What is computer driver?
A computer driver is a program that controls a device. Every device, whether it be a printer, disk drive, or keyboard, must have a driver program. Many drivers, such as the keyboard driver, come with the operating system. For other devices, you may need to install a new driver before connecting it to your computer. In DOS systems, drivers are files with a ".sys" extension. In Windows environments, drivers often have a ".drv" extension.
A driver acts like a translator between the device and programs that use the device. Each device has its own set of specialized commands that only its driver knows. In contrast, most programs access devices by using generic commands. The driver, therefore, accepts generic commands from a program and then translates them into specialized commands for the device.
How to install computer driver?
Usually your operating system like windows xp will install the driver automatically when you add a new device to your system. If you os does not provide you the driver, you need to get it from your device's manufacturer. Usually the driver comes with your device and you just need to click the setup program to install the driver. If the driver does not come with your device, you can go to manufacturer's website to download it and install it. If there is no setup program, you need install drivers manually through the driver's .inf file in the Device Manager, which is often used by some advanced PC users when setting up some modified drivers.
How to update computer driver?
To begin with go to the start button on Windows and click settings then control panel. Once in control panel find the systems tab and open it. You¡¯ll find a device tab there, open that tab. Now choose your device under the device tab and double click it.
Once you find the right device, click on the "Driver Tab" and choose "Update Driver". At this point you will see several tabs but one will say, "Search for a better driver", choose this tab.
Once you have chosen to search for a better driver, the next dialog box will give you a list of places to search including your floppy drive, CD Rom Drive and so on, choose the installation media type you are using and click "Next". If you aren't sure where the updated driver is click on the tab that searches of the best driver available, if you have internet access this tab will also allow for a search of the internet for the best possible driver.
After a short period of time a dialogue box will come up with either having found the driver or now. If it found the driver, just click "Next". Once the driver is found Windows will build a database of needed drivers and then it is time to reboot. You have now installed your new driver.
