smithpd on 4/5/2007 at 05:35
The other day, as I reported above, I had Thief Gold set up with a 7950 GT graphics card, 111.09 drivers, hardware video on, and hardware audio off. TG worked every time I ran it, loaded a saved game, etc. Now it doesn't work any more. :( I'll explain below the sequence of events that I went through to reach this state. If anyone has any ideas how to fix this, I would appreciate it. Otherwise, I am afraid the 7950 GT is going to take a trip back to Newegg. I would really hate that, because the XFX 7950 GT has such a cool looking radiator!:p
Here is what I did. I removed Nvidia drivers and installed DHzer0point_0.8466-[Guru3D.com]. I was hoping that with the tweaked ini file it would include the 7950 GT and that the 8466 would have unbroken support for TG. Nope. It would not recognize the 7950 GT. To date, I cannot find any 8xxx drivers that recognize the 7950 GT. That would be a big help if I could find an 8xxx driver that worked.
Then I installed Biker's suggested driver, Z-Tweaked_v158.19_[Guru3D.com]. That gave me the old dump to desktop / send / don't send error every time I loaded a saved game or started a new game. The software audio did not fix it.
Finally, I deinstalled the Nvidia drivers again and reinstalled 111.09 (10109-xp-32bit-[Guru3D.com]), the version that had worked previously. I tried to set it up as before, but it would not work. Same symptoms as 158.19. I have no idea what magic sequence of things I did before and why I cannot repeat it.
Here is the way it behaves now in detail.
When I start a game, if the game options show either hardware video or hardware audio, or both, it will not load a saved game or start a new game. It crashes with the don't send, etc.
To fix the above temporarily, I can go into Thief Options, set video and audio to software mode, and load a saved game. After the saved game is loaded in software mode (looking terrible, also with very fast running because there is no Vsync), I can go back to Thief Options and set video to hardware mode. I have to leave audio in software. Then, when I hit Continue to go back to game, it looks and works great. For a while....
The problem is that now, if I save a game and reload it, I have the same crash. I have to go through the same stupid software / hardware mode switching every time I want to load a saved game. This definitely encourages iron-man play and essentially destroys ghosting as I know it.
I have tried lots of combinations of when you go into the options menu, what you change when you do, etc. Nothng works.
That method of editing cam.cfg mentioned in another thread is no help either. That accomplishes about the same thing as going in and out of software mode, only it is more trouble.
So, I am totally bummed. I thought the 7959 GT would work, and it actually did work for a while, and now it doesn't, for no apparent reason. Any ideas how to make the hardware video configuration work permanently?
bikerdude on 4/5/2007 at 09:48
Smithy
Have a check on Guru3D to see if the modded 84.56 drivers will install/support your card!
NGO NVIDIA Optimized Driver v1.8456 -(
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1387) link
If they do, try and Install those instead.
biker
One thing you can do to make the evga 84.56 drivers install is modify the 'inf' file that lists all the cards supported etc and ad the 7950Gt to list, this will then let the driver install. - If you need a hand with this let me know.
smithpd on 4/5/2007 at 18:45
Thanks, biker. I'll try this NGO version later this evening when I get home. I doubt that their statement "The Driver has support for all GeForce cards" means much. This driver came out a year ago, way before the 7950 GTwas released. We will see.
As a backup plan, if NGO does not work, should I e-mail you the EVGA INF that needs to be modified, or do you already have it? I think the EVGA has a better chance because it already has a list of modern cards that are close.
EDIT: the NGO drivers did not work. See below for a solution that does work.
smithpd on 5/5/2007 at 07:44
With Biker's help, I figured out how to make the 7950 GT PCI-E work for T1. It is basically to take modified drivers and modify them further yourself. Below I'll give a brief description of what I did. This is not for the faint of heart. I would say, then, that the 7950 GT works, but it is not easy. You had better rush out and download the right driver components before they disappear. I am going to back mine up, for sure, and never upgrade drivers so long as I own this card!
Below is some information I had to beat my brains out for a couple of days to find. I am not a driver specialist, so my explanations below may contain technical errors. If you find errors, please let me know. If you know of a better procedure, please let me know.
As background, the 7950 GT is a recent card that is supported by Nvidia Forceware drivers 93.71 and above. However, T1 is an old game that, when run under XP or 2000, typically works only with 8xxx drivers and below. I think there are exceptions to this (I had 93.71 running once with the old computer), but with my present setup the 9xxx and above drivers always crash when playing T1. This behavior is described a few posts above. Unfortunately, I could find no 8xxx drives that support the 7950 GT directly, leaving me between a rock and a hard place, that is, no T1 capability.
Biker pointed me to an enhanced EVGA 84.56 driver set at Guru3D that he has used with 7900 GT and 7900 GTX cards and that should (but doesn't) work with 7950 GT. It should work because all these cards share a common chipset named G71, so the software is there but can't be accessed. Here is the link:
(
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1385)
To make drivers work for your video card, you need two things:
(1) the software (DLLs etc.) in the driver package that supports your hardware. Different Nvidia chip sets use different software, even though it is all contained in one package. I thought the above would have the right software in it because it supports a wide range of cards, including G71's.
(2) an INF, or setup information file that is used to load the right software when the driver is installed.
The driver installer checks some hardware code in the card and tries to find the right INF entry. There are three possible outcomes. (a) If it finds the INF entry and it also finds the software files needed, it installs the driver correctly. (b) If it finds the INF entry but can't find the software files, the installation goes awry. (c) If it does not find the INF entry (true for all 8xxx drivers I could find), it stops and says your card is not supported, regardless of whether the software is present or not.
Most 8xxx driver sets seem to have neither the software nor the INF entries to support the 7950 GT. They seem to be hopeless.
The EVGA drivers linked above have the software but not the INF entries for the 7950 GT. So they are ripe for further modification.
You need another thing if you are going to replace the INF file:
(3) The installer must extract the install files and store them in a folder, and not delete the files if the installation fails. Many driver sets do not save the files. So, it takes some looking to find a driver set that both has the software and saves the install files. Thanks to Biker for locating part (1) of the puzzle. :)
The EVGA drivers in the above link have (1) and (3) but are missing the correct INF entries, (2). So the next and last trick is to find or make an INF file that works. What I did in this department was to rely on a newer INF file that has the correct entries and was saved by the installer. I found that good INF file in the following drivers:
(
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1621)
Now, to merge the INF with the driver set's software, you really should make sure that there is a one-to-one correspondance between all INF entries and the ability of the software to support them. Otherwise, you could get into the situation where the installer thinks the card is supported but the necessary files are not there. I did not take the trouble to do this careful merging. I simply copied the newer INF file (nv4_disp.inf) directly from the 158.19 driver set (2nd link) into the folder created by the EVGA driver set (1st link), and it worked the first time, without further fiddling! :D
There may well be video cards in the 158.19 INF that are not supported by the software in the EVGA 84.56 driver set. A complete set of cards
known to be supported by the EVGA 84.56 driver set is given in the first link. Any others, like my 7950 GT, are pure gravy. I should add that the 84.56 driver set comes with a separate INF file that the authors advise to substitute into the install folder if the original install INF does not work. That modified INF does not contain the 7950 GT either, so I had to look for it elsewhere.
The result is that my video card is identified as as Nvidia GeForce 7950 GT in the Device Manager, the card is identified as a G71 in the Display Properties / Advanced, the driver version is identified as 6.14.11.5819 in the Adapter properties (what is the deal with that?!), T1 and T2 work fine, and I am a happy camper.:)
That's it. And, no, the 84.46 drivers do not have good sky. What did you expect, a miracle? ;)
bikerdude on 5/5/2007 at 09:21
Smithy
I might be worth making a smaller version of your last post and then using that to replace the first post, so people dont have to dig down through the thread.
wel done btw, Im glad to see you figured out the last bit without my help
biker :thumb:
smithpd on 5/5/2007 at 18:25
Quote Posted by Bikerdude
I might be worth making a smaller version of your last post and then using that to replace the first post, so people dont have to dig down through the thread.
I left the first post intact but placed a summary of this investigation at the end. Please check it for accuracy, especially to see if what I said about the 8800 is correct. If you have any additions or corrections, please let me know.
bikerdude on 5/5/2007 at 18:37
Quote Posted by smithpd
I Please check it for accuracy, especially to see if what I said about the 8800 is correct. If you have any additions or corrections, please let me know.
Atm you have a typo, "EVGA driver, version 84.46" should be 84.56 and come back to this post if and when i find more.
biker
smithpd on 5/5/2007 at 18:58
Quote Posted by Bikerdude
Atm you have a typo, "EVGA driver, version 84.46" should be 84.56 and come back to this post if and when i find more.
OK, thanks. I corrected that and made quite a few other edits. I'll come back to this post, too.
Sneak on 6/5/2007 at 03:27
Thanks for the link Peter. This is good stuff. I want to post something from my perspective though because in your first post there was a reference to the 8800 Nvidia not working with Thief Gold.
I have an 8800 GTX and have had several different drivers. The newest are the 158.22, and had the set before those and I believe the set before that. I have never had a problem running Thief Gold. I have been doing a complete play through of it again and am just starting The Mages Tower mission. I have not had any troubles with it running on the 8800 gtx.
And a slightly OT aside: Will be installing the Guru3D tweaked 158.22 drivers because they have the old control panel of Nvidia. I have never liked the new control panel. It is just not intuitive to me. The old one that you could get to from right clicking on the desktop was just very user friendly.
smithpd on 6/5/2007 at 06:20
Thanks for the clarification on the 8800 GTX, Sneak.:) No question, I was confused and gave incorrect information in the summary. I have corrected it. To date, nobody has come out and endorsed the 8800 series. I thought I had read somewhere that it had a problem with T1 / Gold, but I guess I was wrong.
You mentioned elsewhere wanting to get a 6800 because of driver problems with the 7950 GT. Well, I upgraded from the 6800 GT to the 7950 GT. It was definitely a hassle with the drivers, but I am pleased with the improved performance and glad I did it after all the smoke cleared. The 6800 GT and the 7950 GT both have bad sky and bad dark textures. I see no difference in the images. I have both computers side by side connected by a KVM switch. I don't think there is any advantage in terms of video quality in going back to the 6800. The only positive thing about the 6800 GT is that working drivers are easier to obtain for it. Maybe that is enough.
