modded windows xp 368.81 drivers to support SLI for cards after the GTX 660 ?

Discussion in 'Videocards - NVIDIA GeForce Drivers Section' started by SlCKB0Y_BE, Apr 19, 2021.

  1. SlCKB0Y_BE

    SlCKB0Y_BE Active Member

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    hello everyone,

    you might have seen my post earlier, to make a long story short i've built a XP system with two GTX 960,
    found out having both card installed at the same time not only doesn't allow me to enable SLI but also give me NvCPL.dll error at startup.

    on the Nvidia website i found out SLI isn't supported for cards over the 660 apparently :

    Quote :

    The following SLI features are not supported on Windows XP:

    • Geforce GTX 680, 670 SLI
    • Quad SLI technology using GeForce GTX 590, GeForce 9800 GX2 or GeForce GTX 295
    • 3-way SLI technology
    • Hybrid SLI
    • SLI multi-monitor support

    (Source : https://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3138/~/sli-support-in-windows-xp)


    so my question is : is it possible to mod the drivers to make them support SLI for cards up to the GTX 960 ?

    thanks a lot in advance :)
     
    Last edited: Apr 20, 2021
    chispy likes this.
  2. A M D BugBear

    A M D BugBear Ancient Guru

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    Still on XP? Damn, takes me WAY back.

    Ergh, going to be hard one, I know its possible for Win 7 but for XP, I have not personally tried it myself, I use modified quadro drivers for my 4-way sli projects, works perfectly.

    Going to be tough one, even if there is a modded driver for it, its going to be rather old drivers.

    Surprised your still on XP, XP was the stuff back then.

    You can probably mod the .ini file from those drivers to make your cards to work, you can give that a try.
     
    chispy likes this.
  3. SlCKB0Y_BE

    SlCKB0Y_BE Active Member

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    haha don't worry, it got a dual boot with windows 10 ;) XP is just for the nostalgia trip of playing the games of that era with everything maxed out.

    now that being said it really is the sweet spot between the dos based 98 era and the full NT based windows 10 era, many classics like Max Payne 1 will not run on windows 10 as they are 16 bits apps.
    many games like far cry 1 have bugs like ugly looking water on anything but XP, not to mention finicky EAX support through Alchemy for many other older games.

    and all jokes aside, it almost get more use than my modern build ever since i made it, i'm going through all the classics of my youth in full hd max details and 16x/32x anti aliasing, just glorious ^^


    but back on topic : i've searched quite a bit and found how to add compatibility for the 970/980 already, but haven't found anything about why it prevent me from activating SLI.

    i've never modded the drivers prior but it doesn't seem too hard, the thing is i think i'd need to trick the drivers into thinking they are 660, do you think it might be possible ?
     
  4. CPC_RedDawn

    CPC_RedDawn Ancient Guru

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    You would probably be better off building a PC from that era. If you want to max the games out just get a GPU that was the last one supported for that operating system and stay away from SLI/Crossfire its nothing but headaches.

    I am currently building a 2600K system with a HD7970GHz, seems to be the last AMD GPU I could find official Windows XP drivers for.
     
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  5. SlCKB0Y_BE

    SlCKB0Y_BE Active Member

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    well tbh i checked and saw the 960 was the last officially compatible GPU for XP, never thought nvidia would purposefully disable sli in the drivers for no reasons :x

    all the rest of the hardware is 100% supported by XP, got the lastest drivers for everything using Snappy Drivers Installer and everything including USB 3.0 work no problem.

    not being able to enable SLI under XP when it do work without any issues under win10 is really the last detail to make my config complete :/
     
  6. chispy

    chispy Ancient Guru

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    Have you tried hyper sli with moded inf. drivers ? - https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/hypersli-enabling-sli-on-non-sli-motherboards.153046/ , that might work for you . I hope you get it working as i do know it is possible as even gtx 980Ti works in sli under xp , look in hwbot for 3dmark01 submissions there you will find the drivers the guys are using for it on xp working sli. Good luck and let me know if you get it working :)
     
  7. Astyanax

    Astyanax Ancient Guru

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    hypersli has no xp support.
     
  8. cricket bones

    cricket bones Master Guru

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    Pretty sure one 960 is enough to run any nostalgic game on XP.
     
  9. Kevin Mauro

    Kevin Mauro Master Guru

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    Yeah and Max Payne 1 works fine on W10 just buy it off Steam
     

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