Some driver related questions for Vista Ultimate x64.

[IsLNdbOi]

Ok, I have a GeForce 7950GT and an ATI Theater 650 Pro. TV Tuner card in my PC. I just did a fresh install of Vista Ultimate x64. Downloaded all the Windows Updates for it, installed the chipset drivers for my motherboard, then downloaded and installed the latest ForceWare driver for my 7950GT from NVIDIA's site and the latest driver for my Theater 650 Pro. from ATI's site.

After all that, Windows Update still shows these two updates that I should download:

NVIDIA driver update for NVIDIA GeForce 7950GT (Microsoft Corporation - WDDM)

and

ATI Technologies - Sound - ATI Unified AVStream Driver


Why does Windows Update show these two when I already have the latest drivers for each card? I tried downloading and installing the WDDM one for the 7950GT, but installation always fails.

[dot_Zen]

WDDM does not quite support two different video driver models. It has some limitations.

Multimonitor Support in WDDM (http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/display/multimonVista.mspx)
[Snip..]

However, the Windows Vista Display Driver Model (WDDM) brings fundamental changes to the management of multiple graphics adapters and external displays. This includes a new restriction, because WDDM drivers do not support "heterogeneous multi-adapter" multi-monitor implementations. Specifically:

• All graphics adapters in a system must use the same display driver model. That is, all of them should either be running XPDM or WDDM. The driver models are mutually exclusive, and Windows Vista does not allow the simultaneous loading of both an XPDM driver and a WDDM driver.

If a system has one graphics adapter with a XPDM driver and another with a WDDM driver, then Windows Vista will choose the POST device, which is the one with VGA resources. This is commonly referred to as the "VGA adapter."

•If multiple graphics adapters are present in a system, all of them must use the same WDDM driver. If there are two graphics adapters with WDDM drivers from two different manufacturers, then Windows will disable one of them. The VGA adapter will be enabled, and the second device will be disabled.

Notice that XPDM drivers still support heterogeneous multi-adapter as they did in Windows XP. A user who has such a configuration working fine in Windows XP will encounter a problem when upgrading to Windows Vista. An external monitor connected to one of the graphics adapters will have no video signal, because it is disabled. An error message will appear on system boot, as described later in this article.
The solution for this problem could be as follows:

•A user could force the installation of a XPDM driver for each of these devices, and therefore get heterogeneous multi-adapter multi-monitor to work as in Windows XP.
-Or-

•The user could change the graphics hardware configuration by choosing multiple graphics adapters that use the same WDDM driver. Graphics adapters from the same ASIC family generally have the same graphics driver. In late 2006, each of the major graphics vendors had a single WDDM driver for all supported WDDM graphics adapters. Please consult the graphics vendor's Web site for details on their driver support.
[Snip..]
Unsure if multiple monitor support applies to your situation, but from the sounds of the above just having two different driver models could also cause some issues.

Oh, and before any anti-Microsoft zealot stumbles onto this and curses Microsoft for doing this, go to the link and read everything before passing judgment..Meh, I'll post the "background note" as to why the WDDM driver model was built like this. Still, you should read the contents of that page and any links or related subjects on WDDM.

Background Notes: This restriction only affects a system that has WDDM drivers. WDDM was designed with stability as a key objective. Based on information gathered through Windows Error Reporting and the related Online Crash Analysis for Windows XP display drivers, Microsoft decided to simplify the graphics stack in Windows Vista.
The use of multiple graphics adapters occurred when graphics hardware vendors did not expose multiple connectors on graphics adapters. Today, almost all modern adapters support two or three connectors such as DVI, VGA, and S-Video. Also, most OEMs are now offering SLI/Crossfire configurations that support two or more graphics adapters that could also be used to connect more than two display devices when not in SLI/Crossfire mode.

[IsLNdbOi]

Well after a couple of restarts (from installing other things), the two drivers disappeared from Windows Update. I guess it was taking its time to rescan the system to see what drivers I had already installed.