New nForce (5.10) Drivers For WinXP Released!

[Mem]

new nForce drivers for Windows XP.

Installation Notes

Windows XP users must install Service Pack 1, at a minimum, prior to attempting to install this package. Failure to do so will result in the inability to support USB 2.0.
Audio drivers will not install on the following nForce2 products: Chaintech 7NJS. Please use the drivers that come with these products to enable audio functionality.
Installation of DirectX 9.0 or higher is required in order to use NVMixer.
Release Notes

WHQL certified kit
Unified drivers with support for nForce, nForce2, and nForce3 products, including support for dual-processor systems.
General compatibility fixes
Audio Driver Improvements
Addressed audio issues in numerous games and applications

Storage Driver Improvements:
RAID Morphing
Improved RAID Interface
RAID spans both SATA and PATA devices
RAID 0, 1, and 0+1
Improved handling of various storage devices
Windows XP Driver Versions

Audio driver 4.42 (WHQL)
Audio utilities 4.44
Ethernet driver 4.42 (WHQL)
GART driver 4.36 (WHQL)
Memory controller driver 3.38 (WHQL)
SMBus driver 4.04 (WHQL)
Installer 4.46
IDE NVIDIA driver 4.46 (WHQL)

Link.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Thanks Mem :beer:

 

[LocutusX]

New GART driver!

Any A64 (NF3) users report a performance increase (or stability fix) with these new gart's?

 

[Mem]

DP you`re welcome,well I installed the new drivers on my DFI Infinity Ultra board including the SW IDE driver, no problems to report.I did notice bass was lower then before, so had to boost it in the NV mixer EQ panel.

So a :thumbsup: (thumbsup) in general .

 

[Megatomic]

None of the components in this set are new. What a disappointment. I read the release notes yesterday and didn't even bother to d/l them.

NV must be too busy trying to write drivers for the 6800 to bother with new drivers for NF.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: Megatomic
None of the components in this set are new. What a disappointment. I read the release notes yesterday and didn't even bother to d/l them.

NV must be too busy trying to write drivers for the 6800 to bother with new drivers for NF.

What about the GART and IDE drivers?
GART driver 3.77 vs 4.36
IDE driver 4.12 vs 4.46
Did they just update the driver numbers, and really do nothing else? Or just forget to mention any changes in the release notes?

 

[Megatomic]

All of the components have been previously released, some are the latest available to date but they are not new. I've got MemCTL, GART, and SMBus 4.40 installed right now!

IDE 2.6 is widely shunned over at NForcersHQ due to many problems it has. I'm sticking with 2.5.

Audio 4.42/4.44 is the latest but not new. 4.35 works fine for me, I didn't upgrade it.

Ethernet 4.42 is the latest but not new either. 3.13 gives me the best throughput with the lowest CPU overhead (no spikes) so I'm never gonna upgrade from it.

Bah, here's the readme I have for my own remix:

This nForce WinXP driver package remix (4.40b) contains the below components:

Audio driver version 4.35 (WHQL)
Audio utility version 4.35 (WHQL)
WinXP ethernet driver version 3.13 (WHQL)
GART driver version 4.40 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
Memory controller driver version 4.40 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
SMBus driver version 4.40 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
WinXP IDE 2.5 driver version 4.12 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files

Installer version 4.38

 

[LocutusX]

I installed the package and it works fine. A64 here with an NF3-250Gb motherboard.

Previously, I had the most recent Asus-customized driver set installed. It's actually identical to this one except it had the 3.77 GART driver.
So, installing this only changed my GART driver - fortunately nothing else appeared to have been touched, and there has been NO negative impact on my system.

(No positive impact either... both 3DMarks are reporting same score as before)

Megatomic, been using IDE 2.6 for the past month which controls 2 optical drives and 2 hard drives with no problems. Then again, I believe that it was mainly AthlonXP users who had all the issues with IDE 2.6. And Nvidia's audio drivers are not used on NF3, neither are the MemCtl drivers. Was already using the latest Ethernet driver - I think its necessary to fix issues with the Hardware Firewall, not to mention the Gigabit LAN on NF3.

BTW where is GART 4.40 available?

 

[Megatomic]

I'm glad this release is working out for at least some segment of the NF community. How do you like your system Locutus X?

To be honest, I can't remember where I got the 4.40 drivers from, there were so many leaked/beta sets out for a while a few months ago. If you'd like, I can email those packages if you'd like. PM me if interested.

 

[batmanuel]

I noticed the new SW IDE drivers have an option to enable command queing (greyed out for me, of course). Is this new, and does this mean that the NF3 250 boards can do NCQ with their native SATA, or are they laying ground for the NF4s in the driver package?

 

[LocutusX]

Originally posted by: Megatomic
I'm glad this release is working out for at least some segment of the NF community. How do you like your system Locutus X?

To be honest, I can't remember where I got the 4.40 drivers from, there were so many leaked/beta sets out for a while a few months ago. If you'd like, I can email those packages if you'd like. PM me if interested.

the system is fine... remember, this is the second version (NF3-250) of the nforce chipset for A64... so nvidia was presumably relying on experience gained from creating both the AthlonXP nforce chipsets and the first A64 chipset... that might explain my lack of problems

i think these new nforce driver revisions are aimed at people using the new stuff rather than NForce2 boards...

 

[Megatomic]

Yeah, I've pretty much decided that my own personal remix of drivers is THE best driver set for the NF7-S R2 (probably for any NF2 400 Ultra/MCP-T motherboard). I don't expect any new driver to fix/speed up anything anymore.

All I need now is a stock BIOS from Abit with CPUID namestring recognition of my XP-M Barton chip.

 

[Namael]

Here comes a noob question.... what exactly does GART do? And should if be enabled in bios?

 

[Megatomic]

GART is the AGP driver. I don't think you can enable or disable the GART in the BIOS. If you don't install the NV provided GART driver, windows will use a default MS version. You should use the GART driver included in the UDP.

 

[BW86]

downloading now

 

[subflava]

After I installed the new drivers my Windows XP wouldn't boot. It just hung at the startup screen with the progress bar running continously. Left it there for about 5 mins and it was still stuck. Rebooted a couple of times and the same thing kept happening. Finally did a "Restore last known good configuration" and I could boot again. I've read on some other forums of other people experiencing the same thing and it seems to be the IDE driver. One person says they installed the new driver set without installing the IDE part and it worked fine. Just reporting my experience. It's the first time I've had one of these driver sets screw up my system.

 

[jkresh]

anyone have experience with these and an ati card. Previous gart drivers gave me problems on 2 nforce3 motherboards with my 9800aiw (3dmark would not run more then 1 test, would crash to dekstop when moving between tests) though the release from the motherboard manufacturers (msi and asus) worked fine

 

[LocutusX]

anyone have experience with these and an ati card. Previous gart drivers gave me problems on 2 nforce3 motherboards with my 9800aiw (3dmark would not run more then 1 test, would crash to dekstop when moving between tests) though the release from the motherboard manufacturers (msi and asus) worked fine

The most recent NForce AGP GART driver that Asus has on their support site (for K8N-E Dlx) is 3.77

This 5.10 driver set comes with 4.36. They worked fine on my system and delivered a small repeatable performance increase in 3DMark2001.

But, I found on another site a link to the 4.40 GART driver. I tried those instead... they also worked fine, and apparently fix a few bugs relating to the A64 chipsets. That's what I'm currently running with. It's completely stable and performance hasn't been negatively impacted at all.

EDIT: I should add that I'm using your motherboard and an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
Also, the 4.40 driver I mentioned is the one garikfox linked to below... it works perfectly for me.

 

[Megatomic]

Originally posted by: jkresh
anyone have experience with these and an ati card. Previous gart drivers gave me problems on 2 nforce3 motherboards with my 9800aiw (3dmark would not run more then 1 test, would crash to dekstop when moving between tests) though the release from the motherboard manufacturers (msi and asus) worked fine

I'm running an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro on my Abit NF7-S Rev 2.0 and I have zero problems with the card. I use the 4.40 GART driver and CAT4.9 on my WinXP SP2 install and it's all good here.

 

[garikfox]

Heres the two newer SMBUS and GART. 4.4.0

http://members.cox.net/garikfox/bus_grt_44.zip

 

[Megatomic]

Hey, welcome to AT garikfox. :beer:

 

[garikfox]

Originally posted by: Megatomic
Hey, welcome to AT garikfox. :beer:

Thank you

 

[Hankysmoo]

Originally posted by: garikfox
Heres the two newer SMBUS and GART. 4.4.0

http://members.cox.net/garikfox/bus_grt_44.zip

I just downlaoded this. How do I install it and how do I check if they're installed correctly? Thanks.

 

[Megatomic]

Just check the driver properties in the control panel. It'll show the version in there somewhere.

 

[clicknext]

I installed 5.10, and my startup times have increased a LOT. The WinXP (SP2) loading bar freezes for about 30 seconds now. Previously, my windows would load in between 10-15 seconds. Now it's closer to 45 seconds - 1 minute. Not an extremely terrible thing, but anyone know why it's doing this?