As a rule, the manufacturer of NVIDIA graphics adapters for installing the appropriate drivers or some additional components offers their owners the use of specialized applications or the ability to install drivers from a regular EXE file. But for some reason, it is with these video cards that the largest number of errors is observed when the corresponding utility or the "Wizard" reports that the NVIDIA setup program has failed. What is the reason for such an unpleasant situation and how to get rid of this problem, then we will try to find out.
NVIDIA Setup Fails: What are the Causes of Errors?
That this is precisely a software failure, no one should have any doubts. And in most cases this is connected not so much with the program itself, but with incorrect user actions when choosing the necessary software or with conflicts arising from the presence of undeleted residual components in the system, which supposedly indicate that the driver or additional software components are installed in the system . Moreover, sometimes the cluttering of the hard disk, on which there is a huge amount of temporary files, can also have a negative effect. However, despite everything, the failure of the NVIDIA installer can be eliminated by very simple methods, which will be discussed later.
Preliminary steps to remove old drivers
So, the very first and most optimal solution will be a complete cleaning of the computer from old drivers. To do this, you can use utilities like Display Driver Uninstaller or Driver Sweeper. The first program is good in that it removes not only the main components, but also all the residual files on the disk or even the registry keys, and when using the second application, sometimes the system has to be cleaned manually.
As for the first program, after its launch it is necessary to set the normal launch mode, then select the manufacturer’s name (in our case NVIDIA) from the list on the right, and then click the delete and restart button. After that, you need to agree with the message about preventing the installation of the driver from the Windows Update databases and wait for the restart to take place.
In the case of the second utility, the actions are also simple, however, after removing all the components, you will need to clean the system registry manually by searching by the name of the video card manufacturer, and then, as in the previous version, perform a full restart of the system.
Note: in both cases, it is strongly recommended that you force-clear all TEMP folders containing temporary files.
Clean installation of the NVIDIA driver
Upon completion of preliminary preparation, you should visit the official NVIDIA Internet resource and download the necessary driver from there by the model name of your video card or use additional utilities like GeForce Experience. Now the most important thing!
To install the NVIDIA driver, the settings in any installer must imply a “clean” installation (there is a corresponding item in the “Wizards” main window for this). Its use will save you from possible conflicts if previous versions of the management software have not been completely removed.
Manual download and driver installation
However, even in this case, a failure of the NVIDIA installer may prove itself again. Most often, the problem is that you did not download the driver of the same bit depth as the installed Windows (the installation application will report that the installed driver is incompatible with the operating system).
In this situation, it is better to look at the bit depth in advance, using the properties of the computer for this, and then find the appropriate software on the same official site.
Often, the driver by model name seems to be executed correctly, and the settings of the NVIDIA installer are activated in the desired mode, but the driver does not want to be installed under any pretext, and the program again displays an error message (most often it is reported that the corresponding driver was not found equipment).
As it turns out, the reason is simple: you downloaded the wrong driver. Despite the same common names for accelerators, models in the same line can differ quite significantly from each other. You can determine the exact name of the graphics card in the DirectX dialog (dxdiag). You can also use viewing the equipment ID in the “Device Manager” on the information tab, which is more preferable. After that, it remains only to download the driver and install it again.
Other possible problems
Finally, sometimes when an NVIDIA installer fails, nothing can depend on the official software itself. As noted by many experts, possible causes of this phenomenon may be all kinds of computer viruses and, oddly enough, even anti-virus programs. Actions in this situation are understandable to many. First you need to perform an in-depth scan of the system for threats using portable scanners, and in case of blocking the installation process with protective equipment, try temporarily deactivating the standard antivirus and performing the installation again.
Sometimes you may encounter conflicts with other software (for example, PhysX components). In this case, you first need to get rid of them, using either uninstaller programs or utilities such as Driver Sweeper, and then perform the same “clean” installation that fully matches the driver hardware again.