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I am about to do a fresh install of Windows 7 and I have identified almost all drivers I'm going to need. The only driver I'm unsure about is the chipset driver.

My motherboard: GA-MA78G-DS3H (rev. 1.0) http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=2800#sp

Both the North Bridge and the South Bridge are made by AMD (their model names are 780G and SB700 respectively) which simplifies the matter as I only need one driver however I am unsure as to whether I should download the necessary driver from Gigabyte's webiste or AMD's website. Among the drivers for my motherboard on Gigabyte's website there is a driver labeled as "AMD Chipset Driver (include chipset\sata raid\vga driver)". I was going to just install this one but I noticed that it is rather old. After some digging I found the chipset drivers on AMD's website: http://support.amd.com/en-us/download/chipset?os=Windows+7+-+32 There I found a driver from last September. According to the description it is for motherboards with 700 series or newer AMD chipsets which seems to apply to my motherboard. It also says that it includes the AMD AHCI Driver, however it also includes AMD USB 3.0 Driver which doesn't apply to me as my motherboard only has USB 2.0 and 1.1 ports.

Given all of that, which driver should I get? The "AMD Chipset Driver (include chipset\sata raid\vga driver)" from Gigabyte's website or the AMD Chipset Driver 13.12 from AMD's website?

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While the driver provided by AMD is the most updated one, it's a generic version and might not be fully compatible with your motherboard. What can you do is:

  1. Download both chipset drivers.
  2. Install Windows 7.
  3. Install the chipset driver provided by Gigabyte.
  4. Install everything else, and create a restore point when you're done.
  5. Update the chipset driver to the generic AMD version.
  6. Make sure everything still works. If not, restore the driver to its previous version.
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  • By "Update the chipset driver to the generic AMD version" you mean uninstall the Gigabyte-provided driver and install the generic one? Or should I install the generic one "over" the Gigabyte one?
    – user314945
    Apr 19, 2014 at 17:25
  • @ST17 Simply installing the generic driver package would do. You shouldn't need to uninstall the Gigabyte one.
    – and31415
    Apr 19, 2014 at 17:30
  • Any ideas what would constitute "not everything working" short of obvious signs like BSODs and crashes?
    – user314945
    Apr 19, 2014 at 17:33
  • @ST17 The installer could also give you an error stating that the hardware is not compatible. Aside from crashes, Windows might not boot properly, the performance might get worser, and/or the system event log might record some warning/errors.
    – and31415
    Apr 19, 2014 at 17:54
  • @ST17 - Where do you see "not everything working" exactly? I am not exactly sure the reason there is even a question. Gigabyte will offer ALL chipset driver updates on this website. The AMD drivers are only for your GPU. The driver being "sort of old" is not important it works unless it doesn't support the OS your using there is no reason to use the AMD version.
    – Ramhound
    Apr 19, 2014 at 17:55

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