Catalyst video driver

NeverwinterNights has known compatibility issues with ATI based boards that use the ATI Catalyst OpenGL drivers. Any version later than 9.12 will usually cause the game to crash with this, or a very similar, error:

Problem signature: Problem Event Name: APPCRASH Application Name: nwmain.exe Application Version: 1.6.9.0 Application Timestamp: 486cfadc Fault Module Name: ntdll.dll Fault Module Version: 6.1.7601.17725 Fault Module Timestamp: 4ec49b8f Exception Code: c0000005 Exception Offset: 0002e3be OS Version: 6.1.7601.2.1.0.768.3 Locale ID: 1033 Additional Information 1: f239 Additional Information 2: f239b800942226fe03157817d515cf1d Additional Information 3: e2fd Additional Information 4: e2fdb7073e4eba50d88db756a8748660

Two options are available to fix this issue:
 * 1) Install the 9.12 version of the Catalyst driver for your entire OS
 * 2) Install the latest version of the Catalyst driver, but place the 9.12 version of atioglxx.dll (a file in the Catalyst driver distribution) in the top level folder of your NeverwinterNights directory. This will override the more recent system driver only when you are running NeverwinterNights. This replacement technique is verified to work with up to (at least) Catalyst 10.3.

Copies of the 9.12 version of atioglxx.dll exist in various repositories, but care must be taken to select the appropriate one for the game client's OS. The most common error is to use a Win32 bit atioglxx.dll on a Win64 bit system; this does not crash, but simply disables all graphics acceleration, making the game client unusably slow. The following is step-by-step instructions on how to extract your own version of this file for a PC running Windows 7 64-bit Home Edition:
 * 1) Enter "Catalyst driver 9.3 win64" into a search engine, and download the ATI Catalyst Display Driver. Do not install the entire software suite. You will not need it.
 * 2) Run the program, but DO NOT just click through to use this driver in your operating system. Instead, only install the driver on disk. The default location is: C:\ATI\Support\9_3_vista64_win7_64_dd.
 * 3) Go to Start, and type 'cmd' (without quotes) in the run box to open a command window. Change directory by typing 'cd C:\ATI\Support\9_3_vista64_win7_64_dd' (or whereever you installed the 9.1 version). Now change directory again by typing "cd Packages\Drivers\Display\W76A_INF".
 * 4) If you type 'dir' you should see a directory named B_92022 or a similar name. CD to this directory.
 * 5) Type 'dir'. You should see a long listing of files ending in .dl_. These are the compressed driver files.
 * 6) Assuming that your NeverwinterNights directory is in C:\NeverwinterNights, type the following command in the command shell: 'expand atioglxx.dl_ c:\NeverwinterNights'. You can also type: 'expand atioglxx.dl_ c:\Users\%USERNAME%\Desktop' (without quotes) to put it on your Desktop, where you can move the uncompressed file to the top level install directory using the explorer.
 * 7) Rename the file from atioglxx.dl_ to atioglxx.dll (change the last character from an '_' to an 'l').
 * 8) Assuming the renamed file is in the same place as nwmain.exe, the game should now work.