GeForce FX5600XT and Sim City 4

I'm having a huge problem in Sim City 4 with transparencies. Anything
that's transparent seems to corrupt as soon as I scroll one way or the
other. Explosions of clouds of dirt and dust have hard edges as if the
explosion is taking place within a confined cube, and the colors of this
explosion are order-dithered. If I lay out a new road or avenue, when I
scroll around, it corrupts and disappears until the construction crew gets
it all paved out. The rotating blades of windmills are often not visible
or only partially visible. When using the rush hour mode to drive a
vehicle around, I often crash into things because a car I need to see isn't
visible and then it suddenly becomes visible as if it magically appears out
from under the pavement.

I wondered if anybody else with a 5600XT card experiences this. The FX
5600 is on the list from Maxis of compatible cards. I'm running driver
56.72, but I'm about to update that again to see if it helps. Should I
write to nVidia about this issue? Is this the kind of info they depend on
to write better drivers?

Thanks,
Damaeus

"Damaeus" wrote in message
...
I'm having a huge problem in Sim City 4 with transparencies. Anything
that's transparent seems to corrupt as soon as I scroll one way or the
other. Explosions of clouds of dirt and dust have hard edges as if the
explosion is taking place within a confined cube, and the colors of this
explosion are order-dithered. If I lay out a new road or avenue, when I
scroll around, it corrupts and disappears until the construction crew gets
it all paved out. The rotating blades of windmills are often not visible
or only partially visible. When using the rush hour mode to drive a
vehicle around, I often crash into things because a car I need to see
isn't
visible and then it suddenly becomes visible as if it magically appears
out
from under the pavement.

I wondered if anybody else with a 5600XT card experiences this. The FX
5600 is on the list from Maxis of compatible cards. I'm running driver
56.72, but I'm about to update that again to see if it helps. Should I
write to nVidia about this issue? Is this the kind of info they depend on
to write better drivers?

Thanks,
Damaeus


Unfortunately, Nvidia does not take end-user feedback. You can write them,
but it won't make a difference. As far as your drivers go, It is a driver
issue. All the 5x.xx series drivers are seriously buggy. Try the 61.11's,
they're betas but the should solve alot of your problems. The only thing
that I have found messed up with these are that with some apps(WMP for
example) Nview causes a lot of problems if its turned on. As well as some
newer games have some texture corruption issues unless they are
patched(FarCry). Otherwise these drivers have worked best for my 5600 XT.

In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, "empireAA"
posted on Sat, 15 May 2004 09:39:08 GMT:

Unfortunately, Nvidia does not take end-user feedback. You can write them,
but it won't make a difference. As far as your drivers go, It is a driver
issue. All the 5x.xx series drivers are seriously buggy. Try the 61.11's,
they're betas but the should solve alot of your problems. The only thing
that I have found messed up with these are that with some apps(WMP for
example) Nview causes a lot of problems if its turned on. As well as some
newer games have some texture corruption issues unless they are
patched(FarCry). Otherwise these drivers have worked best for my 5600 XT.

nView causes problems in all drivers or just in the beta ones? I use nView
for sectioning off my screen and for the Always on Top feature, along with
a few other things, not including multiple desktops, though I could put
that feature to use, too.

"Damaeus" wrote in message
...
In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, "empireAA"
posted on Sat, 15 May 2004 09:39:08 GMT:

Unfortunately, Nvidia does not take end-user feedback. You can write
them,
but it won't make a difference. As far as your drivers go, It is a
driver
issue. All the 5x.xx series drivers are seriously buggy. Try the
61.11's,
they're betas but the should solve alot of your problems. The only thing
that I have found messed up with these are that with some apps(WMP for
example) Nview causes a lot of problems if its turned on. As well as
some
newer games have some texture corruption issues unless they are
patched(FarCry). Otherwise these drivers have worked best for my 5600
XT.

nView causes problems in all drivers or just in the beta ones? I use
nView
for sectioning off my screen and for the Always on Top feature, along with
a few other things, not including multiple desktops, though I could put
that feature to use, too.

Generally, no, NView does'nt cause issues with all drivers. Even some beta's
don't have issues with NView. If you want to continue using NView I'd stick
with the 56.72's. Otherwise try the 61.11's or just wait for the final
release of the first 6x.xx series of drivers. Just a side note, but the
6x.xx's are actually made for the NV40 series(6800) of gfx cards but should
work with the FX series(NV30 series) without any serious issues.

In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, "empireAA"
posted on Mon, 17 May 2004 01:41:27 GMT:

Generally, no, NView does'nt cause issues with all drivers. Even some beta's
don't have issues with NView. If you want to continue using NView I'd stick
with the 56.72's. Otherwise try the 61.11's or just wait for the final
release of the first 6x.xx series of drivers. Just a side note, but the
6x.xx's are actually made for the NV40 series(6800) of gfx cards but should
work with the FX series(NV30 series) without any serious issues.

Wow! I upgraded from a GeForce 2 Ultra to a GeForce FX 5600XT to get the
benefits of the latest drivers about a month and a half ago, and now I'll
have to do it again.

"Damaeus" wrote in message
...
In news:alt.comp.periphs.videocards.nvidia, "empireAA"
posted on Mon, 17 May 2004 01:41:27 GMT:

Generally, no, NView does'nt cause issues with all drivers. Even some
beta's
don't have issues with NView. If you want to continue using NView I'd
stick
with the 56.72's. Otherwise try the 61.11's or just wait for the final
release of the first 6x.xx series of drivers. Just a side note, but the
6x.xx's are actually made for the NV40 series(6800) of gfx cards but
should
work with the FX series(NV30 series) without any serious issues.

Wow! I upgraded from a GeForce 2 Ultra to a GeForce FX 5600XT to get the
benefits of the latest drivers about a month and a half ago, and now I'll
have to do it again.

Not necessarily, you should see some improvements on the FX series of cards
untill 1/2 through the 6x.xx's. And the only real big option you'll miss
with the FX series is Shaders 3.0 which alot of games won't use any way. If
your economically minded like I am you can wait till about 6 months after
the intial release of the 6800's and get one when the 2nd installment of gfx
cards come out from Nvidia. The prices should go down some for the gfx cards
that are getting ready to come out now.