K9MM mobo just acquired

I bought one of those from a Tigerdirect 'deal'. A K9MM, bought with an
Athlon 64 3500+, a gig of Ultra PC4200 DDR2. The rest, case, DVD-RW, case,
etc I have.
I've 'built' PC's before, this would be my third. I was very pleased when I
opened the box, prepared to go over the manual over coffee at the local Tim
Hortons. But...this has got to be one of the worst manuals...it's thick but
only because it's written for the flippin' UN, seven languages. Otherwise,
it barely qualifies as a quickstart guide.
And the CD doesn't have a readme as far as I can see, for all the content
within it. I want to know what, out of all those folders, I ought to
install. The website, I tried to register at the site in the box, and, after
filling out the login, it asks me to go to the Canadian site (yes I am
Canuck). And, in the Canadian site, support is a dead link.

So, long story short, is there any reference to what's on the CD, what is
applicable to what hardware?
thanks

Yojimbo wrote:
> I bought one of those from a Tigerdirect 'deal'. A K9MM, bought with an
> Athlon 64 3500+, a gig of Ultra PC4200 DDR2. The rest, case, DVD-RW, case,
> etc I have.
> I've 'built' PC's before, this would be my third. I was very pleased when I
> opened the box, prepared to go over the manual over coffee at the local Tim
> Hortons. But...this has got to be one of the worst manuals...it's thick but
> only because it's written for the flippin' UN, seven languages. Otherwise,
> it barely qualifies as a quickstart guide.
> And the CD doesn't have a readme as far as I can see, for all the content
> within it. I want to know what, out of all those folders, I ought to
> install. The website, I tried to register at the site in the box, and, after
> filling out the login, it asks me to go to the Canadian site (yes I am
> Canuck). And, in the Canadian site, support is a dead link.
>
> So, long story short, is there any reference to what's on the CD, what is
> applicable to what hardware?
> thanks
>

The manual in PDF form here, has only 18 pages of English, so could quite
well be the same thing as you got in the box.

http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=driver&mai...t_no=1&

And on that same page, the list of drivers is pretty indicative of what needs to
be installed.

Realtek ALC Series AC97 Audio Driver
VIA Chipset 4in1 Drivers
VIA MAC + Realtek PHY LAN Drivers
VIA K8M800 VGA Drivers
VIA VT8237(R) SATA RAID Driver
VIA PIDE/SATA RAID Drivers & Utility
AMD Cool and Quiet Driver

VIA K8M800 VGA Drivers
is only necessary if you are using the built-in graphics. If plugging
an AGP card, this one is not needed. For an AGP card, use the chipset
drivers first (to get an AGP driver), then install the video card display
drivers from the video card disk, and at some point, a version of DirectX.

For VIA Chipset 4in1 Drivers:
Old version installed VIA Registry (INF) Driver, VIA AGP VxD driver,
VIA ATAPI Vendor Support Driver (patch so MS driver would work), and
VIA PCI IRQ Miniport Driver. New version still has INF, AGP, but includes
the V-RAID package for storage, and IDE Falcon Storage driver. There are
articles here about storage options:
http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?PageID=58&ACatID=128

Another place for guidance, is this doc from Asus. This should be
pretty close to 8237 in terms of functionality.
http://support.asus.com/technicaldocuments/VT6420.pdf

Looking at the downloads, the "VIA PIDE/SATA RAID Drivers & Utility"
contains materials for making a driver floppy, but handles both SATA
and PATA. Even the VIA Arena articles aren't clear whether you could
install without having to press F6 and provide a disk driver. But
I guess that is necessary. These are the instructions for making a
floppy.


If you lost your Driver Disk labeled as "VIA RAID Driver"
This file will teach you how to make one Driver Disk

First please perpare one formatted 1.44M Floppy
Then please copy necessary driver from MSI Driver CD

Driver for Win2000/NT40/XP/Server2003
Please copy CDROM:\IDE\VIA\DriverDisk\PIDE folder
\IDE\VIA\DriverDisk\RAID folder
\IDE\VIA\DriverDisk\TXTSETUP.OEM file

[In other words, two folders and TXTSETUP.OEM, visible at top level]

Your motherboard CD may already contain a "makefloppy" utility,
which would automate the preparation of a fresh floppy with
the drivers on it. I believe some motherboard CDs are even
bootable, and when booted, have an option to prepare the
floppy that way.

Start your Windows install, press F6 when prompted, and offer
that freshly prepared driver floppy.

Best guess,
Paul