Drivers

[iiiprimeiii]

well i built my first pc back in jan and oticed there is a few new drivers.... any way to quickly scan my computer to find wut new drivers r out or do i need to go to websites for each component??? vista 32 bit

[The Wise Monkey]

Unfortunately not - you need to check each component separately.

[zburns]

About four weeks ago, I loaded Vista 32 bit for the first time on my new build. About two/three weeks ago, I downloaded Vista SP1 after downloading a bunch of updates -- all of this from Windows update.

At this point, I was still looking to update drivers thruout Device Manager. I was able to use Windows Vista to search my computer as well as the internet. Here's how!

Go to Device Manager, click on a specific generic device, double click on a specific device and you get a dialogue box, click on Drivers in the dialogue box and another dialogue box shows up, click on "Update Driver" in this dialogue box. Now you get a dialogue box with two options, one option to search your computer for a driver for the specific device in question, the second option is to search the internet for the latest Windows approved driver for your device.

I actually did this for my video card and Windows choose for me a late 2007 driver for the card.

I mentioned SP1 and the updates first, because I downloaded them before realizing that Windows would do the search for me. So I do not know if this option was there before SP1 or not.

At least this gives an easy method to get drivers with some degree of confidence. In addition to doing this I chose to go the manufacturers website afterwards looking for an even later driver than the one Windows choose -- whether this is really better, I am not experienced enough to know. zburns

[The Wise Monkey]

You can get some drivers through Device Manager, but it is better to get the latest version from the manufacturers website.

[iiiprimeiii]

yea thats what i figured so i just went to webistes thanks