What are drivers??

[Ironcomatose]

Title says it all im wondering what are drivers. I know they have something to do with a graphics card but like how do you know you have the latest one for your card or w/e??

[[R-DEV]Gaz]

A 'driver' is essentially software that enables hardware to communicate with other hardware.

[[R-CON]MrD]

You have a case that a motherboard is bolted inside.

The motherboard is your "'computer'".

You bolt in extra things to it (or in lower end gaming circles, have a microchip on the motherboard dealing with functions)

When youi install your Operating System, the software picks up so much hardware. Over time, software developers make improvements and release new software you manually install yourself.

Examples are :

BIOS
Chipset Drivers
Audio Drivers (for onboard sound or pci/pci-e cards)
Graphics Drivers (for onboard or agp/pci-e cards)
Directx Drivers (covers video and audio functions.


When new ones are released, you tend to remove the old ones, use any 3rd party clearing software to ensure the drivers in question are fully removed, reset your pc, then install the new drivers when you come back up. Then reset again to fully initialise them.

Only install drivers for 'your' equipment make and model. Only change drivers if you have read the 'readme' documents that come with drivers and you know they will improve things.


(gaz, you economic son of a....... )

[[R-COM]Outlawz]

Economic, lol

[Long Bow]

You can also check what driver you have by going to start>control panel> system> display adapter> the driver will be listed here or you may need to click on a tab to see it. This is just going from memory so it may be a bit off. I believe going to start> run> "dxdiag" (without "'s) hit enter and it will display lots of info, driver is probably one of them.

Oh and MrD forgott to add that computers run on "magic"

[vanity]

Originally Posted by Long Bow

Oh and MrD forgott to add that computers run on "magic"

Once my gf asked me how my computer could just "die" all the sudden. In a dead-pan serious tone, I explained to her that; 'The of inside my computer box holds what's called a power supply. What this consists of is, archaically, a precision engineered wheel driven by a highly athletic rodent. The type of rodent is mostly irrelevant but if something were to happen to this tiny, hearty animal, why the entire computer will suddenly...."

"Forget it. I don't care"

And Ta-Da! I never had to answer another computer question again!

[Long Bow]

Originally Posted by vanity

Once my gf asked me how my computer could just "die" all the sudden. In a dead-pan serious tone, I explained to her that; 'The of inside my computer box holds what's called a power supply. What this consists of is, archaically, a precision engineered wheel driven by a highly athletic rodent. The type of rodent is mostly irrelevant but if something were to happen to this tiny, hearty animal, why the entire computer will suddenly...."

"Forget it. I don't care"

And Ta-Da! I never had to answer another computer question again!

That is to funny. Thats my kind of humour, not appreciated by most.

[Fullforce]

The name "Drivers" is also quite literal - just as a Driver of a Car facilitates the ability for the car to go in a straight line, as does the Driver of a graphics card facilitates the ability for the computer to understand it.

I think.