Now I need to know how to remove them! Does "Nvidia GART driver" and "Nvidia memory controller driver"...

[computer]

Guys, can anyone please tell me what exactly are the "Nvidia GART driver" and "Nvidia memory controller driver"? Aren't these needed ONLY for Nvidia video cards? This is the impression I get on trying to find info on them. Do these need to be installed on an Abit AN7 w/AIW 9800Pro video card? These install driver options are showing up as installable on the Nvidia chipset driver download. I'm using the updated download from Abit instead of the CD that came with the AN7. Another thing, why does the CD have some type of "PCI drivers" on it, but it's not in the download? Also, the CD doesn't give you any options of what to install the way the d'load does. (This is for WinXP Pro).
Thanks.

 

[Mem]

"Nvidia GART driver" and "Nvidia memory controller driver"?

Yes you need to install them,Gart is like AGP driver,just install them, they are for the motherboard(motherboard chipset drivers).

 

[computer]

Thanks for the info and fast reply. I'm still trying to find info on this, and a few places said the GART driver was making things faster, but was unstable. Another place said the Nvidia drivers (ALL of the in the download or CD) should not be used unless you can't find any M$ drivers since they are buggy and lead to instability, and are not M$ certified. Have you ever heard of any of this? If you or anyone else can vouch for their stability, does it matter if the GART or Memory Controller drivers are installed before or after the AIW 9800Pro drivers?

All I've installed so far are the SM Bus, Ethernet and Audio drivers since they are obviously a must, and have to be used to get rid the yellow marks in the DM. So, I'm waiting on the video card's yellow marks until I know about the order of install for GART and MC driver.

I'm a P4/Intel chipset platform guy, so all this is new to me. It's my first Nvidia mobo.
Thanks again.

 

[computer]

Mem, can you answer this?
Another thing, why does the CD have some type of "PCI drivers" on it, but it's not in the download?

Does this driver from the CD have to be installed? If so, that's going to be rather difficult since the CD does NOT have checkbox options on what you want installed. I had to run a Ghost since I put the CD in just to check its contents only, and it went and installed ALL the drivers! Overwrote the newer Audio, SM Bus & Ethernet drivers. During this (I couldn't stop it) is when I saw something pertaining to "PCI [something] drivers".

 

[computer]

If you or anyone is only reading the email notification updates and not going to the thread, you missed the edit on my last post, I left out a word. Should have read: "If so, that's going to be rather difficult since the CD does **NOT** have checkbox options on what you want installed." I left out the "not" in my previous post.

 

[Mem]

nd a few places said the GART driver was making things faster, but was unstable. Another place said the Nvidia drivers (ALL of the in the download or CD) should not be used unless you can't find any M$ drivers since they are buggy and lead to instability,

I think you are mixing up the old Nvidia SW IDE driver that use to have stability problems on some systems,I`m using it now and it`s fine,with the the reference Nvidia drivers for XP 4.27s here you get the option to install the SW IDE or stay with the Microsoft ones during install.

You should install the GART and Nvidia memory controller driver it`s painless and they are needed,normally on a clean install of OS I would install the nForce chipset drivers right after the OS so before I install my ATi drivers,when I update my nForce chipset drivers later I just install over the top of the old ones.

So install the nForce drivers first.

 

[Mem]

Another thing, why does the CD have some type of "PCI drivers" on it, but it's not in the download?

To be honest,I`m not sure,however drivers for your Abit AN7 board are all here .

Another place said the Nvidia drivers (ALL of the in the download or CD) should not be used unless you can't find any M$ drivers since they are buggy and lead to instability,

If they were not needed then motherboard companies would not ship them t with every nforce motherboard,think of them as the right drivers between your board and OS that ensures maxmium performance/stability and correct operation of hardware features that your motherboard has.

 

[computer]

I guess I should have mentioned this is for XP Pro, and RAID is not being used, only one SATA Maxtor. I updated my original post to show the OS. All I'm finding in the search engine hits on this is for Linux! Seems like only Linux users are asking questions about these drivers. I found this at one forum (don't know if it was Linux or not), which I why I was asking about stability:
I'm planning on building a new Athlon64 system with the K8N Neo Platinum mainboard. One of the reasons I'm looking forward to my new system is that my current system crashes every time I enable Punk Buster in games like AA, Joint Operations, or BF942. It's a known problem with the TYAN TigerMP mainboard I have in my current system.

I was shock to read several postings on MSI forum that talked about freezes while playing Punk Buster games online. Is this true?

The common belief is that the problem is in the nVidia GART driver? When it is removed, the problem is gone but performance drops way down.

I read some others, but I already closed the webpages.

Yes, the Nvidia IDE driver was something else I forgot to mention. I also read it was bad, and to avoid it. Thanks for bringing that up. What's in the chipset download for the IDE drivers says version "5.10.2600.0446" which experience may tell me that's a Microsoft driver!? Most M$ driver versions are prefixed "5.10.2600xxxx". Here's a paste from the nvatabus.inf file, but note it states "Nvidia" at the bottom:

[Version]
Signature = "$Windows NT$"
Class=HDC
ClassGUID={4d36e96a-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}
Provider=%NVIDIA%
CatalogFile=nvata.cat
DriverVer=06/03/2004,5.10.2600.0446
[DestinationDirs]
Crush11.Files.x86_12 = 12
Crush11.CoInstFiles = 11

[Manufacturer]
%NVIDIA%=NVIDIA

So, is this OK to install, or is v4.27 at your link better? Or for that matter, should I start over again and instead of installing the chipset package download from Abit, get it from Nvidia's site at that link you gave?? Is that download for ALL Nforce2 mobo's? This is really confusing. Sort of why I've stuck with Intel chip mobo's.

 

[computer]

Originally posted by: Mem

Another thing, why does the CD have some type of "PCI drivers" on it, but it's not in the download?

To be honest,I`m not sure,however drivers for your Abit AN7 board are all here .

Yes, that's exactly where I got them, I d'loaded "nforce_5.03_win2kxp.exe" which has all the drivers. That's where I got that nvatabus.inf file info from, it was in the IDE folder. So, what is this "AN7-win2kxp.exe" on that page, an older version? Should I then use "nforce_5.03_win2kxp.exe", or the link you gave me from Nvidia's site http://www.nvidia.com/object/nforce_udp_winxp_4.27 ?

 

[Mem]

So, is this OK to install, or is v4.27 at your link better? Or for that matter, should I start over again and instead of installing the chipset package download from Abit, get it from Nvidia's site at that link you gave?? Is that download for ALL Nforce2 mobo's? This is really confusing

You can use the Nvidia reference drivers in my link,however you`ve installed the ABIT ones so you might get a conflict/problem if you install over the top with Nvidia drivers,so if you wish to try them you should do a clean install again of OS to be on the safe side.
You could always stay with the Abit drivers for now and see how they work out.

Problem with branded(motherboard) drivers is some companies just use the exact copy of Nvidia reference drivers so installing over top is no problem, while other motherboard companies mod them slightly for their boards,so sometimes you can get problems between Nvidia and company drivers.

 

[computer]

Ok, this is interesting. I read the "Readme" file for the Abit download, and compared it to the info on the Nvidia website. They are almost all the same versions, except for **. Note the IDE differences in bold, and some in the Abit package are not in the Nvidia package.

From Abit:

This nForce Win2K/XP driver package contains the below components:

Audio driver version 4.42 (WHQL)
Audio utility version 4.44
Ethernet NRM driver version 4.42 (WHQL)
GART driver version 3.77 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
Memory controller driver version 3.38 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
SMBus driver version 4.04 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
Installer version 4.46
**Win2K ethernet driver version 4.16 (WHQL) (Not in Nvidia download)
**WinXP ethernet driver version 4.16 (WHQL) (Not in Nvidia download)
**Network management tools version 4.42 (Not in Nvidia download)
**Win2K IDE 2.6 driver version 4.46 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
**WinXP IDE 2.6 driver version 4.46 (WHQL) with updated uninstaller files
--------------------------

From Nvidia:

Windows XP Driver Versions

Audio driver 4.42 (WHQL)
Audio utilities 4.44
Ethernet driver 4.42 (WHQL)
GART driver 3.77 (WHQL)
Memory controller driver 3.38 (WHQL)
SMBus driver 4.04 (WHQL)
Installer 4.46
**IDE NVIDIA driver 4.12 (WHQL)
-----------------------

So, looks like the Abit download is fine, and that's what you'd use if you want the M$ IDE driver I guess. I'm a bit confused on why the Nvidia download has fewer Ethernet drivers. So, IYO, is it better to go with the Abit/M$ IDE driver, or the Nvidia IDE driver in their download?

Thanks again for all the replies, I really appreciate it.
-Clint

 

[Mem]

I'm a bit confused on why the Nvidia download has fewer Ethernet drivers. So, IYO, is it better to go with the Abit/M$ IDE driver, or the Nvidia IDE driver in their download?

You might as well stick with Abit drivers since you`ve them installed already,as to fewer Nvidia ethernet drivers,well remember you do get other third party ethernet controllers on a few nForce motherboards(some have dual onboard LAN for example) so it`s the motherboard company in question to ensure you`ve those drivers and not Nvidia`s responsibility.

 

[computer]

Mem:
So, in your opinion, is it better to go with the Abit/M$ IDE driver, or the Nvidia IDE driver in their download?

I haven't installed any IDE driver yet, only audio, Ethernet and SMB bus.

 

[Mem]

I haven't installed any IDE driver yet, only audio, Ethernet and SMB bus.

You started with Abit drivers so might as well follow through with Abit drivers.

 

[computer]

If I could "rate" you I'd give you a 10. Thanks again for your help.

 

[Mem]

computer,you`re welcome btw go over to nForcersHQ forums,lots of useful info on nForce boards etc there,you`ll probably pick up a thing or two in the Abit forums .

 

[computer]

Will do, thanks.
-Clint

 

[computer]

"Well isn't this special". I installed the "IDE driver" from the Abit download, and HD benchmarks are slower! Even memory benchmarks are slightly slower. So, does anyone know how to remove this POS please? No entries for it in "Add/Remove programs", and the .exe file "nvuide" in the "IDE" folder doesn't do it! I can't find them in the Device Manager to remove them, so what else??

I'm going to test the before and after benches for the Memory Controller driver next as soon as I get this sorted out.

Ah, I found it in the Device Manager and "rolled back" the driver. I'm posting this anyway so others will know that at least on this mobo, the basic M$ XP driver was faster!

 

[computer]

FYI, memory benchmarks were about the same +/- 1mb after installing the "Memory Controller Drivers". However, Hmmm, BUFFERED bandwidth efficiency dropped from 90% to 83%. So, looks like I'll be removing these as well! Naturally I'm screwed since I can't find out how to remove these drivers! I looked before I installed them, then compared that to after and all looks the same. Unfortunately I didn't look in the right place evidently. Under "System devices" there's FOUR identical entries "NVIDIA nForce2 Memory Controller" and below that one "NVIDIA nForce2 Ultra 400 Memory Controller. I don't know if they were there before or not. Properties for them state Nvidia as the "Driver provider" but "driver details" says no drivers are installed!

I am curious to know why Sandra's UNbuffered "bandwidth efficiency" on this mobo w/TWINX512-3200LL 2x256mb is only 43%! Lowest I have ever seen before this was 68%! That 43% is the same before and after the memory controller drivers.