Installing new video card - same driver

[iggz83]

Hello,

I am updating my video card from a 9800 GTX to a GTX 560 Ti. I believe they use the same driver and I already have the latest driver installed. I was wondering if I should uninstall the driver, put the new card in and then install the driver again?

Or because I am using the same driver, I can just swap the cards and it will work?

Thanks.

 

[Sunius]

You'll have to reinstall the driver. It's not same driver, it's just same driver installer.

 

[iggz83]

Thanks for the response. So would this be the best thing to do?
1. Boot in safe mode.
2. Uninstall driver.
3. remove card
4. Put in new card.
5. Install driver.

 

[rajyohanson]

You can defintely bypass the safemode, and I would bet you can even just slap the other one in since they are NVIDIA but uninstalling it can't hurt.

 

[willard]

Typically you don't need to worry about jumping through any hoops. Just replace the card and install the driver when windows boots up under the new card. Rarely will Windows have serious enough issues to prevent you from installing the new drivers.

Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure I've never installed the correct drivers before installing the video card, and I've been doing this since before the days of AGP.

 

[rajyohanson]

willard I completely agree. I just slap the new card in and boot, worst cast scenerio you get 640x480.

 

[Sunius]

worst case scenario you get no video, Happened to me twice. Just uninstall drivers in safe mode, being extra careful won't hurt

 

[rajyohanson]

On an NVIDIA?? Wow.

 

[Onus]

Uninstall the old drivers. You need not do it in safe mode. Then delete the old card in Device Manager. Instead of rebooting, shut down, then install the new card and load its drivers.

 

[Sunius]

On an NVIDIA?? Wow.

Yes. Replaced 8600 GT with GTX 560 Ti once, and another time 7800 GTX with GTX 260.

 

[willard]

No video is fairly rare. You can also rarely have Windows crash on startup. Usually things will just work, though. With stuff like this I tend to err on the side of laziness, because it saves a lot of time when it works, and it almost always works.

I'd never cut corners if it had any chance of damaging the hardware, but with this your worst case scenario just means you have to go back and do what you tried to skip.

No risk, so why not?