People who have downloaded and installed the Windows 8 Consumer Preview on their PCs and have graphics cards made by NVIDIA have been waiting for graphics drivers made specifically for Microsoft's latest OS. Today, NVIDIA announced that it has launched the first such Windows 8 graphics card update for its GeForce and Quadro graphics cards.
The drivers, which have the version number 296.17, can be downloaded from NVIDIA's web site. More information about those drivers can be read in the release notes. NVIDIA states:
NVIDIA’s Windows 8 drivers support all the features of the new Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) v1.2, as well as award-winning NVIDIA 3D Vision and 3DTV Play products, allowing you to play more than 600 games, watch Blu-ray movies and view photos – all in 3D. With Windows 8’s new built-in stereoscopic 3D support in DirectX 11, 3D Vision is poised to provide users the best platform for games and applications.
For those of you who are still using Windows XP, Windows 7 or Windows Vista, there is a new but separate driver release, version 296.10, that is now available to download as well. These new drivers should be of particular interest to PC gamers with GeForce graphics cards; NVIDIA states that the graphics performance in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim has been increased by up to 45 percent in this new driver update.
Mass Effect 3 gamers with NVIDIA SLI set-ups in their PC should see up to twice the performance while playing that game. There are also some added GeForce exclusive ambient occlusion graphics added in this driver release for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Diablo III, and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
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