gHacks technology news » device driver http://www.ghacks.net A technology blog covering software, mobile phones, gadgets, security, the Internet and other relevant areas. Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:22:46 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 Device Doctor Scans Windows For Driver Updates http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/26/device-doctor-scans-windows-for-driver-updates/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/26/device-doctor-scans-windows-for-driver-updates/#comments Sat, 26 Sep 2009 08:40:17 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=16672 Most hardware and devices work just fine on a computer system that is running a Microsoft Windows operating system. Microsoft is providing generic drivers for the most important components that ensure that the computer system is working properly. Generic drivers on the other hand have the problem that they do not provide access to specialized features. They are also not optimized. Many users therefor install drivers that are supplied by the manufacturer of the device to take advantage of these features. And this is where the problems begin. These drivers are not automatically updated when new versions are released. There is usually no way of knowing that a new driver has been released unless the user visits the developer’s website to check for new drivers, signs up for some notification service (if offered) or visits third party hardware sites that list driver updates on their websites.

A software that would handle all of these would be more than welcome. There is unfortunately no official one. A few third party tools have been released in the past that have tried to address the problem; Most of them with mediocre success thanks to the amount of devices and drivers available.

Device Doctor promises to do better. The free program scans Windows for driver updates and displays information and download links in a report at the end of the scan. And this is where the confusion starts. Device Doctor mixes update notifications of devices like video cards, sound cards or network cards with internal device driver updates like those for standard dual channel PCI controllers or a plug and play monitor.

The software did find updates for several devices like the Realtek network adapter or the Creative Soundblaster X-Fi audio card. The manufacturer’s website confirmed that updates were available.

device doctor

It does make sense to check the manufacturer’s homepage before installing these driver updates; At least for the first few times that Device Doctor is being used. There is still the lingering question whether to update the generic hardware drivers as well. I personally would be very cautious about it. Decided against it on the test system but some users who might experience problems related to a specific device on their computer system might want to give it a go to see if the update fixes the problem.

Device Doctor is available at the developer’s website.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/26/device-doctor-scans-windows-for-driver-updates/feed/ 30 Windows Driver Updates http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/12/windows-driver-updates/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/12/windows-driver-updates/#comments Sun, 12 Apr 2009 08:57:35 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/12/windows-driver-updates/ windows driver updatesOne would think that there should be at least some free working tools for the Windows operating system that allow users to scan if drivers installed on the computer system are up to date or need updating. A user searching for terms like Windows driver updates or driver updates will most likely be disappointed as the top spots are held by commercial products that sometimes promise a free scan but require registration and purchase before the drivers can be downloaded. There is not really a lot of choice in the free sector which could be explained by the sheer volume of hardware devices and drivers which require a huge database in the backend that gets updated hundreds of times a day. Probably to much work for a group of individuals but excellent for a community project.

Anyway, some free programs to update Windows drivers exist. We have reviewed Driver Max in the past. The application has made some leaps version wise. It can not only be used to scan for Windows driver updates but also to identify unknown hardware or to perform device driver backups. A click on the check for driver updates button in the updates and identification category will start the scan of the computer system’s hardware.

The results will be displayed on the website of the software developer in table form listing the name of the device as well as the installed version and the latest version in the database. A disk symbol at the end of each line leads directly to the download of the device driver.

device drivers

The download pages list all downloads for the selected device. There is no mentioning if the drivers are alpha, beta or final drivers and it is recommended to perform a search on a search engine to verify the result. The suggested update for the outdated Intel Chipset Software Installation on the test system turned out to be an alpha driver. A quick search revealed a final driver that was available for download.

The list of downloads could use some filtering options to filter languages and alpha or beta drivers. Still, it is a better alternative than searching for all device driver updates manually. It will at least list the drivers that are not up to date anymore which will narrow down the manual process to a minimum. A free registration is required to use the program.

A similar program is 3DP Chip (read: Computer Driver Updates) which will only scan the most important components of a computer system.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/12/windows-driver-updates/feed/ 7 Device Driver Cleanup http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/19/device-driver-cleanup/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/19/device-driver-cleanup/#comments Thu, 19 Mar 2009 10:24:47 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/19/device-driver-cleanup/ It is sometimes not possible to remove all device drivers and Registry settings for a device in the Windows operating system. So called leftovers can cause a series of problems from slow boot times to performance and stability issues. Trying to cleanup the device drivers manually is a complicated long winded process as it does not only mean to delete files and Registry settings but also to find out which files and settings are related to the hardware.

Driver Sweeper has been covered about two years ago at Ghacks. The software has been designed to cleanup device driver leftovers both on the hard drive and the Windows Registry. The software program comes as a portable version or installer and can cleanup driver and Registry leftovers of the following hardware devices:

  • AGEIA – PhysX
  • ATI – Display
  • Creative – Sound
  • Microsoft -Mouse
  • NVIDIA – Chipset
  • NVIDIA – Display
  • Realtek – Sound

While that does not cover all hardware devices it does provide the means to cleanup several of the most popular. All the user needs to do is to select and check one or multiple entries from the list and click on the Analyse button afterwards.

device driver

The program will scan the system for files and Registry settings for the selected type of hardware and display those in a list. All entries are checked by default and can be cleaned from that window. It is also possible to uncheck certain entries before starting the device driver cleanup process.

The developers of Driver Sweeper are recommending to uninstall the hardware using the uninstallation routines provided by the Windows operating system and / or hardware manufacturer before running their product to find and cleanup the leftovers. They also suggest to run Driver Sweeper in Safe Mode so that the tool can safely delete the files and Registry settings.

The software has an option to create backups of the device drivers which is highly recommended before starting the cleanup process. Another possibility is the software device driver backup which we covered before at Ghacks.

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