NVIDIA Posts GeForce 310.70 Drivers

[btarunr]

NVIDIA announced GeForce 310.70 WHQL driver suite. The change-log of the new stable drivers are little more than a cumulative of all the R310 series beta drivers launched over the past two months, which include some massive game-specific performance increases, notably up to 38 percent for FarCry 3, up to 27 percent in Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, up to 18 percent in Assassins Creed III, and up to 16 percent in Battlefield 3, for GTX 680. A large number of games receive similar performance updates, NVIDIA 3D Vision profile updates, and SLI profile updates. The drivers include NVIDIA PhysX system software version 9.12.1031, and HDMI audio driver 1.3.18.0. For GeForce 400 series and later, an OpenGL 4.3 ICD is included.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 310.70 WHQL for Windows Vista/7/8 64-bit | Windows Vista/7/8 32-bit |Windows XP 32-bit | Windows XP 64-bit

Update: Although NVIDIA made song-and-dance about this release, and although GeForce.com misleadingly lists these drivers as stable, when you perform a manual search (where it should list stable drivers only), we found out these are in fact not WHQL-signed.



The change-log follows.

Performance Boost - Increases performance for GeForce 400/500/600 Series GPUs in several PC games vs. GeForce 306.97 WHQL drivers. Results will vary depending on your GPU and system configuration:
GeForce GTX 680:

• Up to 38% in Far Cry 3
• Up to 26% in Call of Duty: Black Ops 2
• Up to 16% in Battlefield 3
• Up to 18% in Assassin's Creed III
• Up to 9% in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
• Up to 6% in Medal of Honor: Warfighter
• Up to 6% in StarCraft II
• Up to 6% in Dragon Age II
• Up to 6% in Batman: Arkham City
• Up to 5% in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

GeForce GTX 660:

• Up to 24% in Call of Duty: Black Ops 2
• Up to 10% in Battlefield 3
• Up to 7% in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
• Up to 6% in Far Cry 3
• Up to 5% in Dragon Age II
• Up to 5% in Assassin's Creed III
• Up to 4% in Batman: Arkham City
• Up to 4% in Medal of Honor: Warfighter

NVIDIA SLI Technology - Adds or updates the following SLI profiles:

• Far Cry 3 - updated SLI profile
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 - updated SLI profile
• Dirt: Showdown - updated SLI profile
• Dota 2 - updated SLI profile
• Dou Zhan Shen - updated SLI profile
• F1 2012 - added SLI profile
• FIFA 13 - added SLI profile
• Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad - updated SLI profile
• Hawken - added SLI profile
• Hitman: Absolution - added SLI profile
• Natural Selection 2 - added SLI profile
• Primal Carnage - added SLI profile

NVIDIA 3D Vision - Adds or updates the following 3D Vision profiles:

• 007 Legends - rated Fair
• Assassin's Creed III - rated Not Recommended
• Bloody Good Time - rated Good
• Bullet Run - rated Fair
• Bunch of Heroes - rated Good
• CABAL2 - rated Good
• Call of Duty Black Ops 2 - rated Good
• Carrier Command: Gaea Mission - rated 3D Vision Ready
• Dark Souls - rated Fair
• Dishonored - rated Fair
• Euro Truck Simulator 2 - rated Excellent
• FIFA 13 - rated Good
• Hawken - rated 3D Vision Ready
• Hitman: Absolution - rated Fair
• I Am Alive - rated Fair
• Lucius - rated Fair
• Mabinogi Heroes - rated Fair
• Medal of Honor: Warfighter - rated Fair
• Metro: Last Light - rated Good
• MLB 2K12 - rated Fair
• NBA 2K12 - rated Good
• NBA 2K13 - rated Good
• Need for Speed: Most Wanted - rated Fair
• Of Orcs and Men - rated Fair
• Painkiller: Hell & Damnation - rated Fair
• Planetside 2 - rated Not Recommended
• Prepar3D - rated Good
• Sniper Elite V2 - rated Poor
• Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 - rated Poor
• The Amazing Spider-Man - rated Not Recommended
• Tiny Troopers - rated Fair
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD - rated Good
• Total War Battles: SHOGUN - rated Good
• Unmechanical - rated Good
• War of the Roses rated Fair
• World Rally Championship 3 rated Good
• XCOM: Enemy Unknown rated Fair

Other Profile Updates

• Updated NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Counter-strike: Global Offensive
• Added NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Cross Fire
• Updated NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Darksides 2
• Added NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Dragon Nest
• Updated NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Guild Wars 2
• Updated NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Mechwarrrior Online
• Added NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Meng San Guo

NVIDIA CUDA
Includes support for applications built using CUDA 5 or earlier version of the CUDA Toolkit. More information at http://developer.nvidia.com/cuda-toolkit

NVIDIA SSAA
Added negative LOD adjustments for NVIDIA's full-screen sparse grid supersampling mode to improve image sharpness.

Additional Details

• Installs PhysX System Software 9.12.1031. This version fixes a bug that caused some applications including Unreal Tournament III, Trine, and Metro 2033 not to launch.
• Installs HD Audio v1.3.18.0.
• Supports OpenGL 4.3 for GeForce 400-series and later GPUs.
• Supports DisplayPort 1.2 for GeForce GTX 600 series GPUs.
• Supports multiple languages and APIs for GPU computing: CUDA C, CUDA C++, CUDA Fortran, OpenCL, DirectCompute, and Microsoft C++ AMP.
• Supports single GPU and NVIDIA SLI technology on DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 11, and OpenGL, including 3-way SLI, Quad SLI, and SLI support on SLI-certified Intel and AMD motherboards.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Naito]

Finally! Some pretty decent gains there.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Damn, Nvidia's servers are over loaded, I get twice the speed downloading this from TPU, cheers

 

[TheMailMan78]

Finnaly!

Bta if you run the NVIDIA updater these drivers DO SHOW.

 

[Naito]

Now come on! They're just teasing us...

 

[btarunr]

Bta if you run the NVIDIA updater these drivers DO SHOW.

That's exactly my point. These are not WHQL, yet they show up in NV updater and GeForce.com manual driver search. So they're misleadingly being distributed through stable channels, even through they're beta.

 

[Hilux SSRG]

So no new performance updates to the gtx 670's. I guess they are optimized enough??

 

[TheMailMan78]

That's exactly my point. These are not WHQL, yet they show up in NV updater and GeForce.com manual driver search. So they're misleadingly being distributed through stable channels, even through they're beta.

Confirmed. This is a little strange. They normally don't do this. Maybe they are not signed for Windows 8 but are for Windows 7? Its a reach I know. Ill try tonight and let you know.

So no new performance updates to the gtx 670's. I guess they are optimized enough??

670/680 same thing man. 680 gains are 670 gains also.

 

[Naito]

So no new performance updates to the gtx 670's. I guess they are optimized enough??

Technically the same chip as in 680, so would be strange if it didn't apply to it.

 

[Crap Daddy]

They are sure they'll get the WHQL approval from Windows so why wait? Today is launch day for Far Cry 3 in the US so I guess they're in a hurry.

 

[newtekie1]

They are sure they'll get the WHQL approval from Windows so why wait? Today is launch day for Far Cry 3 in the US so I guess they're in a hurry.

That would be my guess too. These are likely WHQL candidate drivers, and just haven't passed yet, but being that FC3 is coming out today they didn't want to wait to get them out for people to start using.

 

[Naito]

As long as it's not tagged as a beta, I'm happy to run 'em

 

[W1zzard]

The NVIDIA blog post talks about "WHQL-candidate driver", so it's no better than any other beta. The download page or changelog doesn't mention WHQL.

My guess is NVIDIA wanted to push this beta driver out for Far Cry 3, and to everyone, not only the people who click "beta" driver in the driver search.

 

[btarunr]

As long as it's not tagged as a beta, I'm happy to run 'em

If they're not WHQL signed, they're beta.

 

[TheMailMan78]

The NVIDIA blog post talks about "WHQL-candidate driver", so it's no better than any other beta. The download page or changelog doesn't mention WHQL.

My guess is NVIDIA wanted to push this beta driver out for Far Cry 3, and to everyone, not only the people who click "beta" driver in the driver search.

They normally don't list beta drivers on NVIDIA updater. I hope this doesnt become a habit with them.

 

[Naito]

A supposed 38% gain is pretty large optimization, so makes sense if they push them out early

 

[TheMailMan78]

If they're not WHQL signed, they're beta.

I really hate the fact they did this.

 

[btarunr]

They normally don't list beta drivers on NVIDIA updater. I hope this doesnt become a habit with them.

To add to that, unsuspecting people with WHQL drivers are being prompted to update to a beta (by definition unstable) drivers by NV Update. NVIDIA is deliberately pushing unstable software by polluting its stable release channel.

 

[Hilux SSRG]

670/680 same thing man. 680 gains are 670 gains also.

Awesome, I was thinking that but wanted to check with you strangers who are in the know

Those BF3 increases may have to be checked on by me!

 

[TheMailMan78]

To add to that, unsuspecting people with WHQL drivers are being auto-updated to a beta (by definition unstable) drivers by NV Update. NVIDIA is deliberately pushing unstable software by polluting its stable release channel.

Yeah man. Thats not cool at all. Now Ill have to be super careful when updating through them. They are idiots for doing this. Kills confidence with them IMO.

 

[Hilux SSRG]

To add to that, unsuspecting people with WHQL drivers are being auto-updated to a beta (by definition unstable) drivers by NV Update. NVIDIA is deliberately pushing unstable software by polluting its stable release channel.

I have had no stability issues with Nvidia Beta drivers ever, now ATI/AMD drivers on the other hand gave my system occaisonal fits.

 

[Naito]

I agree with MM, but surely in their eyes it's not a beta and, as Wizzard and others mentioned, was just rushed out without WHQL? Seems strange that it's in the stable release channel, but also isn't mentioned to be a beta by Nvidia.

 

[TheMailMan78]

Did you update Bta? I have a feeling you did by mistake.

 

[Crap Daddy]

My guess is NVIDIA wanted to push this beta driver out for Far Cry 3, and to everyone, not only the people who click "beta" driver in the driver search.

That's it. Plus they are delivering through update (which I never enable). They are pushing this driver by any means although not yet certified. Not a fair act, I agree.

 

[Naito]

That's it. Plus they are delivering through update (which I never enable). They are pushing this driver by any means although not yet certified. Not a fair act, I agree.

Could it just be a mistake, or is there a major big/vulnerability that they have found and need the entire Nvidia populationg to test? Surely it's not just for FC3 or other games?