Weird Unknown Device on P4

[rbertino]

Okay, need help here. My father has a Dell Pentium 4 system (I know, I know, I couldn't convince him to let me build him a computer...)
Anyway, when we first got the computer, it had so much crap on it, we decided to format and reinstall windows. We went with Windows ME, because that came with it and I figured it would have more driver support for the 850 chipset (it didn't by the way). After we finished the install, and loaded the 850 chipset drivers, the sound card drivers the video card drivers, etc. there still seems to be an Unknown Device category showing up. It doesn't call it a PCI Device or give any sort of indication as to what it is, it just calls it an unknown device.
I tried pointing it to every driver disk I could find and reinstalled Intel's chipset drivers probably 5 times. On top of that, we decided later on down the road, to go ahead and format it and put Windows 2000 on it. Well, Windows 2000 has that unknown device as well. I've looked on Dell's sight - worthless, I called Dell's tech support, the guy I talked to knew less than I did and told me that if it wasn't affecting the system any (which it isn't), then to just disable it and leave it.
I just find it really strange and can't for the life of me figure out what it is. As far as I can tell, it isn't Sound Card, Video Card or NIC related.
If I "Show devices by connection" it comes up under System (all of the motherboard drivers), so I'm wondering if it's some sort of Intel or Dell diagnostic crap that is on the motherboard. At this point I have no more ideas as to what the hell it could be.

Thanks in advance for any help...

 

[jlanka]

Question: Are you installing the chipset drivers *FIRST* before any other drivers <video, sound,
modem, NIC,.....> ?

 

[rbertino]

Yeah, I installed all of the 850 chipset drivers first before doing anything else. Then I went ahead and installed the video, sound, NIC card drivers, etc. I even went to Intel's site and downloaded the drivers from there and tried those, still has the unknown device...

 

[jlanka]

Well, at this point I would just ask myself "so I have an unknown device. I've done everything I can do eliminate it, and it doesn't seem to be affecting my performance any, so I guess I'll just leave it."

I know, you and I are probably like the next guy, anal enough to search to the ends of the earth to get rid of it. Well, there are just so many hours in a day, etc.

Good luck.

 

[dmcmahon]

I've never had this problem and not eventually traced it to a "device" I'd overlooked. Sure you've accounted for every on-board device on your mobo? No on-board sound or LAN that needs disabling? What about extra pseudo-devices in your cards (I know the device looks like it's on the mobo, but what the heck)? For example, I have sometimes seen a similar-looking questionable device until I remember that I need to install the driver for the gameport on my sound card.

 

[wapaaga]

try to get a hold of raystonn his is pretty knowlegelbe about the p4

he might be able to help you more