Device Manager Unknown Device? VEN_10DE and DEV_0AA3 – Check the PCI Database

After publishing our post on the Eee PC unknown chipset device (Asus Eee PC – Unknown Hardware - Coprocessor VEN_10DE&DEV_0AA3) that we needed to search for we received a couple of great pointers in a comment on that post.

• PCI Vendor and Device Lists (PCI Database)

The PCI Database makes it pretty straightforward for us to figure out what the device is and who made it.

1. Figure out the Vendor Code:
1. VEN_10DE = 0x10DE
1. 
2. Figure out the Device Code:
1. DEV_0AA3 = 0x0AA3
1. 
3. Highlight and search for the Chip Description and:
1. Bing Search Results for nForce 730i SMBus Controller (http://www.bing.com/search?q=nForce+730i+SMBus+Controller&src=IE-SearchBox&FORM=IE8SRC)
2. Result number four:
1. 
3. Click through and:
1. 

Wow, that was _so_ much simpler than trying to sift our way through all of the chaff that came up in our original searching.

Note that nForce driver v15.51 looks to be the most current version available for this chipset.

Another pointer given was to the Driver Easy utility site. Essentially, they keep track of every driver providing a one stop shop for loading the most recent drivers on a freshly installed OS (non-OEM image).

A technician’s license is $0.99/Computer loaded. For a small IT shop that does not keep a lot of driver content readily available this would be a good way of saving time for those one-off OS loads as it would save a lot of time hunting around for the right drivers.

For larger shops there would need to be an evaluation against current practices to see if there was value in using the Driver Easy tool.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer