New NVIDIA drivers seem to cause font problems

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The Purple Panzer
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New NVIDIA drivers seem to cause font problems

Post by The Purple Panzer »

I have two monitors/video cards, the main one is
NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti 200, the second one is NVIDIA GeForce4
MX 440. Windows Update (snarl) told me there were new drivers available; I installed them, and when I start BZFlag I don't see any of the main menu items, just blocks where the characters should be (with what seems like a game texture in them). This machine is a Windows 2000 machine.

I went directly to the NVIDIA site and tried to grab the correct drivers, went through the install, and I get the same problem.

While I might be able to back up (not sure yet), I'd be interested if anyone else has the same problem, and what the resolution might be.

Oddly, on my other BZFlag machine (with Windows XP) playing is normal (I made no changes), but the game spontaneously decides to iconify itself about every 5 minutes; this isn't something I've seen before, and there is nothing running in the background which would do it. Also a new behavior, but I can't imagine the cause.
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Post by blast »

I'm running the latest drivers (53.03) and I'm having no problems. I have a GeForce FX 5200 PCI. I never download drivers from Windows Update, as I'd rather hand pick the right ones and have them stick around for the future. Could you post a screenshot of the font problems?
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Post by Defman »

WinXP...

even though You may not have anything running in the background - your O.S. may be running something. I dual boot, linux and WinXP, haven't seen anything like that with BZ - but ZoneAlarm has caught a few things "running" in the background.

Just a suggestion - not too sure if this will even help.

Good luck
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Post by Grumbler »

purple panzer, do not use the windows update drivers, use the drivers from nvidia.......they seem to be different and the they act different as well. I have ignored that windows update for some time.
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Screenshot

Post by The Purple Panzer »

I've zipped up a bitmap of the screenshot, which I'll try to attach (the original was sufficiently large to cause the posting of this reply to fail). My drivers are 5.3.0.3, dated 11/17/03.

No, the attachment is too big. I'll stick it at
http://www.bentz-engineering.com/bzflag.zip
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Post by SGI »

If you need the old nvidia driver there is a site where you can find it..........
http://www.guru3d.com/
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Post by bamf. »

Blast,

I'm using the same card as you: GeForce FX 5200 PCI on WinXP and lately anytime I fire up bzflag my fan kicks on and goes non-stop. I'm not sure if this could be causing a jumping tank effect on my screen. I'm downloading the current drivers as we speak, just wondering if you or anyone else has experienced this. Thanks.
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Post by menotume »

Grumbler wrote: I have ignored that windows update for some time.
I'll second that, and add this: If it ain't broke, don't fix it, especially in WinDoze :)
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Post by Grumbler »

bamf. wrote:Blast,

I'm using the same card as you: GeForce FX 5200 PCI on WinXP and lately anytime I fire up bzflag my fan kicks on and goes non-stop. I'm not sure if this could be causing a jumping tank effect on my screen. I'm downloading the current drivers as we speak, just wondering if you or anyone else has experienced this. Thanks.


have you tried not using the high res textures?
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Post by bamf. »

Grumbler,

Yes, actually I'm using the non-high res version. Quality is set to high (not experimental) everything else is set to on with the exception of shadows.
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Post by blast »

bamf. wrote:Blast,

I'm using the same card as you: GeForce FX 5200 PCI on WinXP and lately anytime I fire up bzflag my fan kicks on and goes non-stop. I'm not sure if this could be causing a jumping tank effect on my screen. I'm downloading the current drivers as we speak, just wondering if you or anyone else has experienced this. Thanks.
Right now, the only problem with my card is some texture flicker when 2 blocks overlap.
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Problem (sort of) resolved.

Post by The Purple Panzer »

Thanks to you all for your comments; I did grab different drivers
and tried a variety of them, but it seems that the tool for tweaking nVidia drivers on the web site suggested by SGI
(http://www.guru3d.com/) let me get things right (almost right with the latest driver from nVidia) - the display is a little bit too dark now, but I think I can fix that). It was a great help to have your comments.
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Post by SGI »

Can you change the brightness under the options???
I have the same darkness problem in a Pc...my brigh..ss is setup to max.
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