NVidia nForce Control panel saves EQ settings in XP

Question

Interesting little discovery 8)
I had to reload XP lastnight and so far all I have done is load "nForce_winxp_2.00_BKSOD-FIX.exe" drivers I had backed up on my HD.
I discovered after a coldstart that my EQ settings have remained exactly as I set them when I shutdown this afternoon about 8 hours ago.
I suspect that there may be several reasons why the settings "get lost" after a restart.
1.) I hate having things in my system tray so I either disable them in MSconfig or disable them by the application's configuration settings(if available).
I don't mess with Antivirus or monitoring software, I leave that alone.
In  the past I have always disabled the nVidia Sytem Control utility by right clicking on the Sytem Tray Icon and de-selecting "Load at Startup" This time I did not.
This will also remove it from the listing in MSconfig never to be seen again or have the ability to re-set it to "load at startup" ever again. At least that's how I have remembered it.
I think that by disabling that function it may affect previous EQ settings as I think there are hooks in the registry to refer to a log or something of that nature.
It's purely speculative but makes sense to me.
2.) Windows Update, Automatic Update or SP1 may also be interfering with it as we all know that it replaces dll's and such without any intervention or permission, but I have found that after a few reboots, things seem to settle in an start behaving normally for the most part.
I am going to avoid SP1 for now and see if anything changes.
I think someone that knows a contact at nVidia may be able to pass this on to the Driver team to look into this and see if they can incorporate something in the "Windows Control Panel" as it puts an Icon there, but all it does is launch the interface, but does not allow you to re-set the "Load at Startup" or any configuration for that matter.
It doesn't even need to be in the Control Panel if all it's for is to launch the interface.
I think that most of us might prefer a Quick Launch option next to the "Start" button instead of a system tray invasion.
Just an observation I though I'd share 8)

Answer 1

I can now say that XP SP1 has no effect whatsoever on the newer Windows XP-Unified Driver Package Version: 2.03 for the K7N420. I have installed them with no problems whatsoever so far.
I did notice that the Soundstorm control panel is installed in the Start Menu Program group, the Control Panel, and is set to launch to the system tray at startup.
Removing them in MSCONFIG did not stop the system tray utility from loading at startup but this was after one reboot, I set it back. EQ settings, sound levels, and environment settings stay configured.
The key I believe, for those of us that reboot or shutdown often is to leave the tray icon set to "load at startup" as there is no setting to return it to the tray once it is removed unless you reload the utility and drivers.
I believe there is a hook in the registry that is hidden and could easily be modified if we knew the location of the key and the value or parameter to enter.
Hopefully nVidia could supply the values and key location at some point or incorporate the option somewhere other than, the system tray "right click menu". Perhaps within the Interface itself. This redundancy would allow advanced users more control and shouldn't affect novice users adversely as it's only a redundancy, and it should provide a way to reverse the setting. I would think that this would cause more support calls to the OEM in this case.
Novice users can cause this interface to dissapear and lose settings too easily with the current setup.
Quote
Quick question though gfilitti...I noticed that you are using 3 256MB sticks of DDR RAM on your K7N420
No problems whatsoever but I haven't played any games for more than a couple hours. I do tax the system in other ways with no problems.