For all those with 6600GTs

[H-Bomb]

I was talking with some freinds the other day and i found out that we all have virtually the same graphics card. Whats more we all seemed to be experiencing the same or simaler problems: glitching, freezing etc. After swapping advice we all went home to try some stuff out to see if it works. The next day i went to tell them that my games were running smoother now with no problems and believe or not so were theirs. I would strongly recommend any of the following to those with GeForce 6600GTs (PCI-E or AGP) because they definately worked for us:

1) Try switching to the older NVidia Forceware 78.05 drivers. Apparently it works well with mainstream cards like this and helps solve compatibility issues or something like that.
2) Turn off "Write combining". Right click on your desktop and go Properties>Settings>Advanced>Troubleshoot and de-select the check box.
3) Turn off "Fast write" in your BIOS. Apparently it only has positive effects for about 2% of people so the majority should just disable it.
4) Make sure you AGP aperture size is set to the correct memory (128mb or 256mb, NOT 64mb).

I would recommend trying them one at a time to see if they help and so that if something goes wrong you can just put it back to the way it was. Let me know if anyone else found this usefull.

 

[ceewi1]

1) Try switching to the older NVidia Forceware 78.05 drivers. Apparently it works well with mainstream cards like this and helps solve compatibility issues or something like that.

78.05 brings with it its own set of problems, although at least the 6x00 series had matured by the time 78.05 had been released. There are advantages and disadvantages of each driver revision, but for the average user it's a good recommendation to always use the latest drivers.

2) Turn off "Write combining". Right click on your desktop and go Properties>Settings>Advanced>Troubleshoot and de-select the check box.

This setting allows the video card to buffer information sent to the video memory by the CPU. Enabling it will typically provide a small performance boost.

3) Turn off "Fast write" in your BIOS. Apparently it only has positive effects for about 2% of people so the majority should just disable it.

Fast Write allows the CPU to send information directly to the video card, bypassing the system memory. Enabling it will typically provide a performance boost of between 1 and 5% (assuming your video card supports it, which modern cards, including the 6600GT, do).

4) Make sure you AGP aperture size is set to the correct memory (128mb or 256mb, NOT 64mb).

AGP Aperature Size is NOT the amount of video memory on a card. This setting controls how much system memory is available for the video card to use. The ideal size varies depending on the amount of RAM you have, and also on the video card (128MB or 256MB are generally good for modern systems). Generally, the performance difference isn't that significant.

These are useful troubleshooting tips, depending on what problem you're having, but if you're not having any problems you're best to leave these settings on, and stick with the updated drivers.

 

[H-Bomb]

Yeah i should of mentioned that just cos the worked for me doesn't mean they will work for all. Cheers for the info ceewi1. Oh yeah and as you said if it working fine just leave the settings alone, these tips are only meant for people experiencing problems.