NVIDIA Control Panel Quick
Start Guide
Release 195/196 v30 | January 15, 2010
User’s Guide

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 Introduction.......................................................................... 1
About the NVIDIA Control Panel .................................................. 2
Overview .......................................................................... 2
Feature Differences from the Classic Control Panel ....................... 2
Changes in Release 195/196 ................................................... 3
Supported Operating Systems.................................................. 3
Supported NVIDIA Products..................................................... 4
Supported Languages............................................................ 4
Other NVIDIA Software Applications .......................................... 4
Getting Support and Information ................................................ 5
Online Help ....................................................................... 5
Technical Support................................................................ 5
System Information.............................................................. 5
2 Understanding the NVIDIA Control Panel....................................... 6
Opening and Closing the New NVIDIA Control Panel ........................... 7
About the NVIDIA Control Panel Interface....................................... 8
Using the Main Task Area ....................................................... 9
Using the Select a Task Pane ................................................... 9
Using the Tool Bar .............................................................. 10
Using the Menu Bar ............................................................. 12
3 Accomplishing NVIDIA Control Panel Tasks....................................16
Starting the NVIDIA Control Panel ............................................... 17
Accomplishing NVIDIA Control Panel Tasks ..................................... 18
NVIDIA Control Panel Feature List ........................................... 19
Correlating to the NVIDIA Classic Control Panel ........................... 24
NVIDIA Control Panel Groups.................................................. 26
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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 2.1 NVIDIA Control Panel Home Page–Windows XP................................ 8
Figure 2.2 NVIDIA Control Panel Home Page–Windows Vista............................. 9
Figure 2.3 NVIDIA Control Panel Select a Task pane ..................................... 10
Figure 2.4 Navigation History Menu ........................................................ 11
Figure 2.5 NVIDIA Control Panel View Settings ........................................... 11
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LIST OF TABLES
Table 2.1 File Menu Commands ............................................................. 12
Table 2.2 Edit Menu Commands ............................................................. 13
Table 2.3 View Menu Commands ............................................................ 13
Table 2.4 Help Menu Commands ............................................................ 14
Table 2.5 Profiles Menu Commands......................................................... 14
Table 2.6 Display Menu Commands ......................................................... 15
Table 2.7 3D Settings Menu Commands .................................................... 15
Table 2.8 Workstation Menu Commands ................................................... 15
Table 3.1 NVIDIA Control Panel Features .................................................. 19
Table 3.2 Graphics Driver Tasks in the NVIDIA Control Panel ........................... 24
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01 INTRODUCTION
This quick start is addressed to users of the NVIDIA® Control Panel software. This guide 
focuses on getting you up and running with your NVIDIA software.
For technical details on the features and benefits of the NVIDIA Control Panel software 
and details about supported products, drivers, and other software, refer to the NVIDIA 
web page — www.nvidia.com.
This chapter discusses the following major topics:
 “About the NVIDIA Control Panel” on page 2
 “Getting Support and Information” on page 5
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Chapter 01 : Introduction
About the NVIDIA Control Panel
Welcome to the NVIDIA Control Panel, designed for Microsoft® Windows® XP,  
Windows Vista, and Windows 7. You can use NVIDIA Control Panel to control your 
NVIDIA hardware and access other NVIDIA software installed on your system.
Overview
In addition to setting up basic display configurations such as display resolution, refresh 
rate, and multiple display use, you can: 
 Tune your 3D settings with real‐time preview to maximize performance or image 
quality 
 Customize how 3D applications work in your system
 Adjust your screen colors and contrast
 Set custom timings
 Control video image settings
 Change your HDTV format
 Control your notebook system power using PowerMizer
 Control special workstation features such as Frame Synchronization.
Feature Differences from the Classic Control Panel
The following are features that were available in the NVIDIA classic control panel, but 
which are not available in the new NVIDIA Control Panel:
 Creating/Importing Color Profiles
 High Resolution Scalable Desktop 
 Video Zoom
 Full‐screen video mirroring
 Edge Blending
 nView Desktop Manager
nView Desktop Manager is available through the Windows control panel as a separate 
applet (Windows XP only).
 MultiView Display Mode (for NVIDIA Quadro NVS graphics cards)
As of driver Release 173, MultiView is available from the Windows Display 
Properties‐>Settings‐>Advanced tab for Windows XP only.
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Chapter 01 : Introduction
Changes in Release 195/196
Workstation Pages
 ECC State
New page for GPUs that support ECC (error correction code). The page lets you
• Change the Error Correction Code (ECC) state for GPUs.
• View the GPU error count.
• View GPU memory details.
 Manage Quadro Plex Settings ‐ now available under Windows Vista and Windows 
7.
PhysX Indicator
Enabled through the 3D Settings menu bar item, the PhysX indicator appears when 
running applications to let you verify the type of PhysX acceleration the game is using ‐ 
CPU or GPU ‐ or whether PhysX acceleration is being used at all. This feature also 
appears in later Release 190 drivers.
Supported Operating Systems
NVIDIA Release 195/196 Graphics drivers are available for the following Microsoft® 
Windows® operating systems:
• Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 Update Rollup 2
• Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005/2004
• Windows XP Professional
• Windows XP Home Edition
• Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
• Windows Server 2003 x64 Edition
• Windows Vista Home Basic
• Windows Vista Home Premium
• Windows Vista Business
• Windows Vista Enterprise Edition
• Windows Vista Ultimate
• Windows 7 32‐bit and 64‐bit Editions
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Chapter 01 : Introduction
Supported NVIDIA Products
Refer to the release notes and NVIDIA driver download site for the list of products 
supported by the driver version that you have installed on your computer. 
Supported Languages
The NVIDIA Graphics Driver supports the following languages in the NVIDIA Control 
Panel:  
English (USA)
German
Portuguese (Euro/Iberian)
English (UK)
Greek
Russian
Arabic
Hebrew
Slovak
Chinese (Simplified)
Hungarian
Slovenian
Chinese (Traditional)
Italian
Spanish
Czech
Japanese
Spanish (Latin America)
Danish
Korean
Swedish
Dutch
Norwegian
Thai
Finnish
Polish
Turkish
French
Portuguese (Brazil)
Other NVIDIA Software Applications
If installed, other NVIDIA software that you can access from the NVIDIA Control Panel 
includes:
 NVIDIA System Tools–Performance group and System Update 
 NVIDIA Stereoscopic 3D 
 NVIDIA MediaShieldTM 
 NVIDIA Network Access Manager
See the respective user documentation for information about these applications and 
instructions on how to use them. 
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Chapter 01 : Introduction
 Getting Support and Information
Online Help
 To open the online help, either :
• Press F1 on your keyboard, or 
• Select Help from the NVIDIA Control Panel menu bar and then select NVIDIA 
Control Panel Help.
 Help on various topics can be viewed using the Contents, Index, or Search tabs.
Technical Support
To access the NVIDIA Technical Support web page go the following web address:
http://www.nvidia.com/page/support.html
System Information
You can get detailed information about your system and the NVIDIA Control Panel 
configuration as well as version and copyright information.
 To view copyright and version information about the NVIDIA Control Panel:
From the Help menu, select About NVIDIA Control Panel.
 To view detailed system information:
Open the System Information dialog box by either selecting System Information from 
the Help menu, or by clicking the System Information link at the lower left corner 
of the NVIDIA Control Panel. 
Click any of the tabs in the System Information dialog box. 
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02 UNDERSTANDING THE NVIDIA
CONTROL PANEL
This chapter describes the NVIDIA Control Panel in the following sections:
 “Opening and Closing the New NVIDIA Control Panel” on page 7
 “About the NVIDIA Control Panel Interface” on page 8
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