edit***
I almost forgot about this thread... anyway, the new version has nothing new unless you have a GeForce 6500, however I'm finding they make 7-series based systems slightly less stable...

yeah, already got it, got it right after it was posted, hehehe :D

i've actually followed all the steps it says to do and i still don't get the SLI AA option... i can't figure out what s wrong, maybe it's not for all vid cards yet?

Hmmm, what card do you have? I have twin 7800 GTX's and those are nVidia's second newest card, and it works for mine. The only things I can think of are that in regedit you give "Coolbits" a hexadecimal value of 8, so in the main regedit screen check to make sure that the "Data" column reads "0x00000008 (8)". Here are my driver settings (make sure you're viewing the advanced settings as well):

Antialiasing Settings: SLI16x
Anisotropic Filtering: Application Controlled
Image Settings: High Quality
Color Profile: N/A
Vertical Sync: Application Controlled
Force Mipmaps: Trillinear
Conformant Texture Clamp: On
Extension Limit: Off
H/W Acceleration: Single-Display Mode
Trillinear Optimization: Off
Anisotropic Mip Filter Optimization: Off
Gamma Correct Antialiasing: On
Transparency Antialiasing: Supersampling
Triple Buffering: On
SLI Rendering Mode: SLI Antialiasing
Negative LOD Bias: Allow

The only things I can think of are that in regedit you give "Coolbits" a hexadecimal value of 8, so in the main regedit screen check to make sure that the "Data" column reads "0x00000008 (8)".

yup… did that…

I have GeForce FX 5200, which is supposed to work with SLI also…

Triple Buffering: On
SLI Rendering Mode: SLI Antialiasing <<<<<
Negative LOD Bias: Allow

The SLIRM isn’t showing up between the TB: On and NLODB: Allow…

I think maybe it has something to do with the mobo, maybe it’s not SLI rated or doesn’t have the SLI connector for the card, my don’t know…

SLI Requirements:
Two identical cards, SLI-ready (PCI-Express, have SLI link near the front of the card, and SLI power)
SLI motherboard, 24-pin ATX, 30 amp 4-pin, nForce4 SLI chipset
SLI link (usually comes with the motherboard)

Then, on most motherboards, there's a chip in between the PCI-Express ports that has to be flipped around.

After that, go into the driver settings and check "Enable SLI multi-GPU" and reboot. Although, I don't think your card supports it,
http://www.slizone.com/page/slizone_learn.html)
That site says that the following support it (all PCI-Express versions) :

GeForce 7800 GTX
GeForce 7800 GT
GeForce 6800 Ultra
GeForce 6800 GT
GeForce 6800
GeForce 6800 LE
GeForce 6600 GT
GeForce 6600
GeForce 6600 LE

Quadro FX 4500
Quadro FX 4400
Quadro FX 3450
Quadro FX 3400
Quadro FX 1400

Although, I don't think your card supports it

I think you are right, but i could have swore i saw that it was supported in the 77.77 release notes .pdf file... i may have miss read it though...


Edit: I went back and double checked, and what i thought i saw wasn't what i thought i saw it was, hehehe :D

I wonder if they are going to make SLI single GPU compat.?

Well, SLI is "Scalable Link Interface", designed to connect 2 GPU's in order to either double the total performance (usually GeForce cards) or offset heavy graphics loads (usually Quadro FX cards), so a single GPU SLI would defeat the purpose of the technology.

they have a new version out 78.01, but the drivers themselves haven't changed, all it does is adds support for the 6600 and 6600 LE card, i believe...

It's been a while since I've updated this thread, but seeing as there haven't been any noteworthy enhancements, I've had no reason to.

However, the newest FW beta drivers are quite stable and offer a lot better performance. They're version 83.90, and you can get them from Guru3D. (http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1326)

Hey jmac I re-named the thread according to the last drivers you mentioned... (83.90 beta)

we'll try to keep a better lookout for these next time should you decide to maintain this thread, however feel free to PM one of the moderators should you need it renamed again :)