XP Pro and Nvidia drivers

[marmasatt]

Hi All,

Just finished putting XP Pro on my system. NForce 2 mobo. Worked fine previously with the onboard video, but when I installed the Nvidia drivers for my Ti 4200, I started getting a few problems. Nothing major, but we've gotten black screened a few times. No BSOD and no freezing just completely black. Then when I reboot, XP tells me that it doesn't really like the current graphics drivers. I have the latest Nvidia detonator drivers from the website. Should I go back to the ones on the disk? Are there any that XP likes, per se? Its funny when I went to install the drivers I even got a message that these are not Windows certified or "sponsored" or "authorized" drivers (don't remember the exact wording) and I thought nothing of it, blah blah blah. So what did I do wrong here? (I also did directX after the drivers - that doesn't matter does it?) Thanks for any ideas.

Fools

 

[digitalman]

try installing the current drivers for you mobo. one of the drivers will be for your agp card and could help resolve this. while generic drivers for the various componets are installed with XP, you get better performance and compatability out of the real ones released by the company who made your mobo.

 

[Lord Evermore]

The best drivers for a non-FX card seem to be either 40.72 or 30.38. The new drivers really don't do anything and actually can hurt performance.

The proper drivers for the chipset on the motherboard is indeed a good idea. The drivers for the nforce2 from nvidia are known to have major issues. They make CD burning fail for some, reduce IDE performance for others. The latest version was released and then pulled and a utility to remove them was made by nvidia they were so bad. The drivers from the manufacturer are in this case the best one to use for the motherboard. Normally you would want to use the chipset vendor's drivers (like VIA's Hyperion or Intel's identification utility that installs drivers), but not in this case, at least not till they clean it up and people try the new ones out.

The message you got about the drivers was that they weren't approved by the Windows Hardware Quality Lab or weren't designed specifically for WindowsXP. This can usually be dismissed, since it happens to any drivers that aren't digitally signed by Microsoft, meaning almost all drivers that you get from the manufacturer. It really has nothing to do with whether it will work, it just means Microsoft didn't thoroughly test it and approve of it, which the manufacturer has to get done by sending it to Microsoft and waiting till they get around to it, which nvidia and ATi and others can't wait around for because they're already working on the next driver release.

 

[marmasatt]

Thanks. I'll give it a try.

 

[jfunk]

I have an nforce 1 with a GF 3, and I have had problems with anything newer than the 41.09's. (nothing as major as you, but some minor sound glitches). Current NVIDIA nforce drivers work fine for me, and I believe the 41.09's are whats still packaged with them.


j