Nvidia to blame for many early Vista crashes

[Capper]

There is a ton of interesting information in the documents that have been released as part of the Windows Vista Capable lawsuit.

There's the juicy e-mails that show Microsoft caving to pressure from Intel and lowering the graphics requirements to get the Vista Capable sticker. There's also Dell outlining all of the problems it had with Microsoft in getting Vista to market as well as with its many readiness programs.

For those that want to give the full documents a read, the Seattle Post-Intellingencer has posted the complete PDF files of the documents, linked to from this blog by Todd Bishop.

Another area that got some notice this week was the inordinate number of early Vista crashes that were attributed to Nvidia, according to a list from early 2007. Nvidia was cited as causing nearly 30 percent of early Vista crashes (the exact time of the report is not listed), while Microsoft itself was to blame for nearly 18 percent. Intel and ATI each accounted for about 9 percent of crashes, according to the documents.

"These issues are a year and a half old," Nvidia PR director Derek Perez said on Friday. Perez noted the company took a number of steps in response to the issues, including establishing a Web site where people could report such issues and said the company made significant progress in reducing those errors. "We continue to improve drivers," he said.

In a statement, Microsoft also pointed to the complexities inherent in creating new graphics drivers.
"Microsoft takes exhaustive steps in testing hardware compatibility internally, as well as by working directly with our partners, to address compatibility long before customers experience an issue," the software maker said. "However, testing can only be conducted under so many different circumstances, particularly with such an exceptionally complex code that graphic drivers have. Understanding this, Microsoft has set up a system to help quickly identify the problems, work to fix them and, if warranted, potentially push them through to customers via Windows Update. NVIDIA has taken similar steps, and since launching Windows Vista, Microsoft has seen great progress in addressing potential issues by NVIDIA."

One of the questions I have is which is worse--having buggy drivers, as Nvidia clearly did--or pushing Microsoft to lower its graphics requirements to include less-than-optimal graphics, as Intel appears to have done. Nvidia can and has improved its drivers, but there were a whole lot of systems pushed out in 2006 with the Intel graphics chip that did not initially qualify for the Vista capable logo.

Nvidia to blame for many early Vista crashes

[Quakindude]

No doubt. I couldn't even begin to recall the amount of "driver stopped responding" errors I got when I first installed Vista Home Premium. It got so bad, I wiped Vista completely from my machine until four or six months later.

[Stormcrow]

display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered

display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered

display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered

display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered

display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has successfully recovered

This is still what I see on an average basis when my overclocks are just a tab bit unstable, Nvidia drivers are horrible right now.

[polobunny]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

This is still what I see on an average basis when my overclocks are just a tab bit unstable, Nvidia drivers are horrible right now.

That's better than for me. Instead of showing that, it will simply black out and freeze. So much for vista video driver crash protection thingie.

[screwballl]

This all relates to the new Vista driver API that they forced on all vendors and manufacturers. A majority of driver related crashes is simply due to Vista not allowing direct access to the hardware via the kernel. Many vendors continue to write drivers as if it was XP and having direct access to the kernel and hardware without going through the API and it is still causing crashes. This is still true today... this is also why some companies are refusing to update their drivers to work with Vista and are sticking with XP... and if you want to use their hardware or software, you are required to be using XP.
Microsoft really screwed the pooch on this one by forcing the API rather than direct kernel access.... all in the name of their supposed "security" claiming that if a hacker or malware get ahold of your netwrok card they could take over your computer and hack the Pentagon or whatever other excuse they had.... when in reality it was more of a lock down so they could get vendors to lock down hardware to only allow Vista to be used on that computer and nothing else. Luckily many consumers/corporate/businesses got tired of this crap and either stated the vendor allow access to XP or they take their business elsewhere... and many vendors have complied (and some have not ro only did with certain models like Lenovo).

[One4yu2c]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

This is still what I see on an average basis when my overclocks are just a tab bit unstable, Nvidia drivers are horrible right now.

I got those errors non-stop in Vista, and in XP the system would just freeze or restart. The GPU driver problems vanished when I swapped my 680i board for an Intel X38 (all other components remained the same).

[Stormcrow]

Yeah, I've narrowed it down to the the board itself, as the errors don't appear on the 590 SLI or nForce 4 SLI. Thats something right there, when your drivers aren't even compatible with your own products.

[Quakindude]

Call me crazy, but as soon as I applied a couple of Microsoft updates, all those problems went away. With my 680i and the 780i. When I did a fresh install of Vista Ultimate on my 780i, I had the same damned issues with the video. As soon as I installed the MS updates, they all went away.

[One4yu2c]

Mine didn't disappear at all post-updates, including more than one OS and fresh installs of each. And the 680i, fully up to date (including all hardware drivers and Microsoft patches), claimed some hardware before I retired that POS chipset. No where near as much hardware as Boy'n'Black (Chumly) lost, but I dumped the board first chance I got. And I can (unofficially) tell you that from talking with manufacturers at CES, the 680i hardware problems/quirks/failures did in fact lie with the chipset.

If memory serves me correctly Quake, you too lost hardware on the 680i (as well as an initial mobo RMA), and that shouldn't happen regardless of software updates/patches.

[Quakindude]

Yeah, I lost some ram on the 680i. I lost a hard drive too.

Initially, and for the first 6 months or so, I was very happy with the 680i. Still, I didn't have any where near as many problems as some others have had. My first 780i died within 24 hours, but this second one has worked fine. However, I won't install a RAID array on an Nvidia chipset. Period. I've also found that my particular 780i doesn't like overclocking ram much. Same kit in a P35 board will overclock by near 20%. But in the 780i, I'm lucky to get 3% stably.

I personally think the Nvidia chipset is having some serious issues with properly regulating voltages vs. amperage. I'm no electrical guru though, so would be lost as to figuring out what exactly is going on.

I can overclock the nuts off my Q6600 on the 780i. But won't even touch the ram. The 680i I had, an A1 board too, absolutely sucked at overclocking Quads. But did quite well with Dual's.

Overall, if I had the financial means, I would sell this 780i off and get a nice X38 board. I won't be buying Nvidia based boards until such a time as they work out the extensive quirks with them. Many folks swear by the 780i though.

When I had all the time in the world to be messing around with computers, I really enjoyed toying with the 680i. But ever since the tornado, I just need shit to work. Overclock easily, let me tighten the ram up a bit and just work. Nvidia based boards are like working with DFI products.

There's a learning curve and a devoted user base for a reason. Once you figure out all the quirkiness associated with them, you've got so much time invested in it you feel attached at the friggin brain to them.