A short discussion about driver updating (from my experience. Sorry for rambling here, but this is mostly a driver updating guide with some discussion about BSOD issues:
First off, if it's a new, out of box system - I update drivers using Windows Update. While there I also grab ALL available Windows Updates for the system. IME this is the easiest step to keep the system functioning smoothly.
If it's my own system, I update drivers when there's a minor problem. As I'm generally pretty aware of problems (and know which drivers are involved) this is relatively easy for me - but would be harder for someone who doesn't have as much driver knowledge as I do. In these cases I target the fixes at the sub-systems that are having problems (for example: If I'm having problems with Steam, I remove and reinstall Steam).
Removal vs upgrade - In the olden days, installers would leave older files when installing newer files - so a problem file might not be removed (and the "fix" wouldn't fix it). In those cases we developed the un-install/re-install method. That was that you uninstalled the program completely - and then installed a freshly downloaded copy of the latest compatible version.
This fixed most problems - and there were 3rd party un-installers that did an even more thorough job of removing all traces. There were even programs that tracked every change made as a program was installed - and then it gave you the option to "fix" all of these changes when un-installing it.
I found them to be unwieldy and time-consuming - and eventually stopped using them. It was my experience that the remaining drivers were fairly easy to isolate (if they were causing problems) and were amenable to manual removal methods which I now use. The problem with manual removal is that some drivers are tied to the boot process - so just deleting them will actually cause your system to stop booting. In response to this I've developed a several step method to "safely" remove drivers - and so far it seems to have been fairly successful the limited number of times that it's been used. The best point to this method is that it provides a recovery mechanism in case the system still refuses to boot.
So, in short, the more severe problems can probably benefit from the un-install/re-install process (rather than just upgrading - or installing the new driver over the old one). It's what I suggest in the majority of cases.
Then is the discussion about where to get your drivers from. If not having any problems, I don't see any problems with Windows Update drivers (with some notable exceptions). But make sure that you have all the Windows Updates also.
BUT if you're having problems, you want the absolute latest fixes incorporated into your drivers. The only way to do that is to get the drivers from the website of those who developed the driver in the first place. There are certain exceptions to this, but it's the first place that you should check for the latest updates. The Driver Reference Table (
Driver Reference Table (DRT) ) was developed to make this chore a bit easier. It has links to the best known site to download the most current drivers from.
If the driver isn't available from the originators website, then the next best place is the OEM manufacturer of your system/motherboard. While not as current as the originator, these folks will generally keep up with updates that affect their equipment.
If unable to get drivers from the OEM website, then an internet search is probably the next best place to look. But be careful as there are scammers out there!!!
DO NOT PAY TO DOWNLOAD DRIVERS or for driver "fixing" software!!!
Finally is Windows Update. Please remember here that Microsoft only provides the server space for the 3rd party driver updates and doesn't validate the drivers that manufacturer's upload to it. Recently I installed Win8 on my old mobo - and Windows Update picked up a driver from 2005 for it (and installed it). That driver is a known cause of BSOD's on some Windows systems - so I have to wonder about it's inclusion. But also know that I don't get BSOD's from that driver - and haven't for a long, long time!
This brings us to a discussion about BSOD's. I work in a computer repair shop and we see upwards of 40 different computers a week. And BSOD's are rare there (we see maybe a couple in a month's time). While we see a lot of BSOD's here - it's only a small sample of the entire population. In short, while a BSOD is a traumatic, overwhelming problem for those who have them - there just aren't that many happening in the real world. IMO Windows Updates fix more BSOD's than anything else that we do. Have a look at the listing of articles at this page:
BSOD Index
Driver Update example: Suppose you have a video card from eVGA that uses an nVidia chipset and it came installed on an Asus system.
- the first place to check for the most current drivers is the nVidia website
- the next most current place would be the eVGA website
- the next most current place would be the Asus website
- at some point here, you may want to look for other systems with this device (search the internet) - as they may have released drivers that eVGA or Asus didn't
- lastly check at Windows Update for drivers
BSOD's are caused by:
- 3rd party drivers (over 90%)
- hardware (less than 10%)
- Windows (less than 1%) - but this presumes that all Windows Updates are installed
Also, problems that appear to be hardware can be caused by:
- borked (broken) hardware (several different procedures used to isolate the problem device)
- BIOS issues (check for updates at the motherboard manufacturer's website)
- overclocking - You'll know if you're overclocking or not. If uncertain we can suggest things to check.
- compatibility issues (3rd party hardware/drivers)
- low-level driver problems
- or even
malware (scanned for when we ask for hardware diagnostics from
Initial Hardware Diagnostics or
Hardware Diagnostics ).
This is what makes the BSOD analyst's job so difficult.
Good luck!