Nvidia Forceware 180 Series Preview Part 2

This is the 2nd part of the Forceware 180 Series Preview. The first part was reviewed using Forceware 180.10 drivers and games were not used for the tests. This time, we manage to grab hold of a newer, Forceware 180.32 drivers and we will be testing it using Crysis:Warhead + FBWH Benchmarking tool v0.29 in Split/Extended mode + SLI function enabled. We will also be looking into the PhysX function control, now found in the Forceware’s control panel as opposed to the one from the PhysX program itself. Last but not least, a performance comparison between Forceware 180.10 and 180.32 in 3DMark Vantage.

Updated : Included Forceware Driver 180.42 information and tests.

This is the 2nd part of the Forceware 180 Series Preview. The first part was reviewed using Forceware 180.10 drivers and games were not used for the tests. This time, we manage to grab hold of a newer, Forceware 180.32 drivers and we will be testing it using Crysis:Warhead + FBWH Benchmarking tool v0.29 in Split/Extended mode + SLI function enabled. We will also be looking into the PhysX function control, now found in the Forceware’s control panel as opposed to the one from the PhysX program itself. Last but not least, a performance comparison between Forceware 180.10 and 180.32 in 3DMark Vantage.

Note: We have mentioned previously that there were limitations on the multi-display mode + SLI function and we found out that some of them are normal and should not be regarded as a limitation or bug that needs to be fixed as there are actually workarounds or other ways of implementing it manually. They are,

1. SLI main focus screen cannot be set to run on the secondary monitor yet. - This can be fixed by running the game in windowed mode, moving the window, placing the game manually on the second monitor and using Alt-Enter key to expand and re-focus it onto the 2nd monitor.
2. If the 3D application is running for eg. 1280×1024 resolution, the secondary display will also be changed to 1280×1024 automatically. – This only happens when running applications/games that are set to non-windowed focus mode with lower, non-native LCD resolutions and also due to the fact that Flat Panel Scaling is broken.
3. It cannot do 1680x(1050+1050) in 3D and cannot stretch 3D rendering mode into both screens. – This is mostly due to the limitation of the games or applications that do not support that resolution.
4. So far only clone mode is working properly with some drop in performance as shown in the vantage scores coming up next page. – Split mode + SLI did not work during the test because only 3DMark Vantage was used and Vantage requires a focused SLI main screen to function properly and switching activity from the Vantage screen to the secondary screen will result in Vantage not responding.

The additional UI found in the older Forceware 180.10 is exactly the same as what you will find in the 180.32 set, so this time, we will not show any more UI interface like what we did for the first preview.