Nvidia Forceware Tweak Guide
[Page 3] Forceware Installation
The Nvidia Forceware drivers require some attention to detail when installing and setting up, as there are several things you can do along the way to make your entire system work much better with them. Follow the advice in this section to ensure smooth, trouble-free performance from your Nvidia graphics card.
Download the Latest Drivers
The official Nvidia Forceware driver package is suitable for all Nvidia graphics cards, regardless of their brand. You may have used specific drivers found on your graphics card manufacturer's website before, or those on the CD which comes with your graphics card, however these are always based on the generic Nvidia Forceware drivers anyway and almost always well out of date. It is recommended that instead you use the latest Forceware drivers for all Nvidia-based graphics cards.
To download the latest official Forceware drivers, go to the Nvidia Driver Site, select your particular graphics card model, operating system and language, click the Search button. On the next page tick the box and click on the 'Download Now' button to download the latest Official version of the Forceware Drivers which come in a single large unified driver package.
Note the following specific requirements for certain graphics cards/configurations:
Note: If you wish to use GPU-accelerated PhysX technology on your GeForce 8, 9 or 200 series (or newer) graphics card, you will need to install the Official 177.83 Forceware drivers or newer. The latest official Forceware package always contains the latest relevant PhysX driver, however if it doesn't you can also separately install the latest PhysX driver from the 'NVIDIA PhysX System Software' link near the bottom of this page. See the Advanced Tweaking section on page 9 for more details on GPU-based PhysX settings.
In general I always recommend using the latest available official version of the Forceware drivers simply because they contain the largest number of specific fixes and optimizations for recent games, often have the best performance particularly in newer Pixel Shader/Vertex Shader-reliant games, and are a lot more stable and much less likely to cause problems than beta or leaked Forceware releases. If you run a very recent Nvidia graphics card, you should use the latest available official beta driver as these provide better support for newer hardware and newer games. But in general there is no reason to go backwards to older drivers unless you're experiencing serious issues with the latest Forceware. Even if you gain a couple of extra FPS from an older driver, it is likely to cause odd problems in newer games and applications. Remember, if you are experiencing problems with the latest drivers almost always it is due to either not cleanly installing the most recent driver (i.e. there is driver 'residue' from other versions of the driver on your system), or some other system-related problem - see the TweakGuides Tweaking Companion.
Profiles
As of more recent Forceware versions, you can now save and load various Profiles which hold all your main Forceware Control Panel settings. Open the Forceware Control Panel and under the Profiles menu select Save - you will see a new dialog box which allows you to choose which settings to save, and where to save the profile (.nvp) file. I recommend saving your profile(s) to your own personal directory so they won't accidentally be wiped when you remove the Forceware drivers and manually delete the Nvidia directory for example. Note that these profiles shouldn't be confused with per-game profiles which are covered under the Forceware Control Panel section.
Interestingly, the Profiles menu only appears when you select one of the components under the Display category of the Forceware Control Panel. If you are in the 3D Settings category for example, the Profiles menu disappears. This is despite the fact that saving a profile saves all selected settings, including 3D Settings for example.
Old Driver Removal
Now we move on to the simplest, and yet most commonly mishandled part of using graphics drivers - the removal of previous Nvidia graphics drivers. To do this successfully, you need to follow some simple steps which will help guarantee that your installation of the drivers is 'clean', and leads to trouble-free performance. I particularly recommend this procedure if you are experiencing graphical corruption, performance issues, or strange behavior. To completely remove your existing graphics drivers and all traces of them from your system do the following:
1. Uninstall any existing graphics drivers. To do this, go to Control Panel>Add or Remove Programs in XP or Control Panel>Programs and Features in Vista and 7. Select the 'Nvidia Drivers' (or similar) item if available and click the Change/Remove or Uninstall button and follow the prompts, rebooting as required. If you happen to have any other graphics drivers left over from previous hardware, such as ATI graphics drivers, uninstall them from here as well. If you have an Nvidia-based motherboard, when uninstalling the Nvidia drivers you will have to specifically select the 'Remove only the following' item, then only select the 'Nvidia Display Drivers' box. If you cannot find any Nvidia display-related entries (e.g. a fresh install of Windows), you are probably using the default Windows graphics drivers, which means you can skip to the New Driver Installation section further below.
Note that if available, you may wish to save your settings under a custom Profile (see further above) before you uninstall the Forceware drivers. Note further that In more recent Nvidia drivers there will also be an 'Nvidia PhysX' component, and even a 'Nvidia Stereoscopic 3D driver' component. You should uninstall both of these as well before installing another graphics driver to prevent any problems.
Prior to the next step, you may hear some people recommending that you reboot Windows into Safe Mode before continuing installation. You can do this if you wish - see the TweakGuides Tweaking Companion for details of how to enter Safe Mode, and what exactly it does. The reason Safe Mode can be used is because in Safe Mode, no third party drivers are loaded up into memory by Windows; only the default Windows drivers are used. However this is almost always unnecessary; you do not need to enter Safe Mode to install/uninstall drivers properly. Only if you're having serious problems which nothing else resolves should you use the Safe Mode method, it is not a required part of the standard driver installation routine. Certainly I've never used this method and I've also never had any notable driver issues for many years now.
2. When you reboot, you may find Windows detecting your graphics card as a new device and attempt to find appropriate drivers for your card. Cancel out of all such attempts. If you can't then don't worry about it, but it is preferable if you can prevent this from occurring.
3. This step is optional, however it is strongly recommended if you are either (a) downgrading your Forceware drivers to an older version, or (b) experiencing problems and want to ensure you have a complete 'clean' install of the Forceware drivers. Basically the aim is to find all the individual Nvidia graphics driver files and remove them manually. Note that if you have an Nvidia nForce motherboard, it is recommended that you undertake this step with great caution, as you may accidentally delete Nvidia driver files which relate to your motherboard and not the graphics card. The instructions differ based on your OS:
Automated Removal
For less advanced users, or for those who want to take less of a risk, you can remove older driver files using the free and fully automated Driver Sweeper utility.
Manual Removal
If you are still experiencing problems after using the automated method, or you want to be certain you've removed all driver debris, use the manual method below, though it carries extra risks:
Windows XP: For nForce users, the only file you can safely delete is nv4_disp.dll which relates to the graphics driver - skip to step 4 below after that. For all non-nForce users, to manually delete the Forceware drivers go to your \Windows\System32 and \Windows\System32\Drivers directories, and find and delete all files beginning with 'NV...'. You may notice that some of these files keep recreating themselves - don't worry, these are just the default XP Nvidia drivers which are protected and can't be permanently deleted. Just delete all the Nvidia driver files and let Windows decide which default files the system should keep. Alternatively you can use the Windows Search function (Start>Search), with the search string NV*.* to make searching and deletion faster. Importantly however, do not delete the files under the \ServicePackFiles or \Lastgood directories, or under any game or application-specific directories. Just stick to files found under the two directories mentioned earlier.
Windows Vista & 7: See the 'Viewing, Updating or Uninstalling Drivers' section of the Windows Drivers chapter of the TweakGuides Tweaking Companion. It can be trickier to manually remove driver traces in Vista and 7, so you must read the instructions carefully to see how it's done. Generally speaking manual driver removal in Vista & 7 shouldn't be required unless you're experiencing problems.
Note: If you want to know the exact filenames of all the Nvidia graphics driver files in use on your system, prior to uninstalling the drivers open the Forceware Control Panel and click the 'System Information' link in the bottom left corner of the new Forceware CP. Under the Components tab of the box which opens you can see all the individual filenames and the functionality they relate to. Make a note of these and you can then search for and remove any that are left after you've uninstalled the drivers.
Finally, make sure you delete the entire program folder(s) where you installed the Forceware drivers. The default install location is \NVIDIA but if you chose another location when installing, go there and delete the folder and all its contents.
4. This step is completely optional, but again it is recommended if you want to ensure a totally 'clean' install, especially if you are experiencing graphics-related problems. See the Windows Registry chapter of the TweakGuides Tweaking Companion for the relevant tools you can use to do this. If you're using the Windows Registry Editor to manually delete registry entries - which is recommended only for more advanced users - go to Start>Run and type "RegEdit" (without quotes) and press Enter. Then go to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE key, select the 'Software' subkey, and scroll down to the 'Nvidia Corporation' entry, and underneath you should find a 'Global' entry. Right-Click on this 'Global' key and select Delete to remove it. You may also want to delete the 'Installer' and 'NVControlPanel' keys. Do not remove any other items.
That should remove all the main bits and pieces of old Nvidia graphics drivers and Control Panels which have been installed on your system previously. Of course the quickest method is to just uninstall the Nvidia Display Driver item in Add/Remove Programs or Programs and Features under the Control Panel, but as I said, if you have a history of graphical problems, if you've installed multiple versions of the Forceware drivers without a clean out, or if you are reverting to an older version of the Forceware drivers from a newer one, I strongly suggest you follow all four steps above at least once, and even consider the use of the Safe Mode method.
New Driver Installation
Once you've uninstalled any old Nvidia graphics drivers, there is nothing tricky or difficult about installing the new Forceware drivers. The whole process is simple, but here it is in case you want to be 100% certain it's being done right:
1. Once you've downloaded the latest Official Forceware driver package, simply double-click on it to launch the Nvidia driver installation wizard.
2. When the driver package prompts you for a directory to install the Forceware drivers, it is important to note that this directory is just the place where the files will be temporarily unzipped for installation purposes. It is not where the final drivers will be installed. You can leave the default location shown, but I personally recommend you specify an empty folder of your own choosing. In any case make a note of the directory name, as after installation you can safely delete this directory and its contents - see the Tidying Up section on the next page.
3. Follow the remaining prompts and during the installation process reboot as often as you are prompted, since this is also an important step in making sure Windows has a chance to replace system files which are currently in use. As noted above, you do not need to enter Safe Mode in Windows to properly install/uninstall drivers.
If you want to install an unofficial or beta Forceware driver set, and there is no single executable driver package, you will have to manually install the driver file. To do this, go to the Windows Control Panel>System>Hardware>Device Manager in XP or Control Panel>Device Manager in Vista & 7 and under the 'Display Adapters' category, double-click on your particular graphics card. Go to the Driver tab and click the 'Update Driver' option, then select 'Install from a list or specific location' and click Next. Then select 'Don't search, I will choose the driver to install' and click Next. On the next screen click the 'Have Disk' button and Browse to the directory where the new Forceware driver files are located, and find the appropriate .INF file.
Once the above is done, your new Forceware drivers should be installed and your system should be fully functional. Test out a few of your games to see if there are any obvious issues or glitches. If available, you can also load up your Forceware Control Panel settings from any pre-saved Profiles you may have - see the Profiles section further above.
The next section continues with details of how to clean up your system and do some initial optimization after the Forceware installation.
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