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Nvidia releases Windows 7 Direct Compute driver

Published on 25th August 2009 by Richard Swinburne

Nvidia 190.62 WHQL drivers for Windows 7 now feature DirectCompute.

Nvidia has just attained Windows 7 WHQL certification for the latest 190.62 drivers, which enable DirectCompute natively within the Windows 7 OS - and that includes RC1 as well as the retail version.

DirectCompute will be distributed as part of the upcoming DirectX 11, but is fully supported by NVIDIA’s current lineup of DirectX 10 GPUs, including the G80, G92 and GT200 based products. Since it's API based and not CUDA, it also means that in time this technology will be available on ATI cards as well, but for now those with Nvidia hardware will get the first look.

The Windows7 OS uses the GPU like another CPU for certain highly parallel tasks - much like Adobe mixes OpenGL acceleration with CPU processing for its Photoshop CS4 and PDF version 9 and 10 products.

Nvidia also claims that functions like dragging and dropping video files onto portable players within the OS will automatically transcode them on GPU to make them compatible.

We wonder how the performance scales with the graphics card, but it must depend on the application: obviously video transcoding benefits from more memory bandwidth and stream processors, but simpler tasks like rotating an image clearly don't need much GPU horsepower.

Have you tried it? Let us know if you've seen a difference in the forums.

18 Comments

Discuss in the forums Reply

500mph 25th August 2009, 14:19

Argh, I just packed away the computer with my GTS250 in it, otherwise I would try this.

Any chance of a BT Review/seeing if it really works?

Bindibadgi 25th August 2009, 14:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by 500mph
Argh, I just packed away the computer with my GTS250 in it, otherwise I would try this.

Any chance of a BT Review/seeing if it really works?

I'm still waiting for Nvidia to tell me WHAT it does exactly so we can judge the changes. Not just "it's not enabled".

If they gave me a list of GPU accelerated features in Win7 we can go from there :D

ChaosDefinesOrder 25th August 2009, 14:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by 5Article
Nvidia also claims that functions like dragging and dropping video files onto portable players within the OS will automatically transcode them on GPU to make them compatible.

Hmm, will that be native in the OS for definite or only when you buy Badaboom and use it as a plugin/shell extension? I like the sounds of it if it's native OS!

wuyanxu 25th August 2009, 14:59

it's not on nVidia's website........ 190.62 is still the latest.

also, i just installed .62 the other day, god, they really should consider ATI's monthly release scheduling.

SchizoFrog 25th August 2009, 15:33

I can only find the 190.62 Drivers which are WHQL and support DirectCompute... I have looked in both 32bit and 64bit for both Vista and Windows7.

Can the Driver version be confirmed please? Should it be .62 or .68???

Thanks.

Laitainion 25th August 2009, 15:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by wuyanxu
it's not on nVidia's website........ 190.62 is still the latest.

also, i just installed .62 the other day, god, they really should consider ATI's monthly release scheduling.

Monthly is too frequently, and I think it's a good part of why ATi drivers generally aren't as good as nVidias, and I'm currently running a Radeon 4870 but I've had only nVidia cards since the ATi Rage 128 pro (Geforce 4 and up). Never had a single problem with nVidia drivers, but I've had slight graphical glitches with every other ATi release. Nothing serious, only ever slightly annoying but..

Denis_iii 25th August 2009, 16:27

sweet
does this mean a centralised platform so CUDA and ATI's stream thing will die off?

kylew 25th August 2009, 17:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Laitainion
Quote:
Originally Posted by wuyanxu
it's not on nVidia's website........ 190.62 is still the latest.

also, i just installed .62 the other day, god, they really should consider ATI's monthly release scheduling.

Monthly is too frequently, and I think it's a good part of why ATi drivers generally aren't as good as nVidias, and I'm currently running a Radeon 4870 but I've had only nVidia cards since the ATi Rage 128 pro (Geforce 4 and up). Never had a single problem with nVidia drivers, but I've had slight graphical glitches with every other ATi release. Nothing serious, only ever slightly annoying but..

You should check that tweaktown article out where they pit ATi's drivers against nVIdia's. Guess who won? ATi by quite a margin...

In reality though you're just as likely to get driver issues with drivers for any piece of hardware.

HourBeforeDawn 25th August 2009, 18:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by kylew

Monthly is too frequently, and I think it's a good part of why ATi drivers generally aren't as good as nVidias, and I'm currently running a Radeon 4870 but I've had only nVidia cards since the ATi Rage 128 pro (Geforce 4 and up). Never had a single problem with nVidia drivers, but I've had slight graphical glitches with every other ATi release. Nothing serious, only ever slightly annoying but..

In most test when it came to stability and having less general issues ATI tend to come out on top because of how on top of their drivers they are sure some months there isnt much of a change maybe a slight tweak for a game or two but thats better then nVidia when they had a problem with the video out to televisions and they didnt bother to fix it for over 6 months ~_~

Anyhow overall this looks interesting, cant wait to see some actual results, oh and rotating an image came be intense if we are talking a 3d model image in photoshop :)

Hamish 25th August 2009, 20:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by Laitainion
Monthly is too frequently, and I think it's a good part of why ATi drivers generally aren't as good as nVidias, and I'm currently running a Radeon 4870 but I've had only nVidia cards since the ATi Rage 128 pro (Geforce 4 and up). Never had a single problem with nVidia drivers, but I've had slight graphical glitches with every other ATi release. Nothing serious, only ever slightly annoying but..

personal anecdotes ftw
i've only had ati cards since the ti4200 and have never had a problem with ati drivers :p

Bindibadgi 25th August 2009, 21:09

It's 190.62, I typo'd and put 68 - Im too used to putting 192.168...

thehippoz 25th August 2009, 22:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bindibadgi
It's 190.62, I typo'd and put 68 - Im too used to putting 192.168...

SchizoFrog 25th August 2009, 23:30

Good Good... just wanted to make sure. Thanks for responding.

Veles 26th August 2009, 01:18

Hmmm, made me think again about getting the 4870 1Gb but I'll probably still go for it.

biebiep 26th August 2009, 08:08

To quote the guy from GI: Joe.

"What does it accelerate?"

HourBeforeDawn 26th August 2009, 08:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by biebiep
To quote the guy from GI: Joe.

"What does it accelerate?"

horrible movie by the way >.< nothing like the GI Joe I grew up with, its Halo with out the Aliens ~_~

[PUNK] crompers 26th August 2009, 10:08

its promising anyway, hopefully we'll start to see more of this stuff from nv. it would be nice to see takeup from companies like autodesk and adobe (properly) too

[USRF]Obiwan 27th August 2009, 13:59

I also noticed that more and more DAW audio plugins are supporting access to the GPU power. A lot of VSTI instruments are now supporting GPU acceleration for processing sounds.