NVIDIA GeForce 304.79 Beta Released; New film-style Anti-Aliasing technique ‘TXAA’ introduced


Nvidia has released a new set of beta drivers for its GeForce graphics cards. GeForce 304.79 introduces a new anti-aliasing technique called TXAA. NVIDIA TXAA is new film-style anti-aliasing technique designed specifically to reduce temporal aliasing (crawling and flickering in motion) through a combination of hardware AA, custom CG film style AA resolve, and a temporal filter. We should note that this technique is only available for the GeForce GTX 600-series Kepler-based GPUs.
The only game that is currently using this new technique is The Secret World, though we expect to see more games utilizing it in the future.
GeForce 304.79 also feature several fixes and updated SLI profiles for various PC games.
Those interested can download these beta drivers from GeForce’s official website.
Here are also the release notes:
New in 304.79 Drivers:
Adds support for NVIDIA TXAA
NVIDIA TXAA is new film-style anti-aliasing technique designed specifically to reduce temporal aliasing (crawling and flickering in motion) through a combination of hardware AA, custom CG film style AA resolve, and a temporal filter.
The Secret World is the first game to support TXAA (support will be enabled in an upcoming patch)..
TXAA is supported on GeForce GTX 600-series Kepler-based GPUs.
New SLI Support
Adds or updates the following SLI profiles:
The Secret World – added
End of Nations – added
Nexuiz (also provided earlier via NVIDIA Update)
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Future Soldier (also provided earlier via NVIDIA Update)
Tornado Force – added
Tribes: Ascend – updated
Key Fixes:
Fixed a compatibility issue with Civilization V and GeForce 400/500 series GPUs
Fixed instances of flickering or missing mouse cursor when hardware cursor is enabled (reported with Aion, World of Warcraft, Eve Online and others).
Fixed instances of very low frame rates in Deus Ex: Human Revolution (DX11).
Fixed an issue that caused a PC reboot instead of a PC shut down.
Fixed an issue that led to a black screen after driver installation.
Power management mode settings now persist across driver overinstalls.
New in R304 Drivers (Introduced previously with 304.48 drivers):
Performance Boost – Increases performance for GeForce 400/500/600 Series GPUs in several PC games vs. GeForce 301.42 WHQL-certified drivers. Results will vary depending on your GPU and system configuration:
GeForce GTX 680:
Up to 18% in Batman: Arkham City
Up to 15% in Dragon Age II
Up to 10% in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat
Up to 60% in Total War: Shogun 2 (fixes performance issue with latest game patch)
GeForce GTX 560:
Up to 14% in Batman: Arkham City
Up to 5% in Battlefield 3 with SLI
Up to 4% in Dragon Age II
Up to 8% in The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings with SLI
Up to 7% in Lost Planet 2
Key Fixes:
Fixes an intermittent vsync stuttering issue with GeForce GTX 600-series GPUs.
Fixes an issue where some manufacturer’s factory overclocked cards default to and run at lower clocks.
Fixes a performance issue in Total War: Shogun 2 with the latest game patch.
NVIDIA SLI Technology – Adds or updates the following SLI profiles:
Spec Ops: The Line
PlanetSide 2
F1 2011 – updated profile
Final Fantasy XIV – updated profile
Saints Row: The Third – updated profile
Torchlight II
Tribes: Ascend
NVIDIA 3D Vision – Adds or updates the following 3D Vision profiles:
Alan Wake’s American Nightmare – rated Poor
Borderlands 2 – updated profile with new convergence settings
Depth Hunter – updated rating to 3D Vision Ready
Mass Effect 3 – updated in-game compatibility message and profile to be more compatible with community 3D mods
Max Payne 3 – updated rating to Excellent and updated in-game compatibility message to inform users to use DirectX 11, disable MSAA and use SSA0.
Street Fighter X Tekken – rated 3D Vision Ready
Tiger Woods PGA 12: The Masters – rated Good
Tribes: Ascend – rated Fair
The Walking Dead – rating Good
Other Profile Updates
Added NVIDIA Control Panel antialiasing support for Diablo III
Added NVIDIA Control Panel antialiasing support for L.A. Noire
Added NVIDIA Control Panel antialiasing support for Rayman Origins
Added NVIDIA Control Panel ambient occlusion support for Star Wars: The Old Republic
Disabled FXAA for several Windows programs like Media Player and Movie Maker.
NVIDIA Surround
Surround settings now persisted after new driver overinstall.
NVIDIA CUDA
Includes support for applications built using CUDA 5 Preview or earlier version of the CUDA Toolkit.