# Nvidia RAID Driver for Install of Vista



## andrubruer (Aug 13, 2008)

Hello all. I have a predicament here...working on an HP Media Center m8530f desktop pc. The hard drive completely crashed and needs replaced. I do not have a recovery disc to perform the easy recovery...so I'm using just an OEM disc of Windows Vista Home Premium. So needless to say that I don't have any of the drivers for the hardware. I've noticed that for some reason they (HP) has designed this system with one hard drive...but running it in a RAID configuration...??? So I've installed the new hard drive and began the Vista installation process and when it gets to the point to select a disk to install to...it comes up asking for a driver to load, otherwise it cannot find any drives. So what I'm needing is the RAID/SATA driver for the chipset...and I cannot find it anywhere on HP's website. I know it's an nvidia chipset and will most likely be an nvidia RAID driver...but where the hell do I find one...and why must they set them up like that in the first place. I've seen multimedia Gateways that have done the same thing. They manufacture them as media center machines with tons of memory, quad core cpus, and nice hardware...but no way to restore the system when a hard disk needs to be replaced because I cannot find this particular RAID/SATA driver that will allow me to select the hard drive I've installed and install the O.S. on the system. If anybody as any ideas or help...i would like to show my appreciation ahead of time. Thanks.


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## JimE (Apr 16, 2009)

It's not RAID. RAID would be more than one drive. With that said, many of the SATA controllers support RAID.

For future reference, most of the OEM makers provide the system specs on their website. Yours is here:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/...cc=us&site=null&key=null&product=3740333#N200

It would appear to be an ASUS M2N78-LA motherboard, with the NVIDIA GeForce 8200 chipset.

They also provide all of the drivers. Have you tried their SATA driver?


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## andrubruer (Aug 13, 2008)

Well the drivers from HP's website are in an installer package...so I would like to try the SATA driver...but it has to extract and then begin installation. I need RAID/SATA driver that I can put on a USB flash drive and load the correct driver so the Vista setup can see the hard disk and let me choose one to install the operating system on. I'm obviously aware that RAID involves more than one drive, as I have set up many RAID systems...but what I cannot understand why these OEM machines have a BIOS that has some kind of RAID setting turned on and no way to turn it off...and when you get to that point during O.S. installation you have to have a driver to load for the hard disk otherwise it says that it cannot find a disk to install the O.S. on. Very stupid and frustrating. Thanks for the reply.


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## JimE (Apr 16, 2009)

You can get the drivers from nVidia. You will have to extract the file and copy out the SATA drivers.


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## MSDavies (Jan 27, 2011)

I am having a similiar issue and wondered if Andrubruer was able to resolve? I am working on an hp m8360f as well. In my case the Windows Updates screen is in a loop, so the OS is damaged. I just want to try to repair the OS with Vista recovery, but it does not recognize the C: drive. I was able to obtain the drivers from the C: drive backup. I have them loaded on a USB drive and clicked the 'Load drivers' button and pointed it to the files, but it doesn't work. I would assume if it worked, the C: drive would then be visible in the list, but no such luck. Now I am looking for another driver on Nvidia's website. My question is if Andrebruer was able to resolve and how? Thanks!


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## ptooti (Sep 27, 2008)

HP M8530f Problem installing Vista or Win7 when its looking for the driver it took me forever to figure out about 2 full days what I did was run the Nvidia configure raid when the pc boots up CTRL and N I think it is anyway it says on the screen I configured it as striped added it to the array and booted with the disc it never asked for any drivers. if this works for you please post as solved so others can find it that are having the same problem


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## andrubruer (Aug 13, 2008)

Yes I was able to get it working...I finally found the correct driver in another HP driver package. It was actually for a Compaq model...but same nvidia chipset and worked. When you run the driver package, it copies the files to a folder named "swsetup" under the C: drive...and then in a subsequent folder under there. I was able to locate the correct driver and copied it to a USB flash drive...as Windows Vista and 7 will let you load files from a USB drive. I'll have to see if I can track down the model and address for the Compaq model I was able to locate the drivers from. Thanks for all the assistance.


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