nvlddmkm question for Richard Urban

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1) Saw your input in this forum that the Nvidia driver that comes with the
original Vista install is the only one you have not had the "stopped
responding" errors with. I want to get back to the original driver as I am
having ongoing problems since updating several weeks ago. Is the best way to
do this to use the "revert to previous driver" function in device manager, or
is there another way that is preferred?

2) The driver I have installed now (and crashes) is stated by Nvidia to be
"WHQL". Does this not really provide much assurance that drivers really
work, or at least don't cause system crashes?

3) Is it better to wait until the drivers come through Windows update?
Does this take a long time (I think Nvidia has two or three "WHQL" versions
that have never come through Windows update)? When things do come through
Windows update, is additional testing done to assure that they actaully work?

4) Just to vent my frustration: Nvidia has all sorts of junk listed in
their driver updates documentation for fixes like "jerky reflection in the
water" in some obscure game, but nothing listed about fixing this problem
that crashes the operating system. I filled out an input in their Vista
quality issues stuff and suggested that they just Goggle the error message to
find out how widesread it is. No resonse, no indication that they even
acknowledge the problem. What lousy customer service.

Thanks for any inputs you can provide and pardon the rant.

Herb
 
If your present driver is the only driver update that you installed,
reverting the driver should bring you back to the Vista supplied driver
after a reboot. The original will be detected and installed.

Normally I would get any drivers from the manufacturers web site.

WHQL means that the drivers have been certified by Microsoft. But, it is up
to Nvidia to test the drivers under as many different system combinations as
they are able to. They obviously can't test everything. That is why some
people find better performance with an older driver.

I suggest you do as I have been doing. Create an image with TrueImage HOME
10.0 "prior" to installing and testing a new driver. If you are not happy
with what you see, it takes about 5-10 minutes to revert your system to the
way it was previously.


--


Regards,

Richard Urban MVP
Microsoft Windows Shell/User
 
Many thanks, Richard.

Herb

Richard Urban said:
If your present driver is the only driver update that you installed,
reverting the driver should bring you back to the Vista supplied driver
after a reboot. The original will be detected and installed.

Normally I would get any drivers from the manufacturers web site.

WHQL means that the drivers have been certified by Microsoft. But, it is up
to Nvidia to test the drivers under as many different system combinations as
they are able to. They obviously can't test everything. That is why some
people find better performance with an older driver.

I suggest you do as I have been doing. Create an image with TrueImage HOME
10.0 "prior" to installing and testing a new driver. If you are not happy
with what you see, it takes about 5-10 minutes to revert your system to the
way it was previously.


--


Regards,

Richard Urban MVP
Microsoft Windows Shell/User
Click to expand...
 
Just for anyone who is searching this forum, the error I was receiving was
"Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding and has recovered." The screen
would black-out and then the message would appear. This happened about
25%-50% of the time whenever Windows asked permission to continue an
action--like when accessing Device Manager. It would also happen sometimes
when installing new software, but then the screen would black out and get
caught in a loop where it seemed to be trying to recover but would just keep
blacking out--the only way out of this was to shut down the computer and
restart.

Reverted to driver orignially supplied with Vista and so far no more
problems. This driver is listed in Device Manger display adapter screen as
7.15.10.9746 dated 08/22/2006. The driver that caused the crashes was
version 97.46 (WHQL dirver, not beta). Current nVidia WHQL driver is 100.65
but I have not tried it as they do not list the system crash problem as one
that has been addressed.

Thanks again, Richard.
 
I have been testing the 100.65 driver for two days. So far the display has
crashed 4 or 5 times in that period. Better, but not perfect. They are still
not as stable as the supplied Vista drivers.

--


Regards,

Richard Urban MVP
Microsoft Windows Shell/User
 
Guess they'll get it eventually. If you could post back to this forum in a
new thread when the problem seems to be solved that would be really helpful.

Have you noticed any fixes in 100.65 that were a benefit to you?

Herb
 
The benefits would likely be noticed by an avid game player. I am not. I
just want stability.

--


Regards,

Richard Urban MVP
Microsoft Windows Shell/User
 
Have more problems. After reverting to the original Vista driver using the
selection in Device Manager under the display adapter driver I thought the
driver was stable, but this morning when I did a restart the problem with the
display blacking-out several times is succession recurred.

I noticed that things weren't completely like prior to the 97.46 driver
update. For example, I could still access the Nvidia Control Panel by right
clicking on the desktop (prior to the 97.46 update, there was no Nvidia
Control Panel--or at least it was not accessible by right clicking the
desktop). So I figured maybe everthing didn't get reset to the way it was by
reverting to the original Vista driver, and since uninstalling the 97.46
driver was still listed as an option under "Uninstall Programs" I uninstalled
it (a little knowledge is a dangerous thing).

I'm not sure if things are stable yet, but now on restarting Vista after a
shutdown I get two error boxes at the end of the boot sequence:

1)Error loading c:\windows\system 32\NvMcTray.dll. The specified module
could not be found.

2)Error loading c:\windows\system 32\NvCpl.dll. The specified module could
not be found.

I click Ok on these boxes and they go away.

Any idea how I can keep these error boxes from appearing at reboot? If I
install the 100.65 driver and just live with the instability for now, do you
think that will solve the errors?

Many thanks!
 
Go to uninstall and uninstall the Nvidia drivers. You should reboot after
you do this, even if you are not prompted to do so.

--


Regards,

Richard Urban MVP
Microsoft Windows Shell/User
 
Nothing was listed in uninstall for Nvidia at this point (after uninstalling
the 97.46 version, nothing was listed in uninstall; the only uninstall option
seemed to be in device manager).

Did some checking around on display driver installs via Google and noticed
the recommendation to always uninstall current dirver prior to installing a
new one. I downloaded the 97.46 version from the Dell site and it said
nothing about this--I just installed it. So I started to suspect that stuff
was just generally mucked up.

I purchased Driver Cleaner.net for $10, booted to safe mode after
disconnecting from the internet to assure new drivers were not downloaded,
uninstalled the driver using device manager, ran Driver Cleaner.net with the
nVidia filter, rebooted and shutdown virus scanning, installed the 100.65
driver downloaded from the nVidia site. So far all is well--no error
messages, no display crashes yet. Will post back if crashes develop. If
they do not, you might want to consider trying Driver Cleaner.net
(instability caused my incomplete install????).

Thanks for all your help.

Herb
 
I was overly hopeful--the display crashes continue with 100.65 and the clean
install. Don't think I can do a cleaner install so it must just be
inherently unstable. Really like Vista; too bad it's getting mucked up by
drivers. "As it is today, so it has always been." I'm tired of trying
different stuff--hope Nvidia gets it fixed soon.

Again, thanks for your help.

Herb
 
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