Home › News › Gaming
Skyrim gets up to 25% performance boost via GeForce beta drivers
Nvidia has unleashed its latest GeForce beta driver with a few updates, including -- and perhaps most significantly -- performance optimizations for Skyrim players. Version 290.53 should offer GeForce owners up to 25% more frames per second. Nvidia reports a 25% boost over last month's 290.36 beta drivers while playing with cards such as the GeForce GTX 560 at 1920x1200 on Ultra quality settings.
Download GeForce 290.53 beta
Desktop: Windows XP 32-bit | Windows XP 64-bit | Windows Vista/7 32-bit | Windows Vista/7 64-bit
Mobile: Windows Vista/7 32-bit | Windows Vista/7 64-bit
That's a best case scenario, the company admits. The 25% gain was recorded indoors, while outdoor scenarios only run up to 2-3% better. Your mileage will vary depending on your specific GPU, system configuration and in-game location. Nonetheless, it's hard to complain about a double-digit increase indoors considering much of your time is spent in smaller environments, be that caves or buildings.
Skyrim players can also look forward to improved Ambient Occlusion, an Nvidia Control Panel quality setting that enables more realistic shadows. The company added Ambient Occlusion support for Skyrim with 290.36, but 290.53's effects are "faster" and should eliminate the tacky shimmering users have reported. Nvidia has also updated the 3D Vision crosshair to better match Skyrim's default 2D pointer.
There's not much else to see for folks without Bethesda's latest RPG. Build 290.53 includes SLI profiles for Afterfall: InSanity, Trine 2 and WRC 2: FIA World Rally Championship 2011 along with new or updated 3D Vision profiles for Trine 2, Orcs Must Die!, Stronghold 3 and a few lesser-known titles. The beta driver also resolves triangular artifacting in Battlefield 3 and a default panel resolution-timing bug.
Related Stories
Related Products from Product Finder
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 550 Ti 1GB GDDR5 PCIe
Read expert reviews, pros/cons and product information about NVIDIA GeForce GTX 550 Ti 1GB GDDR5 PCIe. There are 21 reviews available so far.
Asus GeForce GTX 560 Ti DirectCU 2 TOP 1GB GDDR5 PCIe
Read expert reviews, pros/cons and product information about Asus GeForce GTX 560 Ti DirectCU 2 TOP 1GB GDDR5 PCIe. There are 18 reviews available so far.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 1280MB GDDR5 PCIe
Read expert reviews, pros/cons and product information about NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 1280MB GDDR5 PCIe. There are 62 reviews available so far.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB GDDR5 PCIe
The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 packs 512 CUDA cores with a graphics/processor clock of 772/1544MHz, 1.5GB of GDDR5 memory with a 384-bit interface and a data rate of 4.0Gbps. The 10.5-inch, dual-slot card draws a maximum of 244W over one 6-pin and one 8-pin PCIe connector and carries two DL-DVI outputs with one mini-HDMI port.
User Comments (23)
Post a comment|
Alpha Gamer
on December 22, 2011 7:12 PM |
I used to have a great performance at Skyrim, than I took a 1.3 Update to the knee. |
|
lawfer
on December 22, 2011 7:21 PM |
I updated and I do see some improvements in BF3, not so much in Skyrim. Perhaps because it always ran smoothly to me. Except in Markath, for some reason it sometimes dropped to the 30s. Now it drops to the 40s. Something is something, I guess. alpha gamer said: I used to have a great performance at Skyrim, than I took a 1.3 Update to the knee. I was going to make fun of you, but then I realized you've just done the job for me. |
|
treetops
on December 22, 2011 7:37 PM |
Im glad I didn't worry about the release day performance of bf3 and skyrim with new patches its getting smoother and smoother. |
|
amstech
on December 22, 2011 7:59 PM |
Looks nice. I'll wait for the official driver though. |
|
Guest
on December 22, 2011 10:11 PM |
My GTX 470 has handled Skyrim just fine with the 285 official drivers. Beta drivers are for nubs. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 2:06 AM |
My GTX 470 has handled Skyrim just fine with the 290 Beta drivers. Official drivers are for nubs |
|
Alpha Gamer
on December 23, 2011 4:40 AM |
My GTX 560 Ti has handled Skyrim just fine with no drivers at all. Drivers are for nubs. |
|
Burty117
on December 23, 2011 6:05 AM |
My GTX 260 has handled Skyrim just fine with no graphics at all. Graphics are for nubs. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 7:06 AM |
My Geforce2 MX handled graphics with no Skyrim at all. Skyrim is for nubs. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 7:21 AM |
My Commodore 64 has handled Skyrim just fine using sprites. 3D graphics are for nubs. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 7:28 AM |
Calling people nubs is for nubs... wait a minute?! |
|
gwailo247
on December 23, 2011 7:30 AM |
My imagination has handled Skyrim with no computer at all. Computers are for nubs. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 8:00 AM |
@gwailo247 I used to do pen and paper RPGs as well. Then I took a D20 to the knee. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 8:05 AM |
My imagination has handled Skyrim with no computer at all. Computers are for nubs. Return of pen and paper rpg's... yay! Then I took a D20 to the knee. My D6 system has handled pen and paper rpg's just fine. D20 is for nubs. |
|
Burty117
on December 23, 2011 8:19 AM |
I walk into a game shop. The man comes up to me and says "you come here all the time, here's skyrim for free" Man this isn't skyrim, this is a Disc. So i through it on the GROUND! |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 9:07 AM |
I used to take updates to the knee but then someone stole my sweet roll.... |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 10:40 AM |
Ati (Amd) used to update their drivers with performance improvements but them they took an arrow to the knee. |
|
Chazz
on December 23, 2011 10:52 AM |
What the hell is going on here? LoL. |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 11:41 AM |
Here's a mod for Skyrim that will give you a nice boost in performance. http://forums.bethsoft.com/topic/1321575-rel-tesv-accelerati |
|
Guest
on December 23, 2011 1:29 PM |
It is quite apparent that school is out. I'll return to reading comments the second week of January. |
|
yukka
on December 23, 2011 7:43 PM |
That's about right. |
|
venomblade
on December 23, 2011 11:40 PM |
lmfao! TLI ftw |
|
gwailo247
on December 29, 2011 8:18 AM |
It is quite apparent that school is out. I'll return to reading comments the second week of January. Yes, we'll be having a lively discussion on deconstructionism vis a vis patellar trauma. |
Most Popular
| Trending | Featured |
-
iOS 5.1.1 untethered jailbreak tool released, supports 4S, iPad 3
-
After five days, Facebook ranks as worst IPO flop of the decade
-
Rumor: AMD "Piledriver" FX CPU production to begin Q3 2012
-
Is Apple's USB wall adapter really worth $29?
-
Google warns users infected with DNSChanger malware, provides help
Editors' Mouse Picks
Subscribe to TechSpot
Get free exclusive content, learn about new features and tech breaking news.
