NVIDIA Driver won't install. (NO matter what it would seem)

[Matt The Cat]

I posted this on two others sites so I can get the maximum help possible, and if you need further information you can probably find the two other sites just by copying and pasting this below stuff into a search engine. I hope someone can help with this impossible (it would seem) to fix issue. Make sure you search for the other sites this was posted on, one of them has extra comments that have useful information.I have a computer from 1999 that I normally run Windows 2000 with the Black Winged Cat kernel extension, I upgraded the RAM from 300-ish MB to 700-ish MB, I upgrade the Graphics card to a NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS, and used a driver that provided OpenGL 3.2 to Windows 2000, things were great, I could play Minecraft, et cetera. But the problem was the shear amount of games that couldn't run because of requiring a newer operating system such as Windows 7. I have a Pentium III which has no SSE2 support, but that wouldn't be a problem as long as I didn't install updates from 2018. I bought an unopened Windows 7 Professional OEM DVD (with license key) and a 60 GB IDE hard drive, and so I was able to successfully install Windows 7 despite having less than a GB of RAM. I was even able to use my SB Live! and Ethernet card, even though there were no new drivers nd certainly none made for Windows 7. I found an early 2000 driver which was made for Windows XP and under online for the Ethernet card, it actually worked, I encountered some weird things though, some application wouldn't work, such as problems installing driver booster, installing the 2019 VC++ Redist, and so I found a safe portable driver installer (no virus total detections). This driver installer was called "Snappy Driver Installer Origin", and with that I was able to install a driver for my sound card. Now you may be wondering, "why the heck would you use a driver installer!", well, I initially got it because of theMAIN PROBLEM THAT I AM CREATING THIS THREAD FOR, which is that, despite their being official Windows 7 drivers for the NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS, I was unable to install them. I had tried reinstalling Windows, extracting the NVIDIA driver installer and directly installing from the .inf, which always yielded results such as "Windows encountered a problem installing the driver software for your device... Windows found driver software for your device but encountered an error while attempting to install it." or in one case saying a line was missing from the .inf. I had also tried installing older Windows 7 NVIDIA drivers made for this model, and I had even tried installing some of the Windows XP drivers such as the one I used on Windows 2000, and some newer one, which after finding that it wont even let me install, I tried extracting and directly installing from an .inf, which it then said this was made for a different version of Windows or something like that.SO... I need a solution, I know I am using the correct installer, and again even when making sure the installation of Windows was fresh, I still encountered the problem, I know it is using older hardware, but the compatibility definitely checks out, so I believe it is not a hardware problem, and the NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS driver that came with Windows 7 as well as the driver that came with the card on a disc are much too outdated for modern gameplay.Another thing to mention is that this installation came with service pack 1, and yes I have made sure to get at least some important Windows installations such as the prerequisites for IE 11 and IE 11, Direct X updates, .Net 4.8 (which I had to get an updated certificate for), VC 2015 redist, VC 2017 resist, and even something called the 2016 "Convenience Update".It really seams impossible to me that it isn't working, because I feel as though I have checked every crevasse of the situation, but surely someone will help me figure out the way to make it possible for me to install the latest NVIDIA driver for the NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS. Thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope this conundrum is worth the effort for you to solve.

 

[flavallee]

The most current driver for Windows 7 SP1 32-bit for the NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS graphics device is version 342.01 which was released in December 2016.

NVIDIA DRIVERS GeForce 342.01 Driver WHQL

Download and save it, then close all open windows first, then double-click it to start the install process, then follow the directions.

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After you installed Windows 7 Professional SP1 32-bit, did you update it in any manner?

If the KB4490628 and KB4474419 updates have not been installed, you are going to have a problem installing the NVIDIA graphics driver and some other apps.

 

[Matt The Cat]

The most current driver for Windows 7 SP1 32-bit for the NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS graphics device is version 342.01 which was released in December 2016.

NVIDIA DRIVERS GeForce 342.01 Driver WHQL

Download and save it, then close all open windows first, then double-click it to start the install process, then follow the directions.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

After you installed Windows 7 Professional SP1 32-bit, did you update it in any manner?

If the KB4490628 and KB4474419 updates have not been installed, you are going to have a problem installing the NVIDIA graphics driver and some other apps.

I have not installed those updates yet, but do you really think it will make any difference? Because I tried installing that exact driver before with the installer always failing, and I have even tried installing by extracting the driver installer and installing from the .inf file through device manager. I guess the only way to find out is to try, so I will post my results after I find out.

EDIT: Before I test it, since it is an update from 2019 (since 2018 SSE2 updates have been common, but not all of them, for Windows 7), will it cause a problem with my non SSE2 CPU (Pentium III)?

Second edit: Someone on msfn specifically mentioned KB4490628 and KB4474419 as being updates past 2018 that might work on non sse2 CPUs. So I will go for it.
I just don't see how this will fix the .inf install portion of the driver installation "Windows encountered a problem installing the driver software for your device... Windows found driver software for your device but encountered an error while attempting to install it.", the NVIDIA driver installer did run, but it always failed upon installing.

THIRD EDIT: I was able to install KB4490628, but when I try to install KB4474419, it says it is not applicable (this issue has nothing to do with the sse2 processing inability). I accidentally messed with some other files yesterday, I think I just corrupted the installation, but this is completely separate from my Graphics card problem, I will reinstall Windows. Then I will try to install the two mentioned KB updates.

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Even after doing a fresh install and making sure nothing was corrupted, it still says KB4474419 is not applicable to my computer. Honestly I don't think that would have solved the issue anyway, the driver is from 2016, so it should not need an update from 2019 to work.

So do you have any other ideas?

 

[flavallee]

Your computer is a dinosaur and was never designed to run Windows 7 SP1, so I'm not surprised at all that you're having hardware and driver issues with it.

Without being there to have a "hands on" with it, I really don't know what else to advise you.

It's my guess you're not having much luck at the other forums either.

 

[Matt The Cat]

True there, but remember, I was able to use OpenGL 3.2 on this card with a Windows XP driver (version 258.96) on Windows 2000. So this should have an even higher compatibility with Windows 7. Hardware-wize, there is nothing really stopping this from working, and I do have the default Windows 7 8400 GS driver, but it is too outdated so it only supports OpenGL 1.1.
I know I already mentioned that detail, but again, (just so I know help is happening), does this bring any ideas?

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I was able to install driver version 295.73,
SO WHAT I WOULD LIKE HELP WITH: I would like you to list all NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS driver versions above 295.73 and below 331.58.

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Okay, I found a bigger part of the problem, despite driver version 295.73 being installed (from 2012), only OpenGL 1.1 is recognized (and even working) with OpenGL extension viewer, and trying to test OpenGL 2.1 always leads to an error. How do I fix this issue.
Also, all of the direct display features are showing to be "Not Available".

I was able to have all of these features and OpenGL 3.2 when using Windows 2000, what is going on?

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Alright, for anyone having the exact same problem as mean (unlikely), the latest NVIDIA driver that will install on my computer is 320.49


https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/drivers/windows/320_49/win8-win7-winvista-32bit-320-49-whql-driver/


BUT, I cannot mark this as solved because I still need to find out how to get this driver to use what I am guessing is OpenGL 3.0+ (possibly OpenGL 4.0). Because as of now it has either no OpenGL or it only tries to use OpenGL 1.1.

 

[townsbg]

I wouldn't have put 7 on such an old computer. No telling what issues you will have with driver incompatibility. For one think you don't have near enough ram. 2 gb is the absolute minimum and anymore that's pushing it. You would really have to strip down the processes and no telling how comparatively slow a processor that you have. Don't expect anything near the performance as with XP on it. Frankly I'm surprised that you got this far.

 

[Matt The Cat]

I can watch Netflix on it at a decent speed using the basilisk 52 web browser and Silverlight (the overall GUI of Windows can be decently smooth, and if I need to set looks to optimize performance, that helps).
I found RAM usage to never be that higher, CPU usage is only high when changing something like with certain updates, but even installing updates (through KB files) does not seam to slow things down.

But I need actual solution help, not comments on the situation, I have read similar problems online for people with higher specs.

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I have been suggested a lot on other forums, but my issue is still at large, surely a solution to my issue exists? The drivers should provide much higher OpenGL support than 1.1, and of course sometimes the tools to check graphics card info such as OGL ext. viewer just crash altogether, obviously it shouldn't just do that.

 

[Matt The Cat]

[FONT=&quot]Any suggestions?[/FONT]