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I am not sure exactly what the purpose of the chipset is yet so i apologize if i question the obvious. I have read that the chipset provides the architecture for the processor and a connection to all other devices. Clearly this is transparent when you begin writing drivers based upon other standards such as PCI. So why is it that windows includes chipset drivers? How could access to specific chipsets inprove the OS?

Also... what exactly is included in a chipset? One site i have read claims it includes the PIT, PIC and other built in devices, yet other sites claim it is a totally transparent set of devices.

You can use everything generically, but other things, like low power modes, being able to modify your cpu speed on the fly, some specialized (read faster) agp drivers, etc. I am not to familiar with specific chipsets, but other things like reading temperature,fan speed, etc from the mb as well can be found. Also,other things like onboard modem, sound, etc (although mots of these are now kinda standard as modem/sound drivers seperately). I am not sure on anything else off the top of my head, but i would continue working without them until you come upon a reason to, or do some more research and see if there is any need right now, or if you need to plan for anything future.