GeForce 337.50 BETA Driver

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LazyJohnwon
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Joined: Mon Mar 31, 2014 8:11 pm

GeForce 337.50 BETA Driver

Post by LazyJohnwon »

Spawned from a response in the seemingly outdated (last post before mine dated October) 331.40 beta drivers. I post this thread for the 337.50 BETA drivers (A.K.A. NVIDIA's Response to Mantle) More specifics/details as well as performance tests to come soon

Basically Nvidia optimized low level API handling of DX11 (if memory serves), offering a supposed increase on par with mantle. Real World outcome is nowhere near advertised gains usually, but for me it was like getting a GPU bump. Personally recommenced for those with a slower CPU/Newer GPU combo in your rig, or those with a large CPU bottleneck. My original post with my personal experience for what it's worth, without having benchmarks or proof of this yet posted (soon), it moved me from a frame dropping peasant to a smooth framing shooter!:



I do not have a before/after comparison, I will come back here with one once I move my rig to it's new case, but, this beta driver has made an IMMENSE increase in FPS and FPS stability! I cannot stress this enough, it is like night and day. 45 fps smooth with dips on mostly ultra/some high settings to 55 Solid as a rock (only dips with Firestorm map explosion effects) All 1080p First off, here is my (aging fast) rig.

MB:asus p5p77d-e
CPU: i7-860 unparked/Turboboost off at 3.2 GHZ - Looking at this and the Intel chip specs, I'd suspect the other cores are running at stock speed, however all my tests show all cores at 3.2 ghz, so perhaps a minor OC
HDD: WD 7200RPM 750GB (Seagate hybrid drive goes unused in case)
RAM: 4x2gb 1600Mhz G. Skill RAM (Currently underclocked to 1333Mhz due to this chipset and my need to OC the processor)
GPU: 760 GTX Reference Card (From Nvidia) Stock
PSU: Antec Earthwatts 750w

I believe the bolded to be why I'm seeing such immense performance increase. This beta release was Nvidia's response to MANTLE. A refined DX11 API with emphasis on low-level access, decreasing the load on the CPU. Now, my CPU is 5 + years old running on air, So I've got a nice CPU bottleneck going. Due to my luck in a free 760 gtx I can run this game at all.

(And yes, a waterblock for a nice CPU OC and SSD are on the way ASAP :)

For what it's worth, this runs more stable than any official release for me, aside from the occasional texture load time of .5sec (which I attribute to my HDD/Ram). Will post whatever graphs you need for me to prove this to you all

TL;DR: BETA driver, theoretically and in my real world experience, really only shines as advertised in situations like my own. Older/Slower CPU paired with a newer GPU. Honestly if you don't have a CPU bottleneck (basically a CPU older than sandy bridge, or comparable AMD processor with a single card) you won't see much improvement.
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