Please see my post on page 1 too. Here's some more drivers advice from me: - I'm a thrifty person (some out of necessity, some out of greed), whose PC hobby has led me to regularly work on about 40-50 PC's a year. Many are repeats from family, friends, neighbors, and some for people I've sold a PC to, or have repaired / upgraded their PC before. One of the most important things I need to be able to quickly and more easily upgrade, repair, or totally redo a systems software, is an operating system disc / files, and system drivers. Probably about 80% of the PC's I am first given to work on, come without any software discs or information whatsoever! Apparently, many (some irresponsible, some careless) people lose their discs, throw them away, misplace them, forget to give them to me, or never had any discs in the first place. 1. Before you buy a new PC, determine what the restoration software, drivers, and/or media options are. (Some PC's just come with the restoration software on the hard drive). Some systems also make you create your own restore discs, and other companies charge you extra for the software on discs). When I ask the PC owner about any discs, many look at me with a blank stare - like that is something they didn't care to learn about, or don't understand, so it's not their fault or responsibility. When you buy a new PC, order the discs AT THAT TIME if you have that option. (They will only be available for a certain period, then the manufacturer can't / won't provide them). Buy from a different PC supplier / manufacturer if they don't give you that option. 2. Take reasonable care of your software discs! Store them away from direct heat or sunlight, pets, and small children. Store them in paper or plastic sleeves, or (better) hard plastic jewel cases. If you lose a disc's case, buy some replacement ones. Look for the wider, older plastic jewel cases, instead of the newer, thinner ones. Don't throw your discs, leave them on the floor or anywhere they could get stepped on, scratched, or broken. Don't leave your discs in an optical drive. If you accidentally put a second disc on top of another disc that's in a drive, and you close the door, when it tries to spin up to be read, it can ruin them! Also, many people forget they are in the drive when they get rid of the PC. -If the drive breaks and the door won't open, straighten out a paperclip and push the paperclip into the emergency eject hole on the front of almost all CD / DVD drives, to force the tray open. 3. If you sell your PC, give the new owner all the discs (with CD keys) that they will need in order to reinstall drivers and an operating system! Not providing the software / discs, is like selling your car without a spare tire and jack!!! Commonly, the operating system that came originally with the system is the one that's best suited for its hardware. If you fail to provide the software, that operating system may no longer be sold at a retail store months / years later, making system software recovery more difficult and expensive. 4. Otherwise, keep your other old software discs, even if you get new versions of the software. Newer software is not always better. Sometimes, when you try to install a newer driver, it doesn't work right, and you find you need the old version. Also, many times you can get a rebate if you can send in a prior version, a photocopy of a disc, or the previous software versions manual's main page. 5. One of the first things you should do after buying or building a new PC, is to install and update the software drivers! Usually, you should update the motherboard / chipset drivers first. As you update your drivers, take notes of the main components that make up your PC, besides your PC's manufacturer, exact make and model, noting such things as your video, ethernet, sound, modem, BIOS version, etc. Write down any problems you may have / special install issues you have, so that it will be easier the 2nd time (which may be in a year or so). 6. Anytime you install a new peice of hardware or software, immediately check in Device Manager to see if there's any problems with the device - to see if it's correct and updated driver is properly installed, to see if there's a conflict, if it's disabled, broken, or if a generic / standard driver entry appears instead. 7. Read the software driver installation instructions! On some components, you must uninstall an old driver / and/or it's hardware, before installing a newer one. Sometimes you must reboot, sometimes more than once before the installation is fully done. On other components, you can update one driver to another by pointing the driver properties in Windows' Device Manager, to the new driver file(s). On other components, you run the driver / components Setup program / file to install it. Sometimes you must disable antivirus software for an installation to properly run. In extreme cases, you may have to boot up in Windows' Safe Mode to install a driver. Learning how to properly install software and drivers is something most people should know how to do. Otherwise, maybe you should just run to the store and either pay a repair technician $50+/hr. or buy a new PC when (not if), there's a software or driver task / issue. |