Hacking Nvidia's Drivers!

[CoUsT]

One dude on techpowerup forum did some black magic and created small app for doing the background work with drivers and I did some refactoring of that. His post is here:

 

https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/sli-with-different-cards.158907/page-123#post-3996362

 

My fork:

 

https://github.com/MaciejGorczyca/DifferentSLIAutoLoader/releases

 

Basically benefit over manual work is that all you need to do is grab your nvlddmkm.sys file, modify it in HexEditor, go to safe mode, replace the file, boot back into the normal mode and use install script then reboot.

[Candunc]

On 2/17/2019 at 1:44 AM, sycodelic said:

What's the easiest way to sign the driver to play games such as gtav? Thanks.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/develop/signing-a-driver-for-public-release

 

Good luck

[dartraiden]

On 2/6/2019 at 11:59 PM, UnrealEngine4 said:

I tried to flash different bios to this but nvflash wont allow me to do so ( GPU mismatch error)

Try this

[dartraiden]

On 2/12/2019 at 6:52 PM, poorboy said:

I decided to try installing 417.71 myself with the .inf files you provided, and now I got hit with an error 43 too

Same for me. I tried to modify the driver in both ways, but the latest working version is 417.22

 

On 2/17/2019 at 12:44 PM, sycodelic said:

What's the easiest way to sign the driver to play games such as gtav? Thanks.

if you modified only inf file, then disable the test mode after  installing the driver.

[UnrealEngine4]

14 hours ago, dartraiden said:

Try this

Already Tried, it didnt work...

[marsa]

Hello all ! 

I just got my p106-100 and im trying to run it with my eGpu setup.

EXP GDC Beast v8 with Expresscard Line connector.

 

With Gtx 760 it worked just fine but with this card, problem is that it's stuck Gen1 bus speed(PCIe x16 1.1@x1 1.1) 

Former Gtx 760 it did use gen2 speed. When the only thing changing is gpu(Gtx760>p106) why does the link speed stay in gen1  

 

I tried the Chinese one and the driver thats mentioned at the start of this thread but still the same. 

 

 

Oh btw you guys with error 43 have you tried nvidia-error43-fixer over at the egpu.io forums ? 

 

[poorboy]

12 hours ago, marsa said:

Hello all ! 

I just got my p106-100 and im trying to run it with my eGpu setup.

EXP GDC Beast v8 with Expresscard Line connector.

 

With Gtx 760 it worked just fine but with this card, problem is that it's stuck Gen1 bus speed(PCIe x16 1.1@x1 1.1) 

Former Gtx 760 it did use gen2 speed. When the only thing changing is gpu(Gtx760>p106) why does the link speed stay in gen1  

 

I tried the Chinese one and the driver thats mentioned at the start of this thread but still the same. 

 

 

Oh btw you guys with error 43 have you tried nvidia-error43-fixer over at the egpu.io forums ? 

 

That is because the P106 only has PCIE 1.1. It's the primary reason I've never recommended it as an eGPU card (or else I would have done it myself for my own laptop). How is the performance like at 1.1 speeds? How does it compare to the 760 at 2.0 speeds?

[marsa]

2 minutes ago, poorboy said:

That is because the P106 only has PCIE 1.1. It's the primary reason I've never recommended it as an eGPU card (or else I would have done it myself for my own laptop). How is the performance like at 1.1 speeds? How does it compare to the 760 at 2.0 speeds?

Ah shucks ! But why in Linus videos the performance is same as regular 1060 ? 

gtx760 at 2.0 speed destroys p106.  For example Overwatch @1366x768 the gtx 760 gets over 70fps as where the p106 gets just barely 40fps.

 

 

[poorboy]

2 minutes ago, marsa said:

Ah shucks ! But why in Linus videos the performance is same as regular 1060 ? 

gtx760 at 2.0 speed destroys p106.  For example Overwatch @1366x768 the gtx 760 gets over 70fps as where the p106 gets just barely 40fps.

 

 

Yup, so my suspicions were confirmed; I held off using the P106 as an eGPU because I suspected that it wouldn't even be that much more powerful than my laptop's 760M after the bottleneck!

 

In Linus's build, the bottleneck didn't have as large of an impact on 1080p gaming. IIRC it should have 90-95% performance, not a full 100%.

[dartraiden]

2 hours ago, marsa said:

But why in Linus videos the performance is same as regular 1060 ?

I did some tests

 

My setup:

• Core i7-6700 Engineering Sample @ 3.7 GHz
• ASUS Z170-P
• 16 ГБ DDR4-2133 (single channel)

 

Unigine Valley Benchmark 1.0
Render: Direct3D11
Mode: 1920x1080 8xAA fullscreen
Preset: Extreme HD
FPS: 65.7
Min FPS: 31.9
Max FPS: 125.8

 

P106-100 = 2748

GTX 1060 6GB  = 2751

 

Unigine Heaven Benchmark 4.0
Render: Direct3D11
Mode: 1920x1080 8xAA fullscreen
Quality: Ultra
Tessellation: Extreme
FPS: 61.7
Min FPS: 25.5
Max FPS: 125.2

 

P106-100 = 1555

GTX 1060 6GB = 1779

 

Final Fantasy XV Benchmark (1080p, Standard Quality/High Quality)

P106-100 = 5902/4383

GTX 1060 6GB = 6427/4694

 

[Emily Young]

4 hours ago, marsa said:

Ah shucks ! But why in Linus videos the performance is same as regular 1060 ?

ExpressCard utilizes only 1 PCI-E lane, while the motherboard we'd plugged the card into can utilize all 16 lanes of the x16 slot. That means that despite only being PCI-E 1.1, it's still got enough bandwidth to manage decent performance. At x1 PCI-E 1.1, you're getting significantly less speed than even a USB 3.0 (gen 1) port. Even if the ExpressCard slot you're using is PCI-E 2.0, you'd still only get 1.1 out of the P106.

[marsa]

2 hours ago, GabenJr said:

ExpressCard utilizes only 1 PCI-E lane, while the motherboard we'd plugged the card into can utilize all 16 lanes of the x16 slot. That means that despite only being PCI-E 1.1, it's still got enough bandwidth to manage decent performance. At x1 PCI-E 1.1, you're getting significantly less speed than even a USB 3.0 (gen 1) port. Even if the ExpressCard slot you're using is PCI-E 2.0, you'd still only get 1.1 out of the P106.

Ah ok thanks ! Need to test P106 in othen computer then!

[poorboy]

For some reason, Windows is still considering my P106 as an eGPU. I've noticed that this actually significantly reduced its performance, and I haven't yet found a fix  I even tried reinstalling Windows (as it was working properly the first time, with a fresh Windows install) but it still doesn't work. I'm starting to wonder if it's a BIOS setting, but even after resetting the BIOS to factory defaults the problem still occurs.

[dartraiden]

On 2/22/2019 at 1:52 AM, UnrealEngine4 said:

Already Tried, it didnt work... 

Oh, now I see. There patched "Board ID mismatch" check, but flashing 1066 BIOS to P106-100 leads to "GPU mismatch" check.

I think I can patch it

[dartraiden]

Successfully patched "GPU mismatch", "PCI subsystem ID mismatch" (occurs in case of successful completion of the previous step). But now I encountered NV_UCODE_ERR_CODE_DEVID_MATCH_LIST_DEVID_MATCH_FAILED error:

Storing updated firmware image...

PMU command complete with error, Error code = 0x005A

Device ID in the rom image does not match the device ID in the chip.
Update aborted, please use a rom image that supports device ID 0x1C07

Seems like current GPU firmware performs this check? if so, it cannot be bypassed at the program level

[Bitter]

So the GPU itself is hard coded as a P106, yea?

[dartraiden]

Yes, GPU is hardcoded by PCI straps

See these

https://www.tomshw.de/community/threads/flashen-unmöglich-die-2-klassen-gesellschaft-bei-den-turing-chips-der-geforce-rtx-2070.471/page-4#post-6206

 

We can patch all software checks (inside nvflash.exe): PCI device ID, PCI subsystem ID, Board ID, but GPU also doing PCI device ID check on hardware level. during firmware flashing.

 

So:

- we still able flash BIOS from 1066 via CH341A hardware programmer

- this will change the speed of the coolers / frequency / power limit, but the card will still be P106

[Bitter]

That's a bummer, no way to just 'make it work' with newer and newer drivers. I mean I can understand why they'd do that.

[variaator]

Hi, can someone please share this P106-100 modified driver? cant download it from original links anymore

[dartraiden]

4 hours ago, variaator said:

Hi, can someone please share this P106-100 modified driver? cant download it from original links anymore

Download and unpack latest working driver

Replace files in /Display.Driver/ subfolder (replace existing ones)

nv_dispi.inf

nvaci.inf

[Tengin]

Hey, been trying to get the P106 option to show up in "high performance GPU", have tried the old and new drivers with modified nv_dispi.inf & nvaci.inf. (and all other settings)

 

The driver installs correctly and is unsigned, have tried fresh install,

 

PC is running intel HD Graphics 4000 with latest windows (1809),

 

Was wondering if anyone know if windows version matters ?

 

[dartraiden]

5 hours ago, Tengin said:

if windows version matters ?

Seems like Intel graphic driver version is matters. Driver for pre-Haswell CPUs does not support necessary functions  What is your CPU? Ivy Bridge?

[Tengin]

1 hour ago, dartraiden said:

Seems like Intel graphic driver version is matters. Driver for pre-Haswell CPUs does not support necessary functions  What is your CPU? Ivy Bridge?

Ahh, righto, 

Yeah it's pre-haswell, ill have to give it a crack on on of my haswell machines,

 

Thanks for heaps up.

[Ivob_]

Hey guys, is this method woking with every motherboard and cpu configuration or there are some limitation?

 

I'm currently trying to make a p106 work with a core i5 2400 in an intel motherboard but i cant make it working .

 

[dartraiden]

2 hours ago, Ivob_ said:

there are some limitation?

You need Haswell or newer CPU.