This release is especially important for users of the latest nVidia drivers (versions later than 258.96) on Windows 7 and Vista, because these recent nVidia drivers conflict with earlier DisplayLink drivers in the area of DirectX functionality.
We’re recommending that affected users download this latest DisplayLink 5.5 M1 (Dec 3, 2010) release or any later version, available at http://displaylink.com/support/downloads.php
Note a reboot may be required as the installer removes the prior version, and installs the new. Please feel free to comment with any experience reports or problems.
Here’s a rundown of important problems that are intended to be fixed from 5.5 (Sept 29, 2010) to 5.5 M1 (Dec 3, 2010) from the DisplayLink 5.5 M1 release notes. We have some notes from us [in brackets] based on what we’ve seen from Plugable customers.
These issues have complete or partial fixes in 5.5. M1:
- Video playback issues on Microsoft Windows 7 with the latest NVIDIA Drivers. [This is the big incompatibility where nVidia drivers after 258.96 broke DirectX functionality on systems with DisplayLink drivers installed]
- DisplayLink Software upgraded through Windows Update will not work correctly after rebooting the system (issue affecting releases R5.3 to R5.4 on Windows update). [This problem has kept the DisplayLink version on Microsoft’s Windows Update system to the older version 5.2, meaning that users who simply plug in their device without a manual driver download have been missing fixes for a number of serious known issues. Now DisplayLink should be able to resume delivering the very latest drivers via Windows Update]
- DisplayLink USB monitor could occasionally remain blank after a PC reboot. [we’ve seen this problem intermittently from several customers. We suspect multiple causes, but hope this resolves most]
- Sometimes the DisplayLink icon is missing in the system tray. [this had previously been a sign of larger problems]
And other important problems DisplayLink reports fixed, that we haven’t specifically run across:
- Blue screen on Windows 7 on some platforms when rebooting after having applied layout changes.
- The DisplayLink GUI stops functioning correctly after switching GPU on some ATI/Intel hybrid systems.
- Sometimes there are two DisplayLink icons present in the system tray.
- Video in Basic Mode not working with the latest Windows updates on both Windows Vista and Windows 7.
5.5 M1 is compatible with all Plugable USB graphics devices. Generally DisplayLink does a good regression testing so we’ve generally had a good experience being aggressive about upgrading to get the latest fixes (when things break, they break more often between DisplayLink releases because of external OS or other main GPU driver changes). So we’re recommending this release to all Plugable users who are experiencing any of the problems above.