Drivers give BF3 38% performance boost

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 26 September, 2011

Nvidia drivers out now. AMD to come.

New Nvidia drivers released today improve the performance of upcoming first-person shooter Battlefield 3 by a whopping 38 per cent.

So stark is the improvement that Battlefield developer DICE has taken to Twitter to tell PC gamers to download the drivers ahead of the Battlefield 3 beta, which launches this week.

The drivers are available from the Geforce website.

New in Release 285.38

  • Increases performance in Battlefield 3 by up to 38 per cent - performance measured vs. GeForce 285.27 driver on GeForce GTX 570 at 2650x1600 (DX11)
  • Improves overall stability and image quality in Battlefield 3.
  • Added or updated SLI profiles for Battlefield 3, Dead Island, Diablo III, Dragon Age 2, Need for Speed: The Run, and Saints Row: The Third.
  • Fixed a performance regression in 285.27 beta running Crysis 2 (DirectX 9).

Other Details

  • Supports GeForce 6, 7, 8, 9, 100, 200, 300, 400, and 500-series desktop GPUs as well as ION desktop GPUs.
  • Installs PhysX System Software to version 9.11.06.21.
  • Installs HD Audio driver to version 1.2.24.0.
  • Supports OpenGL 4.2 for GeForce 400 series and 500 series GPUs and OpenGL 3.3 for GeForce 8-series and later GPUs.
  • Supports multiple languages and APIs for GPU computing: CUDA C, CUDA C++, CUDA Fortran, OpenCL, DirectCompute, and Microsoft C++ AMP.
  • Supports single GPU and NVIDIA SLI technology on DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 11, and OpenGL, including 3-way SLI, Quad SLI, and SLI support on SLI-certified Intel and AMD motherboards.
  • Supports GPU overclocking and temperature monitoring by installing NVIDIA System Tools software.

Battlefield 3 drivers from AMD are expected today.

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (52) Latest comment 8 months ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • rob_of_the_robots #1 8 months ago

    Oooh, geeky.

  • misterdoctor #2 8 months ago

    I thought this article was about vehicle drivers.

    I was wrong.

  • Dashnak #3 8 months ago

    Does this mean nvidia is going to seriously outperform radeon cards?

  • Alex_976 #4 8 months ago

    Bring back voodoo 2s!!! :)

  • Nismo400R84 #5 8 months ago

    heres the recommended specs
    OS: Windows 7 64-bit - check got that
    Processor: Quad-core CPU -check i7 920
    Memory: 4 GB -check DDR3 ram
    Hard Drive: 20 GB -check
    Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 - i have the gtx550 ti and on there website it says no you wont be able to run on high settings ,funny that i can run arma2 on some fairly decent settings ie screen resolution 1680 x 1080 and 3d resolution 1680 x 1080

    @dwarfyP "What is also funny is that ARMA2 is NOT Battlefield 3. Ohhhh how I laugh" .....Never really !??1!?
    What i was implying was arma2 is a beast of a game to run .Always get someone who states the obvious

    Edited by Nismo400R84 at 26/09/11 @ 13:04

  • darkmorgado #6 8 months ago

    Oooh, officially supported GPU overclocking software?

    /goes off to look

  • harzo #7 8 months ago

    Serious question.... my GTX 570 can pretty much max out any game I have flung at it, I have an i5 2500, 8 GB RAM.... do you think I will get close to Ultra settings on BF3?

  • Retro_ #8 8 months ago

    I had Voodoo cards ( 1 then 3 later) , needed it for Quake 2 in my Pentium 166 PC that cost me £2000 new. I bought it when Quake 1 demo was released. !!

  • Cadence #9 8 months ago

    Excellent, my new PC meets those specs. I better download these new drivers then!

  • munki83 #10 8 months ago

    How many people play at 2650x1600 ? I think I need to invest in onw of these 24"+ monitors

  • DwarfyP #11 8 months ago

    @Nismo400R84

    "i have the gtx550 ti and on there website it says no you wont be able to run on high settings ,funny that i can run arma2 on some fairly decent settings ie screen resolution 1680 x 1080 and 3d resolution 1680 x 1080 "

    What is also funny is that ARMA2 is NOT Battlefield 3. Ohhhh how I laugh.

  • NKSR #12 8 months ago

    harzo, not according to Dice. GTX 580 SLI = ultra settings.

    See how the beta pans out, but 2 570's should come close to 2 580's.

    64 players, explosions and action everywhere, this is going to be tough on GPU's.

    edit: wow my spelling is bad!
    Edited by NKSR at 26/09/11 @ 12:02

  • ruddiger7 #13 8 months ago

    2560x1440 is affordable but the dell 2560x1600 was about $1000AU more for 3 inches.

  • Bagpuss #14 8 months ago

    "Increases performance in Battlefield 3 by up to 38 per cent - performance measured vs. GeForce 285.27 driver on GeForce GTX 570 at 2650x1600 (DX11)"

    38% increase...from what?

    Marketing bullshit as usual......give me the baseline figures for this comparison to actually be a worthwhile comparison.

    Afterall, a 38% increase on a shitty 20fps@ 2650x1600 will still keep you below 30fps.....which is shit.

  • darkmorgado #15 8 months ago

    From the performance the same card would give on the previous driver, presumably.
    It's not rocket science.

  • Captain_JMac #16 8 months ago

    All this faffing around with drivers is why I usually prefer playing on console these days.

  • darkmorgado #17 8 months ago

    Simply clicking "ok" when you're alerted to a new driver isn't what I would consider to be "faffing around".

  • rojjer #18 8 months ago

    Hopefully this means that the freezing that was prevalent in the alpha with Nvidia cards will no longer be an issue

  • cheeky_pete #19 8 months ago

    Yeah on 1 card at one resolution this is hardly news worthy since the game is not even out yet.

  • rtk79 #20 8 months ago

    Well I for one can't help but feel BF3's recommended specs are a marketing ploy destined to sell expensive hardware.
    Especially given the minimal specs and console ports.
    Edited by rtk79 at 26/09/11 @ 12:38

  • kristo #21 8 months ago

    Bagpuss is talking sense. Without a baseline just spewing out a number is worthless.

    Let's wait for the benchmarks to see what we need.

  • green_nifta #22 8 months ago

    That's a huge performance boost. I wonder if they've been custom-designed for BF3 so much that they're now less good on other games?

  • Toothball #23 8 months ago

    The last few nVidia updates have left me unable to watch Blu Rays, so I'm wary of installing this one. Hadn't planned to get Battlefield 3 though so I probably won't notice.

  • Darren #24 8 months ago

    Couldn't care less about BF3, beta or otherwise, but I'm always up for new drivers! Thanks for the heads up, EG!

  • nasanu #25 8 months ago

    Just means that till this point the drives where at least 38% slower than they should have been. Why publicise such incompetence?

  • RodHull #26 8 months ago

    When will Matrox release similar drivers for my Mystique? It runs Doom okay but struggles with Crysis 2 :(

  • arcam #27 8 months ago

    It's just 38% for one specific card, at one specific resolution, and probably only in specific points of the game.

    In other words, it's just a driver update. Nothing really to get excited or annoyed about, though improvements are of course always welcome.

  • superstu1337 #28 8 months ago

    Geeks neging the first comment - LOL.

  • lordofthedunce #29 8 months ago

    Will the drivers be in Camaros though?

  • danidrums #30 8 months ago

    I would be happy is AMD drivers fixed my pixelated textures (AF broken) in Crysis 2 after Highres pack and 1.9 patch, I'm not worried about a game that isn't out yet....

  • geeza2020 #31 8 months ago

    "Geeks neging the first comment - LOL. "

    coming from a guy with a username of superstu1337?

  • Lucodeath #32 8 months ago

    God it must have been really shit before the update.

  • Iain815 #33 8 months ago

    Guess me and my GTS 450 will go sit in the corner then.

    Oh well, I'll be content playing at around 720 resolution anyway.

  • Reckless99 #34 8 months ago

    The whole "You need Gtx 580 sli" to run BF3 on Ultra is just a marketing trick. Almost £1000 worth of GPU power to run on Ultra? Yeah, right. Best thing to do is wait for the game to come out and see how it performs on your current hardware. It's Q4 and ram is getting cheaper, bulldozer is right around the corner so we will see price drop in CPU's and also GPU's.

  • harzo #35 8 months ago

    [link url=http://youtu.be/AGbo50Ar420
    ]http://youtu.be/AGbo50Ar420
    [/link]

    Before you neg me I have a PS3 as well and found this amusing...

  • Flipper79 #36 8 months ago

    Why are people saying the high system req's are a marketing ploy? What the hell kind of marketing ploy tells 70% of it's customers they won't be able to play a game on optimal settings? And why the hell would they care about trying to sell you new hardware from other companies? Idiots.

  • chessboxer #37 8 months ago

    I will playing this on PS3 tomorrow then seeing how my Quad SLI GTX295s handle this on the 29th. I can't remember the last time I updated my drivers. I normally use tweaked ones but I might give this official set a shot.

  • Pup #38 8 months ago

    The beta drivers that were supposed to enable SLI for the bf3 alpha actually made things worse for me than switching SLI off, and also halved rather than improved my fps in a number of other games, forcing me to roll back to earlier ones. Hopefully these ones do a better job.

  • Reckless99 #39 8 months ago

    The current recommended BF3 settings are able to run on high or so Dice says, but you need two 580s in sli to run on ultra. Went from needing 560 to run on High to two 580s to run ultra, wtf? Ah and why would they be want to sell you hardware, the same fucking reason you get Nvidia or AMD logo blasted in your face when you turn your game on, idiot.
    Edited by Reckless99 at 26/09/11 @ 15:50

  • Flipper79 #40 8 months ago

    And you really think the money they gain from 1 bit of advertising is in any way comparable to the money they could potentially lose by people who aren't willing to upgrade? Moron.

  • danidrums #41 8 months ago

    Reckless99 is right in both comments. Wait to test it before throwing your precious money out the window, please people, THINK!

  • cyber_nicco #42 8 months ago

    Serious question.... my GTX 570 can pretty much max out any game I have flung at it, I have an i5 2500, 8 GB RAM.... do you think I will get close to Ultra settings on BF3?

    According to their website, no, you can't run Ultra settings. Of course, you're question is if you'd be able to get close - I'd say that depends on your definition of close. To me, I'd say yes that you can get close.

    p.s. Even my laptop has an I7... Maybe you can trade your PC in somewhere?

  • cyber_nicco #43 8 months ago

    I think it's kind of lame that they are pushing Beta drivers

  • arcam #44 8 months ago

    Stands to reason, at the moment it's still a beta game.

  • rtk79 #45 8 months ago

    Moronic I may be, but the minimal specs seem unusually low compared to the recommended specs. Besides, DICE has stated that PCs capable of running Bad Company 2 would have no trouble running BF3.Again, the minimal specs are low enough that they don't risk losing customers. I, for one, won't be updating my fairly modest computer for the game, which I'm very keen to play.
    Edited by rtk79 at 26/09/11 @ 18:03

  • Bravestinsane #46 8 months ago

    Based on the ATI driver support on the Beta i try in a few days will determine if i still get the game.

    I really want it, but if they really think a 580 in Sli, will be needed to play on ultra.... ill have to see what the specs that will be needed to medium will be like.

    51/60

  • azic #47 8 months ago

    PC Version is going to Rock ppl.
    No compromises, No Sub HD, No BS

    I really don't know why consoles would be concerned with FPS. You can't make it faster with making cuts.

  • Chufty #48 8 months ago

    I have a *fairly* modest PC (Q9550, Radeon 4870, 4GB RAM) and I can tell you that the alpha ran totally smoothly at 1680x1050. And looked incredible.

    All you chaps with your fancy new graphics cards will have no trouble I'm sure.

  • Kaminari #49 8 months ago

    Can't wait to install these drivers on my PS3.

    /grins

  • rojjer #50 8 months ago

    This is a BETA driver, so expect there to be probs :-S

  • TheEarlOfZinger #51 8 months ago

    It will push all platforms, and look great within the constraints of each.

    Willy waving. Yawn.

  • Bluetooth #52 8 months ago

    Excellent, will this run on my Intel Pentium M 1.4GHz with GeForce 440MX 10 year old laptop?