I have a Sony Vaio using a Nvidia GeForce 310M graphics driver. I run Windows 7.
It is not compatible with Windows 10 and I can't upgrade. Sony are going to take forever to update the Windows 8 drivers so I'm not holding my breath for an early update on Windows 7 (if at all).
Is there a generic unit I can buy which will run on this machine and be compatible?
Thank you
If I understand what you're asking and if by "generic" you mean not from Sony, yes the current Nvidia driver for Windows 10 supports the 300M series, see http://www.nvidia.co.uk/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-uk
If you install this rather than the one from Sony, you may lose access to keyboard shortcuts (brightness settings, etc.) as those are added in by the OEM, but it's usually nothing too important.
You'll also probably run into issues with the other Sony apps, particularly if you do a clean install.
Can you clarify? When you post "buy", that suggests that you wish to replace the graphics hardware in your laptop.
That is not impossible, but it's very unlikely. (Look up MXM devices.)
There are newer Win7 drivers available from nVidia for the 310M. They have the same version number as the ones that "xtcrefugee" provides a link to, above.
You may have a common problem with laptops: the laptop manufacturer uses a custom ID for the graphics device, which may not be recognized by NVidia's installer. I'm not sure what the best work-around is fro that, but I somehow succeeded in installing nVidia drivers on my old Compaq CQ50-105NR notebook (nVidia 8200M graphics). I currently have Win 10 Home X64 running on it. (It originally came with Vista X32.)
Thank you for your help. It would be so much easier if Sony would just comply, particularly when they have had so much notice. I shall probably renew this PC early in 2016 but it won't be with a Sony. Thanks again.
In a way, you won't get a Sony if you buy another Vaio.
Sony spun them off, but they retain a close relationship.
Vaio - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Unless things have changed recently you will never get the default Nvidia driver to install for the reason bobkn mentioned, as Sony (no idea how it stands with the "new" ownership} is one of the last (Toshiba was another) that refused to allow reference drivers on their laptops and used a custom product ID to stop it. Now with that said you should be able to get a driver from here,
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/drivers
to install as it will be pre-modded to work with almost any current and semi-current laptop with Nvidia graphics.
Well, you may download latest drivers directly from nVidia and try installing them. If the installer cannot find the card (rather unlikely if you downloaded the correct version) you can always install them manually from the Device Manager. Open Control Panel and select View by Large Icons to see all settings rather than groups. Open Device Manager and expand Display Adapters. Right click on your graphics card and select to update drivers. Always choose the last option until you see a "Have disk" button. Click on it and browse to the folder where the installer extracted the files. If you see a list of devices, scroll to the first matching your model, that is 300M series. Choose it and proceed to install it. Windows might warn you it cannot verify the driver is compatible with your device, proceed anyway, and if everything went OK and you didn't end up with a BSOD you should have latest driver installed. Now Windows 10 will have no objection upgrading your computer. If not, then there is plan B: Manually upgrade the driver again, but this time instead of "Have Disk" select Microsoft Basic Display Adapter (unckeck the box to only show compatible drivers if necessary). Do the upgrade to Windows 10 and then try to install latest nVidia driver.
As for the brightness setting, I think this doesn't have to do with the graphics driver. It is the utility usually called Launcher or similar. Go to notebook's driver download page and look carefully for a driver or utility for keyboard or "Launcher". This is the one you should install to enable the key combinations.
Actually, certain OEMs are well known for including such modifications in their drivers, Sony among them. I have 2 Vaio's myself.
While what you've written about force installing the driver is possible, the problem is that there may well be multiple entries that have the same name but actually refer to different hardware. There's no way to tell from the "have disk" dialog what hardware IDs those names actually refer to, and you could cause serious problems if you guess and choose the wrong one. If the driver doesn't install as-is, stormy13's approach is the correct one, download a modded driver with the missing hardware IDs already added.
I have manually installed graphics drivers many times without any issue and I always choose the first in the list. It's rarely the case that the first won't work and I have to try another. Maybe it won't provide all the features, in case the notebook manufacturer has modified the hardware, but it's better than nothing. And when the manufacturer decides to provide his own driver, you can always download and install it. My experience as a technician says that the manufacturer simply provides the OEM driver in their site, and it's almost always an old version since nVidia/AMD will most probably have released at least two newer versions by then. So unless these is a specific issue to address using the notebook driver, I always prefer latest OEM driver.
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