NVidia Drivers BSOD-ing in Crysis

[Captain828]

since I installed the 177.66 nVidia GeForce driver (taken from guru3d.com) I can't play for too long in Crysis as i get a BSOD (related to nvkdlm.sys or something like this) or if i don't get a BSOD, the game says it crashed and then I start seeing artifacts in windows

another weird thing is that if I play Crysis for a while and try a different game (eg: GoW, GRiD, COD4) I get a BSOD in a while; but if I don't enter Crysis (load a level) I don't have any problems

I tried getting back to the latest WHQL drivers (175.19 i think) or the newer 177.72 one, but I get the same thing

My OS is Windows Vista Ultimate x86;
Specs:
CPU: C2D E6600 @ stock (cooled by a Zalman CNPS9500)
Mobo: ASUS P5N32E-SLI PLUS (BIOS rev 0901)
RAM: 2GB DDR2 PC2-6400 (4-4-4-12)
GPU: nVidia GeForce 8800GTS (the old 320, G80 core one) @ stock
HDD: 2x Seagate 320GB in RAID0
PSU: Antec TP3-650
Case: Antec P182 (2x Front Intake; 1 rear Exhaust; 1 top Exhaust; 1 lower chamber PSU cooler; all 120mm Antec tricool fans)

before these drivers I had no problems what so ever, also I only crash when/after playing Crysis; 3DMark Vantage and CoJ DX10 benchmarks + all other games work fine

I remember there was some kind of way of totally erasing what would remain of the nVidia drivers after an uninstall (besides formatting C:/) but I forgot it and the tool I found (nVidia Nasty File Remover) shows me all DLLs belonging in system32 (not only the nv ones) so I'm afraid of deleting any of them

if anyone can tell me what to do or how they clean up leftover driver files...

 

[EXCellR8]

You could try running Driver Cleaner Pro to clean up the left over files. Going into the system directory and manually deleting .dll files is typically not a good idea. If you could post the minidump to the corresponding BSOD, I'm sure someone would be able to tell you exactly what the problem is. My guess would be that it's a driver side issue but there are a number of things that could be to blame. Also, make sure that your graphics card isn't overheating as that can produce system errors as well.

Driver Cleaner Pro Download:

http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=745

 

[SNGX1275]

Vista should have created a restore point before installing that driver. So if you haven't done much with your system since you installed you may try restoring back to just before you put those drivers on.