Microsoft Issues Windows Vista Hotfix for Gaming - KB940105

[malware]

Microsoft has made available the following Windows Vista KB940105 hotfix. All NVIDIA GeForce 6, 7 and 8 series users should install this update in order to resolve potential Graphics Virtual Address problems that may occur when running Windows Vista OS. This hotfix resolves abnormal application behavior such as crashes and extremely low frame rates when running some 3D applications at very high graphics settings. This issue has been most commonly noticed on high-end graphics cards and the following applications: Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142, Civilization IV, Company of Heroes, Half-Life 2, Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth II, Supreme Commander, and Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas. In order for this hotfix to be effective, GeForce customers must also update to the latest ForceWare Release 163 drivers.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[mikey8684]

anyone put it to the test yet ?

might DL soon

 

[NympH]

Im using it, but i don't notice any difference, as usual...

 

[Zero Cool]

Im using it, but i don't notice any difference, as usual...

nothing stopped working? thats unusual!

 

[WarEagleAU]

Are the Geforce 6,7 and 8 cards more prone to problems with gaming in Windows vista?

 

[Zero Cool]

Are the Geforce 6,7 and 8 cards more prone to problems with gaming in Windows vista?

then...ATi?

Gaming was fine on my 7900gtx

 

[Pinchy]

All games are fine on the 6800GO in the laptop. Dont see a reason to update to it (plus i cant update to 163 drivers....stupid dell ).

 

[Flint]

...and what about users of ATI video cards? the MS site says nothing about this being exclusive to any brand, so is this recommended for us ATI users too? http://support.microsoft.com/kb/940105

 

[FAXA]

My BF2 has stopped crashing YAY!!!

 

[Mussels]

i've been running this one for a while, anandtech has info about it.

this DOES work on ATI. What it does, is fixes a bug.


In DX9, the video card ram was shadowed into the memory address space, so that the 32 bit programs/drivers could access and modify it as if it was system ram.

However, for some reason it was always maxed out in vista - if you have a 768MB GTX, that was 768MB of address space gone. Under 32 bit vista, when you hit 4GB address space.... you crashed. BF2142 on titan maps was very prone to this.

All this fix does is reduces the amount a fair bit, so its not at max - a 768MB card might use 200-300MB now, giving you some more headroom before you crash. A proper fix should come out some time in the future, but most people are reccomending vista x64 instead.


P.S
It should be noted that this affects memory *address space* and not system memory itself - system memory is part of the address space, video card ram, and all shadowed ROM's (bios, PCI cards, etc use some) - however, i have noticed 1-200MB less ram usage after installing this, i assume this difference will be lower for users with less than 512MB of total video ram.

 

[Flint]

Thanks, Mussels. I'll DL it later on.

 

[Grings]

good find mussels, i wonder if this would help that guy having issues with 2 1gb 2900's and 8gb ram that was on here a while back (i know he was on 64 bit, but maybe theres a good few bugs linked to extra address space available)

 

[effmaster]

Does this update only affect desktop video cards or will it work on My geforce Go 7600 even though its a laptop graphics card it has 256 MB on it

 

[wiak]

i've been running this one for a while, anandtech has info about it.

this DOES work on ATI. What it does, is fixes a bug.


In DX9, the video card ram was shadowed into the memory address space, so that the 32 bit programs/drivers could access and modify it as if it was system ram.

However, for some reason it was always maxed out in vista - if you have a 768MB GTX, that was 768MB of address space gone. Under 32 bit vista, when you hit 4GB address space.... you crashed. BF2142 on titan maps was very prone to this.

All this fix does is reduces the amount a fair bit, so its not at max - a 768MB card might use 200-300MB now, giving you some more headroom before you crash. A proper fix should come out some time in the future, but most people are reccomending vista x64 instead.


P.S
It should be noted that this affects memory *address space* and not system memory itself - system memory is part of the address space, video card ram, and all shadowed ROM's (bios, PCI cards, etc use some) - however, i have noticed 1-200MB less ram usage after installing this, i assume this difference will be lower for users with less than 512MB of total video ram.

yep vista x64 is the best system for you gaming rig ^^
vista 32bit is the best system for you htpc
in vista x64 you get more than 3GB RAM!, this is why you can get upto 16GB on motherboards when running x64 version of windows aka windows amd64

all heil to amd for getting this revolution to the consumer

 

[Solidus J2K]

Bioshock now works fine in Dx10 mode (no more RT 2.03 + D3DOverride Triple Buffering in DX10 enable)

 

[Mussels]

good find mussels, i wonder if this would help that guy having issues with 2 1gb 2900's and 8gb ram that was on here a while back (i know he was on 64 bit, but maybe theres a good few bugs linked to extra address space available)

Yes. He'd have lost 2GB just to his cards alone, with the bug.

Does this update only affect desktop video cards or will it work on My geforce Go 7600 even though its a laptop graphics card it has 256 MB on it

This affects the vista OS - however, with only a 256MB card, it wouldnt affect it all that much.
Dont forget you need the 163.xx drivers, they arent available on laptops yet.

yep vista x64 is the best system for you gaming rig ^^
vista 32bit is the best system for you htpc
in vista x64 you get more than 3GB RAM!, this is why you can get upto 16GB on motherboards when running x64 version of windows aka windows amd64

all heil to amd for getting this revolution to the consumer

Vista64 is great - so is 4GB ram
And shhhh, the intel users *cough* who are running x64 *cough* might hear you

(Intel did have 64 bit first, just not a chip that did 32 and 64 simultaneously)

 

[R_1]

(Intel did have 64 bit first, just not a chip that did 32 and 64 simultaneously)

There was Intel Itanium possessor in year 2003 when AMD64 was introduced on the market. I still remember looking Intel website - the cheapest price was 7000$ for a CPU. It was a server CPU on PCB with DDRSDRAM level3 cash and IA-64 architecture. Intel didn't manage to sell even 10 000 of this CPU till 2003 , but MS made an OS for Itanium. There was an opinion that Itanium CPU is only for DB servers and it is a long term Intel goal to introduce 64bit computing to the desktop PC's (10 yarns or so).

 

[Grings]

Itanium wasnt x86 though, and no more compatible with x86 than the 64bit RISC chips in the early 90's
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIPS_architecture