New GeForce 290.36 Beta drivers have been released that correcting bugs and adds ambient occlusion support for Skyrim and Modern Warfare 3. Screen flickering and triangular artifacts in Battlefield 3 should also be fixed by the new drivers, and Nvidia recommend the update to Batman: Arkham City players.
The update streamlines PhysX support, so players of Batman: Arkham City, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, should certainly update to this newest driver set, and Battlefield 3 as well as Crysis 2 will receive fixes for tiny broken bits like the “random appearance of triangular artifacts” in the former game. Grab it now!
Take a look at full release notes below:
Release Notes In Full
NVIDIA Ambient Occlusion
- Adds NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
- Adds NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
NVIDIA PhysX
- Updates PhysX System Software to version 9.11.1107 for the best PhysX experience in Batman: Arkham City.
NVIDIA Surround
- Enables NVIDIA Surround support for Intel X79 SLI-certified motherboards.
NVIDIA SLI
- Added or updated SLI profiles for Crysis 2, Heroes and Generals, Inversion, Stronghold 3, and Syndicate.
3D Vision
- Adds support for 3D Vision over native DisplayPort 1.1 connection – available on BenQ XL2420T and BenQ XL2420TX monitors.
- Added or updated the following 3D Vision game profiles:
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 – Rated Good
- Cang Sheng – Rated Good
- Diablo 3 – Rated Good
- Fei fei – Rated Good
- Final Combat – Rated Good
- L.A. Noire – Updated Rating To 3D Vision Ready
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 5-7 – Rated Fair
- Qian Nv You Hun Online – Rated Good
- QQ Xi You – Rated Good
- Sonic Generations – Rated Good
- Xian Tu – Rated Good
- Yong Bing Tian Xia Online – Rated Good
HD Audio
- Updates HD Audio driver to version 1.3.9.0.
Bug Fixes
- Fixes random flickering as Windows boot logo is loading or fading away.
- Fixes corruption in Crysis 2 with SLI and lower quality shadow settings.
- Fixes ability to set Surround resolutions to 5760×1080 using custom resolutions.
- Fixes some random instances of triangular artifacts when playing Battlefield 3.
- Fixes corruption and flickering of some objects in Battlefield 3 in the New York single-player level when anti-aliasing is enabled.
- Fixes corruption seen in Settlers 7 with the NVIDIA 275.33 drivers.
- Fixes playback of videos or live TV using Window Media Center resulting in a black screen.
- Fixes the issue where 1920×1080 @60Hz PC resolution mode switched down to @59Hz.
- Fixes mouse cursor flickering and shaking in Crysis 2, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Deus Ex and Civilization V when SLI is enabled when using 3DTV Play.
Ambient Occlusion
As mentioned, the 290.36 beta drivers now allow for the use of Ambient Occlusion directly through the control panel in the two most popular titles of the moment: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
If you’re unfamiliar with Ambient Occlusion, it is most easily described as a way to make in-game shadowing more realistic, and therefore better. To enable the effect, open your NVIDIA Control Panel either via the desktop or the tray icon, and follow the steps below:
- Browse to ‘Manage 3D Settings,’ select ‘Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim’ or ‘Modern Warfare 3’ in the drop-down. If you can’t see it in the list, untick the ‘Show only programs found on this computer’ box and try again.
- Set the ‘Ambient Occlusion’ option to Performance or Quality.
- Click the Apply button.
