NVIDIA Driver causes Windows Issue

Hey what's up AO? I don't know if this has already been posted months ago and I never found it, but I thought I would post this incase anyone else is going insane.

A few months ago I noticed that my computer wasn't as customized as it should be. I am the type of person to change the name and icon of 'My Computer', 'Network Places', etc. One day I noticed that these both were set to default after I would switch users/logout-login/or restart my computer. I laughed and thought maybe it was something I installed. Only if I knew...

Format after format I kept trying different things trying to figure out what the problem way. I was going insane, I couldn't find anything online explaining the problem... and I couldn't figure it out myself. I am one who knows that if all else fails... format/reload will fix the problem. Only this time it kept coming back, and only on my main gaming computer (which was the only place I ever had the problem).

I was getting so pissed off at something so simple and so stupid that I actually stopped using this computer all together for awhile. I would sign on to check my outlook, but I usually did that through a Remote Desktop channel from my laptop over the wireless. I stayed away as much as I could because this problem hunted me.

Well I started beta testing some software for M$, and was formatting to test out some ideas about their software. Well I then sat and tried one last time to figure out what was causing my problem. I spent 11 hours restarting my computer after I installed one program, one update, waiting for this issue to come up. It didn't, I sat and laughed louder and harder with each restart and the icons/names weren't changing. I got through ALL of the Windows updates, and ALL of my software that I install and nothing... it was being normal like it use to be a long LONG time ago.

I was so happy, finally had my computer back to the way it was! That was two days ago. Tonight I installed Jedi Academy and went to play it, and it came up saying that it couldn't load my Open GL drivers. I laughed because I forgot to do that after formatting so much over the past two days. I went to NVIDIA's website and downloaded the newest driver, as I always do to stay current and restarted my computer... only to find my problem way back. I sat back for a few minutes thinking. I uninstalled the drivers and restarted my computer again, happily to see that I could rename my system icons and change the icon's name once again and it would stick without going back to default.

Makes a person wonder doesn't it, how a video driver could do something like that. But I also noticed from when I installed the driver and uninstalled it, my boot time was greatly faster and my system wasn't as sluggish with just opening a folder. Not sure why this problem is like it is, or really how to fix it. I went to http://www.driverheaven.net/downloads/index4.htm to download a version of NVIDIA's this guy puts out for overclocking. It's an older version, so I thought maybe this would not cause the problem. Basing that on the fact I didn't have this problem a few months ago, when NVIDIA also put out their newest driver for their video cards.

Like I said before this problem has haunted me, and I just had to get this posted online to see if this has happened to anyone else. So if this problem was posted before, I'm sorry. But I think you can understand from my frustration came madness, and with madness... well you like to see if you're the only one or not.

Next I think I will check NVIDIA's site to see what they say, but I didn't see anything at a glance or receive anything through the email newsletter, so I wonder if they know or if this is truly a "big problem". I've got an older video card of theirs (GeForce 3 and my Ti 4200), so maybe that was the cause. Who knows?

Sincerely yours...
~AciDriveHB

Just a quick note the Omega drivers from DriverHeaven work fine, and they don't mess with my icon modifications.

I know it sounds like something stupid to care about, but stuff like that bugs me. If my computer does not act the way it should and does something like what it was... it makes me feel like I have a virus or something.

Anyway I'll keeping posting what I find until I'm told to shut up...
~AciD

Shut up !

No j/k. What Video Card do you have, i have GeForce2 and i updated to the new driver but had some display prolems after that. Then i went back tot he 52.16 version and everything was good, i think the problem is if you have a older video card and have a newer update it will cause problems. Probably because the new driver is more "programmed" to serve GeForce 4 and later versions. Just my opinion.

Nvidia Drivers install a Service call "Nvidia Help Service" or something similar that realy suck and slow down computer!

Yeah I know what you mean. But I never really noticed a problem with it until this last version I don't think. I tried shutting that off and it still didn't help with my major issue at hand. Thanks though...

~AciD

I havent had quite the same problem although it is a problem with Nvidia drivers so I thought it may be apropriate to post here...

A while back when the newest Nvidia drivers came out I upgraded ( I have a Ti4200 8x 128MB card that I bought back in Feb. of 2003), I didnt notice any relationship but soon there after when I tried to play Soldier of Fortune 2 all my textures were corrupt, I could play Halo PC, and Unreal Tournament 2003 forever with no troubles at all, also Quake 3, ( Soldier of Fortune 2 uses the Q3 3d engine ) so I reinstalled it a half a dozen times or so, at one time going so far as to delete the old folder which still contained screenshots, downloaded files, ( mods, maps, skins, etc. ) thinking that one of them was the culprit. About a month ago I got a new motherboard and a new HDD, it's Serial-ATA so I wanted the OS on that so it was as fast as possible, after reinstalling Windoze ( It's easier to game on ) I just installed all the drivers off the CD's that came with my hardware, and not thinking about the new drivers online I just installed the video card drivers off the CD, figured that I'd play SoF 2 to test out the performance changes, not remembering that it didn't work. Well to my surprise it worked...however Halo wouldn't, so I went and got the newest drivers, and Halo worked but SoF 2 would have corrupt textures and lock up after about 30 seconds of being into a server and playing...I still haven't found a fix for this and still have to change drivers depending on what games I want to play, I'd have to assume that my card is still new enough that the drivers would work with it well however the new ones seem to have some issues with a couple of my older games...

I've never noticed the icons and/or names going back to default as I too have all that changed so it doesn't look quite as much like Windoze... ( I have Mandrake on a 450mhz that I do everything important on... )

I hope I'm not the only one with these problems :)

Interesting! Well I emailed NVIDIA the other day about my problem. Still waiting to see if I get any responce. Though if I do, I'll pass the email address on and you can give it a try with your problem. I know I would be jacked if I had to install different drivers depending on what game I was playing. I've never tried playing SoF2, but I've played the other games you listed.

Though you know if it was a big problem that there would have been a patch or something out for it anyway. But that leads me to ask why are the problems we are having so uniquie? LOL crazy stuff...

~AciD

Just another update to those who have been reading this, I just got new motherboard last week and installed it. Still the same company, just something newer. I now have an nForce chipset (not that it really matters, I'm just happy to say it because I'm a big nVidia fan). The problem has not come up with this new motherboard at all, so I'm just wondering if it was more related to a big mixture of different things.

My only problem now is trying to get the board working stable. Been testing it out since I put it in, not sure if it has something to do with drivers or just all the new settings I'm not sure how they all mesh together. But then again I'm overclocking, so you know how that goes.

Still no responce from nVidia though, which kind of makes me wondering if they even care or not. It's probably just one of those things where they won't care unless more than 25% of their customers email them with the same sort of issue. Oh well it would have been nice to at least hear from someone saying they were looking into it instead of being brushed off.

Just an update. Also to say sorry, usually whenever I've made my post in this thread I've been tired and never bothered to spell check. Don't worry though, I'm not that sane... hehehe

Sincerely...
~AciD

Personally i like nVidia products, but man i really had problems with my drivers on my 5200 fx ultra. It was very particular, my chipset was the via kt333. i still dont know exactly how i "fixed" it but when i downloaded a older detenator driver it just worked. So i left it alone. (if it aint broke, dont fix it):)

Interesting, I had a similar board. I had a MSI Kt3-Ultra2 mohterboard with the kt3 via chipset. Maybe it's a combo with their new driver and the via chipset? Still never really got anything back from NVIDIA about the whole issue though.

~AciD

Im about to buy this card:

http://www.circuitcity.com/detail.js...&catoid=-10266

is it a good card ? or deal:)

btw: I have a Intel Whitney i810E motherboard Chipset. 382 MB SDRAM. It's an 800Mhz Computer. one 20 GB Hard Drive and one 60 GB HD. I have dual monitors. I'm running WinXP Pro buil 5.1.2600. Basicly what i want it to play the "latest games" without lagging. Can this graphic card bring me that performance.

GeForce 4? This is not a DirectX 9 card! This card won't be able to run the lastest video game unless you set the game to lowest video perfromance possible. Go for a Nvidia 5*** card or a Ati Radeon 9***

The MX series of the Geforce4 are the 'downgraded' videochipset series, so for games it's not the best choice, it's a budget choice. You should go for the newer ATI 9* or Nvidia FX5* series like said before.

I suggest when installing new Nvidia drivers always to remove manualy the old drivers otherwise you will get problems no matter what chipset.

I recently installed a Nvidia based Fx5600 card on an NForce2 based board (Asus A7N8X) and an ATI Radeon 9200 based card on another Nforce2 based board (Abit NF7-S) both systems run smooth and without any problems.

Well i ended up buying a GeForce 2 MX 400 FXF. :( Halo (the latest game i got) runs pretty good on it, no lagging). Well i'll se later on i wanna upgrade my motherboard first and then i'll add some stronger video cards and so on....

damn memory a geforce 2?
lol

I'm running a Geforce 4 Ti 4200, but I'm gonna upgrade to either a ATI Radeon 9600XT or a Geforce FX 5700 Ultra

I dont play games anyways, the only game i play is Unreal Tournament. So i dont realy need a good card, and i decided that im gonna stop spending money on the computer, there are more important things in life.

Man I've been out of the loop, waited three weeks (years it seems) to get my "new" motherboard RMAed.

A GeForce 2 huh Memory... how much did you pay for it? If you're not a big gamer, any video card will do just fine. These new games coming out take a lot to run, but I had to downgrade to a 64MB GeForce 3, and I am not having big issues. The graphics are the best, but with my overclocked system I can still keep the frame rate up. You know how it is, always so many factors.

Sorry I wasn't around for the video card debate. But I'm back, got all the overclocking sorted out with the new board, and got everything reinstalled. =)

Sincerely your AO mate...
~AciD