Slimming Down Ati Catalyst Drivers

[Crusty01]

As you all know, the Ati Catalyst drivers are BIG.

The version I will describe here, 5.12, is 35 Mb unpacked.

This is proably not an optimized slimming down, i just deleted all the stuff that's obviously not needed.

When you install the Ati driver, it usually unpacks itself first into a C:\Ati directory.

Go there and you will find something like this:

A couple of directory's called:

BIN

CP

Driver

WDM_ALL

And a list of files like these:

AtiCim.bin

AtiCimUn.exe

CheckVer.exe

data1.cab

data1.hdr

data2.cab

DrvUI64A.exe

ikernel.ex_

install.ini

issetup.exe

layout.bin

makensisw.exe

psapi.dll

Setup.exe

Setup.ini

setup.inx

You can delete ALL the files in this directory. This is the attended setup tool which has not only zero value for us, but even for those of us who manually install these drivers it has very little added value.

The real stuff is in the subdirectories of this directory.

I can be short about the BIN directory: you don't need it. Delete it.

The CP directory is for, guess what, the Control Panel. I don't fiddle around with this directory, I just move them to the directory where I install it from my guirunonce section of the unattended setup.

The Control Panel is not needed unless you do a lot of tweaking with games. I find I hardly ever use it myself, but YMMV.

The Driver directory is where the real driver sits, and this is the part that we'll take a look at now:

You'll find one subdirectory called 2KXP_INF and a bunch of files:

C2_28472.INI

CX_28472.INI

data1.cab

data1.hdr

data2.cab

Driver.dat

Driver.DLL

ikernel.ex_

INSTALL.INI

layout.bin

Setup.exe

Setup.ini

setup.inx

setup.iss

_setup.bmp

Delete the files and continue into the directory 2KXP_INF.

Here you find another subdirectory called B_28899 (This is where the actual driver files are).

atiiseag.ini

C2_28472.inf

CX_28472.cat

CX_28472.inf

I have no idea what the ini file does, but it doesn't take any space at all so I just leave it. The inf files are what you need, and the cat file is secure signing for the drivers. I recommend leaving all these files in place.

IMPORTANT: Before we proceed into the 2KXP_INF directory, take note that you do not change the name of this directory. The inf files point to the name of this directory to find the driver files, so if you change the name of the directory driver setup fails.

The 2KXP_INF directory contains these files (in my case at least):

ati2cqag.dl_

ati2dvag.dl_

ati2edxx.dl_

ati2erec.dl_

ati2evxx.dl_

ati2evxx.ex_

ati2mdxx.ex_

ati2mtag.sy_

ati3duag.dl_

atiddc.dl_

atidemgr.dl_

atifglpf.xml

atiicdxx.dat

atiiiexx.dll

atikvmag.dl_

atioglx1.dl_

atioglxx.dl_

atipdlxx.dl_

atitvo32.dl_

ativcaxx.cpa

ativcaxx.vp

ativckxx.vp

ativcoxx.dl_

ativvaxx.dl_

ativvpxx.vp

oemdspif.dl_

These are the actual driver files. Unless you know something I don't, I recommend you leave these files alone.

So, in short: You only need the files in the Driver\2KXP_INF and it's subdirectory for the driver, and the CP directory if you also want the control panel.

In case you have an All-in-Wonder card, you'll probably need the WDM_ALL directory too.

You'll find these three directories like these:

AVS_T200

WDM_NSP

WDM_SP

And a bunch of files.

data1.cab

data1.hdr

data2.cab

ikernel.ex_

install.ini

layout.bin

Setup.exe

Setup.ini

setup.inx

WDM_ALL.dat

WDM_ALL.dll

You can delete the files, and use the subdirectories.

Hope this helps you slimming down your unattended CD's.

Cheers,

Crusty