0.6000.xxxxx. If
not, it probably came from another source, such as from a driver disk, from
the Web, from Windows Update, or from a previous installation of Windows.
Drivers with newer dates are usually??”but not always??”more recent,
but the date alone is not a reliable indicator.
Click the Driver Details button to view the files in use by the
driver. Sometimes a driver won??™t load merely because one of
the files listed here is missing or broken??”a problem updating
the driver, discussed next, doesn??™t always fix. Instead,
uninstall and reinstall the device, as described later in this
chapter.
To install a new driver for a device, right-click the device in Device Manager
and select Update Driver Software. When prompted, point to the folder
containing the latest and greatest driver you??™ve just obtained from the manufacturer??™s
web site and, if necessary, extracted from the ZIP file.
Or, to start over, right-click the device and select Uninstall. Then, from the
Action menu, select Scan for hardware changes.
When troubleshooting a device, don??™t forget to update the firmware, too;
see the ???Firmware: Software for Your Hardware??? sidebar, next.
Firmware: Software for Your Hardware
User-upgradable firmware is a feature found in many modern devices. Firmware
is software stored in the device itself, used to control most hardware
functions. Although it??™s not possible to, say, increase a hard disk??™s capacity
by upgrading its firmware, it is possible to improve performance and fix bugs
in devices like wireless routers, DVD recorders, motherboards, and even digital
cameras.
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