Nvidia has released the first beta of the new 256 series of graphics card drivers. As we told you a while back there is no 3D Vision Surround in these drivers, even though NVIDIA promised, but there are other goodies. Nvidia has optimized performance of the GeForce GTX 400 family with 4-25% in a number of games, including Just Cause 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Metro 2033 and Alien vs. Predator.
Other pleasantries include stereoscopic 3D when watching movies. Nvidia Release 256 supports Blu-ray 3D and with the first title slated for release on June 1st NVIDIA 3D Vision will be ready.
Other news included in the drivers are 48x SLI antialiasing, which is expanded to 96x AA at 3-way GTX 400 SLI. We also get better support for multi-GPU settings and support for CUDA 3.1 and OpenGL 4.0. The latter can be tested in Unigine Heaven 2.1 that supports OpenGL 4.0 and tessellation.
The new beta drivers are available for GeForce, and Nvidia’s mobile circuits and the Optimus technology.
Did I just miss driver versions 198 to 255? Any explanation for the jump?*
*I realize I am asking this question about the same company that has re-branded the 8800gt about six times now and doesn’t have a reliable naming scheme for any of its products, but I’m still curious.