Fix for Nvidia and Vista Problems in WoW

For the past few months since the release of the Wrath of the Lich King I have been experiencing awful instability problems when I play World of Warcraft. I’m currently using a brand new PC  that I purchased from a reputable company called DigitalStorm. My rig has a Nvidia GTX 260 video card and Vista 64 bit operating system.

The problems I’ve been experiencing include texture flashing, my character’s movement stutters, nvlddmkm display driver stops responding, blue screens of death and other various other crashes. One look at the official WOW tech support forums will tell you that there are thousands of other WoW players experiencing similar issues with their performance. Unfortunately, all of the suggestions by Blizzard reps and other players has not worked.

After lots of research I finally I found a great website called RepairYourPCNow that has provided a solution to my problem with an article on the subject. I’ve implemented 3 of the suggestions and now WoW has been running flawlessly for the past 3 days without one problem or crash.

Here are the solutions that I used:

Fix 1 – Vista Users – ATI and Nvidia Users

Disable the Windows Update KB952287. It’s an obscure update that won’t affect many people. Many people noticed that their video performance deteriorated after this fix from Microsoft. Uninstalling it seems to work.

Click on your Start button in Vista. Type the words Windows Update in the start search box

Click on Installed Updates.

Now the Windows UpdateKB952287 icon will come up. Right click on the icon and select Uninstall.

Fix 2- Disable Windows Aero

Disable the Windows Aero Theme. Aero is just a visual enhancement for your desktop — you really don’t need it. Choose another theme instead.

Right click on your desktop and select Personalize.

Click on Window Color and Appearance.

Select Windows Vista Basic (or whatever you prefer) instead of Vista Aero. Click Apply.

Fix 3 – Disable User Account Control

Disabling the annoying User Account Control has seemed to work for some people.

Press the Start icon in the lower left hand part of your desktop.

Type in msconfig into the start search bar. The msconfig program will start running. Select tools then scroll down to disable UAC and click Launch which will reboot your PC.

All three of these fixes have worked for me. They are very easy to apply. You may want to try each one separately to see which one has worked for you, then go back and re-enable the other fixes. For more info on these fixes again please read the original article that I found on this subject.

Finally I recommend that everyone who uses a high performance video card download a free program made called EVGA Precision. EVGA is a reputable video card and motherboard manufacturer. Run this program before you play WoW and set your fan speel to 100. Also you should routinely open up your case and clean out the dust from the insides — especially from the fans and heat sinks with a can of compressed air you can purchase at CostCo or any computer store.

Hope this helps!

-Wolfshead

This problem started happening again for me. Here’s a great fix (which is explained rather well) that I got from one of the official Blizzard Tech Help forums.