Installing ide drivers before windows xp is installed

Hi "rythmshifter", do you plan to install any OS on your computer? (You'll have to, to be able to use it anyway) IDE drivers are part of many OSes, even the non-Windows kind.

In short: install an OS, and the no IDE driver business should take care of itself nicely.

There's no such thing as a IDE driver independent of an Operating system. All drivers have to be designed for a specific OS. Since IDE has become almost universal, virtually any OS you choose to install will also install its own IDE drivers, and that's your solution. In a few cases you may have an option AFTER installing the OS of installing different IDE drivers supplied by the mobo makers. Supposedly these may be better-optimized for the specific IDE controllers on your mobo, and they have to be the drivers designed to work with your actual OS you've installed. After all, drivers are the interface between the OS and the hardware and hence must be designed to meet both sets of requirements. But normally the basic drivers that come with your OS will work anyway.