Hi MrE , Have you tried cleaning the drivers out completely ? ... I did this the other night , because windows updated to the "WDM 1.1" (or something along those lines )video drivers. Im not sure what difference these drivers are over the 181.79 , but I cleaned them out with NFR (Nasty File Remover) This is set up to clean up drivers , and it always gives me a clean slate to work with.
I too am a gamer , and always stayed away from 64bit systems , but now i wont go back to 32 ! All the programs I use (and games) are fully compatible these days ... give it a go , I think you will be pleasantly surprised