Problem with the new WHQL R310.70 driver on GTX460s

[Napoleon]

310.90 WHQL has worked for me, viewtopic.php?f=80&t=23376#p233106.
The security patch motivated me to update ASAP.

[art_l_j_PlanetAMD64]

I'm glad that some people are having success with the 310.70 and 310.90 drivers, but there are also many people reporting serious problems with both of these drivers on the NVidia GeForce Forums:
https://forums.geforce.com/

Most of the "Popular Topics" on the home page of the GeForce Forums are users reporting problems with both of these drivers. And many of the users say that they have done all of these things to try to fix the problem, without success:
1) Uninstall the older driver, then
2) Run a driver sweeper or driver fusion to clean away remnants of the old driver, then
3) Run a Registry cleaner (eg CCleaner), then
4) Do a "clean install" of the new driver (310.70 or 310.90).

The fix that does work for most of these users, is to go back to an earlier driver version (306.97 or earlier).

Just do a Google search for "NVidia driver 310.70 problem" and see what you come up with.

What's really scary, is that NVidia has now created drivers that work perfectly on some computers (including 310.70 on two of my own Windows machines), but that cause weird effects, freezes, crashes, BSODs, or worse for other people. And it is completely unpredictable beforehand which way it will go if someone upgrades. It could work perfectly, or it could require you to go back to the older driver, or it could make your computer unusable (requiring a reformat and reinstallation of Windows).

Again, saying "it works for me" is not meaningful. It works for a lot of people. And it does not work for a lot of other people. And NVidia does not seem to have a clue as to what is going wrong.

[ford316]

Again, saying "it works for me" is not meaningful. It works for a lot of people. And it does not work for a lot of other people. And NVidia does not seem to have a clue as to what is going wrong.

This is why I say I am testing and it might be worth for some to check it out as well... there has always been and will always be some problems that some will have while others will not... I do hope however they can find and fix the problems soon...

[art_l_j_PlanetAMD64]

Just posted on the NVidia Forum "Official NVIDIA R310.70 WHQL Candidate Display Driver Feedback Thread" page 39, username art_l_j:

Our next driver release is soon and I've found them to be smoother than R310 drivers in BF3.

NVidia, I really, Really, REALLY love your hardware products! I just bought two more last week, Gigabyte GTX 660 Ti OC (GV-N66TOC-2GD), and they are working great. The factory overclocking is outstanding, hitting 1228MHz without me having to do anything (other than watch in amazement).

I use these new cards exclusively for Folding@Home (FAH), I do not play games or do 3D rendering or anything else like that. The FAH performance is jaw-dropping, to say the least, hitting 39,000 PPD (Points Per Day) on each card.

I really wish I could say the same thing about your new drivers, but unfortunately I cannot. My experiences with anything newer than 306.97 have been absolutely terrifying, to put it in words that could be printed in a family-friendly newspaper. For at least the last 5+ years, updating to the newest driver used to be an absolute no-brainer, it was just ho-hum, click, click, and everything worked perfectly. That is no longer true. Based on my very unpleasant experiences with anything that starts with '310', I will never, ever, install a new NVidia driver until my research (including, but not limited to, reading user feedback at this forum) has shown several months of good, stable operation for most users. Sure, any driver will have a few problems for a small number of people, but the tidal wave of problem reports for the 310.xx drivers is far too extensive for me to recommend these drivers to anyone.

Regardless of how bad your newer drivers are, I know that 306.97 will always be there for me. I really do hope that the drivers following the 310.xx series will return to the extremely high quality level that I saw in the past.

Sincerely,
A True NVidia Fan

Edit by Mod: Added Quote tags.

[P5-133XL]

Sorry, but I look at upgrading any drivers (and BIOS) as a no-brainer: Do not unless there is some issue that matters specificly to me and is explicitly resolved by changing the driver. Changing from something that is working fine can result in only one result that is different and that is it no longer works. Changing a driver because it is newer is never a good enough reason. Changing because it improves performance in a game I never or infrequently play is never good enough. There has to be a known significant benefit and it has to directly affect me before I'll ever consider it. Read change logs and you'll be amazed at how infrequent you'll need to change your drivers.

[art_l_j_PlanetAMD64]

Sorry, but I look at upgrading any drivers (and BIOS) as a no-brainer: Do not unless there is some issue that matters specificly to me and is explicitly resolved by changing the driver. Changing from something that is working fine can result in only one result that is different and that is it no longer works. Changing a driver because it is newer is never a good enough reason. Changing because it improves performance in a game I never or infrequently play is never good enough. There has to be a known significant benefit and it has to directly affect me before I'll ever consider it. Read change logs and you'll be amazed at how infrequent you'll need to change your drivers.

I agree 150%. I was saying the same thing as you, and although I did not mention the "having a reason to upgrade" as I should have, there will be one for me as described here.

[mmonnin]

Sorry, but I look at upgrading any drivers (and BIOS) as a no-brainer: Do not unless there is some issue that matters specificly to me and is explicitly resolved by changing the driver. Changing from something that is working fine can result in only one result that is different and that is it no longer works. Changing a driver because it is newer is never a good enough reason. Changing because it improves performance in a game I never or infrequently play is never good enough. There has to be a known significant benefit and it has to directly affect me before I'll ever consider it. Read change logs and you'll be amazed at how infrequent you'll need to change your drivers.

Yep. I've basically said the same thing here as well.