Just bought an ASUS 6600 256MB...need driver help

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Greenmachine

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Hi...
I just bought this card...and need help with the driver installation.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814121196
I assume I need new drivers because I am not getting the performance I expected over my old ATI 7000 64MB AGP 4X card.

Currently I am running driver version 7.1.2.4. It is the driver that came packaged with the card. I want to update the driver but do not know whether to use nvidia drivers or ASUS drivers. If you could provide me a link of where to go...I would really appreciate it. Also do I really have to uninstall the previous driver before updating it?
Thanks
 
ok thanks...I have already uninstalled the old ATI drivers. I was asking if I needed to uninstall the current nvidia drivers before the update.

Thanks
 
I won't bother uninstalling the nvidia drivers, then you are using just default windows drivers and the screen looks like a giant fish bowl while trying to install the new drivers. You should use the latest release 84.XX (i forget) or the 81.89 drivers.
 
As kirock says, you CAN just install the new driver over top of the old. I have done it many times, and it works fine.

Officially, you are supposed to delete the old before installing the new though. Officially ;)

From the nvidia website:
Driver Installation Hints

* "Download Accelerator" utilities should be disabled when downloading any drivers.

* Do not run virus protection software in the background while installing the drivers. This prevents the driver from configuring itself properly.

* Before installing new drivers make sure you uninstall all NVIDIA display drivers from the Windows Control Panel. Browse to the Start Menu > Windows Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs and search for "NVIDIA Windows Display Drivers" or "NVIDIA Display Drivers" and select remove.
 
alright...done and done..
I am now running driver 8.4.2.1
-One problem though..when I restarted my computer after install the ASUS smartdoctor program loaded up and said some of its components may not work. It said that I needed to install ASUS enhanced driver. What the heck is that?? It appears as if smart doctor is still monitoring vga temps, fan speed, etc. I am not really sure what is not functioning on smart doctor.

-I have one last and final question: Under my graphic card properties the location says PCI bus 1, device 0, function 0. Why does it say PCI bus 1? It seems like it should say AGP bus or something like that.
Cheers
 
It sounds to me like you don't have the latest AGP drivers installed for your motherboard, which would explain why it is showing up as running in PCI mode.

Right-click any empty space on your desktop and choose Properties.
Click "Settings", "Advanced" then the 6600 tab.

Take a look what it says there. Look at the "Graphics card information" areea, it says Bus: PCI or Bus: AGP or something.

If it says Bus Type: PCI or Bus Type: PCI (AGP), your card is running in PCI mode. If so, then you need to update your AGP drivers for your motherboard. If you need help doing that, give us your motherboard's make/model.
 
And by the way

DO NOT HAVE ANTIVIRUS SOFTWARE RUNNING

when you are installing chipset drivers. This has messed me up a few times.
 
okay..I updated the chipsed drives and the location still says PCI bus 1, device 0, function 0.

Everytime I boot up it still says *some features of Smart Doctor cannot work - Please install ASUS enhanced driver. Do you know what the ASUS enhanced driver is?
 
The "enhanced" driver is a special driver made by asus for things like "gameface live" etc. It also appears to be necessary to run Smart Doctor.

You can download it here (you have to follow the links in the dropdown boxes):
http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us

Choose "graphics card" then "N6600"

As for it still showing up as PCI, let me see what else I can find, or if someone else has any other ideas.
 
CPU-Z says that my graphic interface is AGP version 3.0, 8X transfer rate, with side band enabled. I guess everything is fine then??
 
I'll be honest and say I am not 100% sure. We know for sure that your interface SUPPORTS agp, but it still seems to me that your card is running in PCI mode.

However, updating your motherboard's AGP (chipset) drivers should have fixed it.

Can you confirm (one more time)

Right-click any empty space on your desktop and choose Properties.
Click "Settings", "Advanced" then the 6600 tab.

Take a look on this screen for what it says there. What does it say here for BUS?
 
Under Bus in that tab it says AGP 8X....
My card still is not performing all that great though. My old ATI Radeon 7000 64MB AGP4X card performed better on Halo. What can I do to fix this? Kind of disappointed about the upgrade at the moment.
 
OK. Well at least now we know you are running in AGP (not PCI). That's the good news.

But performance is sucking? A 6600 is not a very high end card, but still it certainly shouldn't be WORSE than a 64mb ATI 7000. Something's messed up!!!
 
well I know it isn't a high end card..but for Halo it should not lag at all and it should be better than my old card. Do you think it has something to do with how I hooked the power cable up to the card? I used a cable that also has a fan on it. Power goes from the hard drive to the vga and the fan. I only have a 300W power supply as well. You know what is strange though? When using the extreme PSU calculator, my PSU wattage was actually less for the 6600 then it was for my old ATI 7000. Any other ideas of how to speed things up??
 
As for now I am going to run 3d mark 03 and see what my score is. On the box the card came in the score is 4851. Waiting for the download right now...prob going to go to sleep. Get back with you tomorrow.
 
My score is 5008. The picture looks great but I noticed during the tests that the fps are all over the place. I think that is what is causing the poor gameplay. How can I fix the poor fps??
 
Reboot into BIOs/Advanced Chipset and make sure AGP 8X support is enable.
Set the Graphics Aperature Size to 128MB.
Enable Fast writes. Then try disable fast writes. (on next reboot if no improvement)
Save and exit.
 
Ok I have been all through my BIOS and did not see anything about fastwrites or AGP aperature size. What does BIOS/advanced chipset mean...do I have to push something to get into that screen? In my BIOS there are the following headings:
  1. Standard CMOS features - time, date, etc.
  2. Advanced CMOS features - boot sequence, flexible AGP 8X, Init Display first
  3. Integrated Peripherals
  4. Power Management Setup
  5. Pnp/PCI configurations
  6. PC Health Status
  7. Frequency/Voltage Control - AGP clock set at 66???
  8. Top performance
  9. Load Optimized Defaults
  10. Set Supervisor PW
  11. Set User PW
  12. Save & Exit
  13. Exit Without Saving

My mobo is GA-K8NS socket 754. Here is a link to the manual----
http://www.giga-byte.com/Support/Motherboard/Manual_DownloadFile.aspx?FileType=Manual&FileID=16572
Thanks
 
Nevermind....I found in the manual it says press Ctrl + F1 in BIOS to see hidden features. I pressed it and changed the aperature size to 128 MB like you said. I left fastwrite on for now. I am going to try it out and I will get back to you guys...
Cheers
 
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