Nvidia Support Sucks

[whoosh]

I have been trying to contact someone at Nvidia to help sort out their halfassed instructions on how to upgrade drivers. I think I have screwed my computer because of their bs instructions already.

But guess what, you can't get in touch with anyone from Nvidia. There isn't an email address anywhere. And I mean anywhere. employment, investment, corporate, and god forbid there might be one in support.

You can submit a support ticket if you remember your username which I obviously don't or thats just a joke menu,
But HAHAH we got that covered too. You can't ask them to send your username because there isn't an email address to send it to. You can get your password but not your username.

You can make a new account but then you have to have your validation email which I can't find either so basically I have a New Nvidia 6800GT card which I have questions about and these assholes have basically went to a great deal of trouble to create what looks like a reputable company website but with every intention of making sure you can't get in touch with them to provide support for what they sell.

So if anyone out there can help me - - I would really appreciate it.

And my advice Don't buy anything that says Nvidia on it.


So heres my problem.

Of course the problem has to do with how well my BF2 game runs. Which ain't that dam great.


Nvidia HELPLESS site says to delete your drivers before you install new ones.
I have read its really important to make sure all traces of old drivers are removed before running new ones.
There is actually an Nvidia driver removal tool out there that does that. (Guess who used it????)

In my add/remove programs I have two listings for NVIDIA.
1. NVIDIA DRIVERS (exactly like that) If I click on that it comes up with and options menu.
a. Delete all drivers or
b. delete only the following.
here are the options

Nvidia Audio Drivers
Nvidia Ethernet Drivers
Nvidia GART Drivers (i dont know where the hell my gart even is)
Nvidia IDE Drivers
Nvidia memory controller drivers
Nvidia Nforce PCI System management drivers.

I need to know which ones to delete


If you go to their HELPLESS website - here are the options
1. Graphics Drivers
2. Platform/Nforce Drivers
3. Multimedia Software
the rest are for crap I don't have.

If you select Graphics Drivers the next menu says
GeForce and TNT
GeForce Go 7800 GTX
and some other crap

I selected Geforce and tnt. (I have a Geforce 6800gt). I guessing thats the right one.

heres what the download says it for;
ForceWare Release 80
Version: 81.98
Release Date: February 7, 2006
WHQL Certified

The reason this concerns me is right below the Nvidia Drivers in the add/remove menu is another Nvidia listing for Nvidia Forceware Multimedia.

BTW there isn't a listing for that anywhere that I can find for upgrading that.

Basically I don't have a clue anymore what the hell to delete and what to install

According to the website Driveragent.com

These are the drivers on my computer which are out of date.

Nvidia 6800GT Display Adapter
Nvidia Nforce2 IDE Controller
Nvidia Nforce MCP Networking Controller.
Nvidia Nforce MCP Audio Processing Unit
Nvidia Nforce Audio Codec Interface.

They provide sites for all of these Downloads but I don't have a clue where to start since I am pretty sure its already screwed up and I don't want to screw it up any worse.

If you got this far thanks for reading this post.
I really am hoping someone has the smarts or Nvidia experience to help me with this one.

Don't tell me I'm a noob. I think thats pretty obvious already LOL

*EDIT* do NOT try to circumvent the swear filter, you've been warned

[ptegan]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

When I run the program from ADD/REMOVE I get the option to either select the drivers like you, but also to 'remove display only'. You should have an option for 'Nvidia display drivers' somewhere...

An other solution is...


CONTROL PANAL -> SYSTEM

Choose the HARDWARE tab and then DEVICE MANAGER

Click on DISPLAY ADAPTORS and double-click on the entry for your 6800.

On the DRIVER tab you can choose to UNINSTALL the driver.


I'd suggest downloading 'DriverCleaner' (www.drivercleaner.net) and running it after the reboot when you delete the drivers.

1. Uninstall drivers
2. Reboot
3. Driver Cleaner
4. Reboot
5. Install new drivers

[<}US{>BlackHawkPilot73]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

ok for what i am seeing is that u didnt uninstall ur drivers right
download drivecleaner http://www.drivercleaner.net/

then re-download all the drivers
-GFX-http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_81.98.html
cant do more till i know ur full comp specs..i need ur full mobo model.

[whoosh]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

When I run the program from ADD/REMOVE I get the option to either select the drivers like you, but also to 'remove display only'. You should have an option for 'Nvidia display drivers' somewhere...

An other solution is...


CONTROL PANAL -> SYSTEM

Choose the HARDWARE tab and then DEVICE MANAGER

Click on DISPLAY ADAPTORS and double-click on the entry for your 6800.

On the DRIVER tab you can choose to UNINSTALL the driver.


I'd suggest downloading 'DriverCleaner' (www.drivercleaner.net) and running it after the reboot when you delete the drivers.

1. Uninstall drivers
2. Reboot
3. Driver Cleaner
4. Reboot
5. Install new drivers

LOL thats how I got here to start with using drivercleaner.net.

I ran that then tried to upgrade drivers and thats when the train left the tracks.

I'll give it another whirl if you guys are going to be around for a little bit.

[whoosh]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

BTW.

I went back and checked to see if I still had the dc program.
I did. Then I looked around to see if I could tell what I had done when I used it.

In the logs it says

--------------------------------------------------------
---- Driver Cleaner Professional Edition 1.4
---- 26-01-2006 -- 10:12:53
--------------------------------------------------------
- 3Dfx
File Deleted (C:\WINDOWS\Inf\Banshee.Inf)
File Deleted (C:\WINDOWS\Inf\Banshee.Pnf)

And the answer to "did you do a backup first" is . . . . .

(drumroll)

Of course not.

It just keeps getting better.

[ptegan]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Wow! A Voodoo Banshee.inf file?

I haven't seen one of those since 1998 :)

[whoosh]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Wow! A Voodoo Banshee.inf file?

I haven't seen one of those since 1998 :)

well if you run your drivercleaner program its the first one on the list.


I thought the program was for just cleaning Nvidia drivers. Apparently it has a whole list of other programs it will clean too.


I'm kinda hoping i don't need a file that old, but the way my luck is running right now - - I doubt it.

According to the research I did all the apps where for windows 98 and 2000

[ptegan]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

well if you run your drivercleaner program its the first one on the list.


I thought the program was for just cleaning Nvidia drivers.

No it does a lot of stuff but only Nvidia if you choose to only uninstall Nvidia drivers.

Did you try my way of removing the drivers (not driver cleaner)?

[Eternal-Souljah]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Have you seen Valve's tech support yet? if not I suggest you re-think what you said lol.

[whoosh]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Have you seen Valve's tech support yet? if not I suggest you re-think what you said lol.

Yeah I remember trying to talk to them.


I just expected more from somebody I paid that much money to for a product.

[Eden]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Have you got them working yet?

Download the new drivers

Right-click My computer >
Properties >
Hardware tab >
Device Manager >
click the [+] beside display adaptors >
Right Click NIVIDIA GeForce 6800GT > Unlinstall

Restart

Install the new drivers

[imported_VISTREL]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Download new driver, extract the files into directory, and run setup.exe

In most cases you don't have to run setup.exe as it will be automatically launched after extraction.

And you don't have to remove old drivers. New driver will override the old one. Trust me, it's been tested and works fine.

[Eden]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Download new driver, extract the files into directory, and run setup.exe

In most cases you don't have to run setup.exe as it will be automatically launched after extraction.

And you don't have to remove old drivers. New driver will override the old one. Trust me, it's been tested and works fine.

Not always, I dont know about nvidia drivers because ive only had my card for a week but ATI drivers you almost always have to uninstall the old ones first.

[imported_VISTREL]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

Unless your previous card was ATI you better remove old drivers but if you upgrade from one Nvidia driver to another then there is no need. Ive done it for a year, and my system is stable. Not to mention, I get great FPS and no slowdowns.

[whoosh]

Re: Nvidia Support Sucks

I'm making some progress, and my game is running better.

I used my 6800 vidcard disk to reinstall the Nvidia package that came with the card.

Then started over. Downloading new upgrades. Made a big difference the actual graphics are way sharper.
But I still get lag and choppy operation. But despite the lag it still seems faster if that makes any sense.


The first time I flew I had some trouble flying. It was like the airplane was going faster than usual despite the fact that it was intermittently choppy.


If nothing else this has been VERYYYYYY educational.

Found a lot of very helpful sites for finding out whats going on in my computer.

I upgraded my bios so now I can use the dynamit overclocking technology that came with that upgrade.

According to Driveragent.com I still cant seem to get these two to upgrade
IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers
NVIDIA nForce2 IDE Controller

and
Network adapters
NVIDIA nForce MCP Networking Controller

I don't know how crucial these are to game operation though


Also a little worried about deleting those two banshee files.
Anyone got any ideas about those. They look like just two files, but when you go to dl them there are a bunch of them in a zip file and I don't want to install a bunch of old programs at this stage of the game if they aren't need to run the computer or the game.