Common Solutions for Driver Errors…
Causes of Driver Errors
Device drivers are software programs that your Windows applications use to communicate with hardware and peripheral devices connected to your system.
You may encounter driver errors when one or more of the following conditions are true:
- Missing or busy resources causing conflicts between two or more drivers.
- Missing drivers.
- Faulty or buggy driver files.
- Driver files incompatible with your operating system or hardware device.
- Problems in the Windows registry.
Various errors, such as Stop errors and printer driver errors clearly indicate driver problems. Discussed here are a few methods that you can use to troubleshoot driver errors on your system.
Identify the Device Causing the Driver Error
To start fixing driver errors, begin by identifying the faulty device. To do this, perform the following tasks:
- Open Control Panel, select Performance and Maintenance link, and then select the System link.
- On the System Properties dialog box, open the Hardware tab and then select the Device Manager button
. - In the displayed Device Manager window, you can easily identify the faulty device because it is marked with a yellow triangle with a black exclamation mark within it.
- To check the status of the identified faulty device, double-click on it.
- Check the Device Status section on the General tab to find out the reason behind the problem.
Repair Faulty Driver From Device Manager
8 out of 10 hardware-related problems are caused by faulty drivers.
If the error occurs due to an outdated driver, then you may fix the error by updating the current driver. To update the driver, in the Device Manager window, double-click on the faulty device, open the Driver tab, and select the Update Driver button. Now, follow the screen instructions to search for and install the updated driver. It is recommended that you first download the updated driver of your device from the manufacturer’s website and then run the Update Driver tool.
If the driver error started occurring soon after you installed a driver update, it is possible that the installed update is buggy. In this scenario, select the Roll Back Driver button from the Driver tab and revert the driver of your device back to its old version.
If your current driver is corrupt and you want to repair it by reinstalling it, then you must select the Uninstall button on the Driver tab to first uninstall the driver. When you restart your PC after the uninstallation is complete, the uninstalled driver will be automatically reinstalled on the system.
Repair Windows Drivers
If the driver error is occurring in a driver file that was shipped with your XP operating system, you can fix the error by replacing the driver file from the Windows XP installation CD-ROM.
To do this, boot your PC with the Windows XP installation CD-ROM, select ‘R’ at Welcome to Startup Screen to open the Recovery Console screen. Log on to Recovery Console by providing administrator username and password. Here, type the following commands at the prompt and press Enter to run them.
cd C:\windows\system32\drivers
ren Driver_Name.sys Driver_Name.bak
copy F:\i386 Driver_Name
exit
After you are done, restart your PC normally.
Note: Here, C: represent the root drive of your Windows system and F: represents the drive letter for the CD-drive.
Repair Registry Problems
Problems in the registry may also generate driver related errors on your PC. To fix and prevent these problems, you must use a registry cleaner tool to regularly scan the registry for errors and repair them.
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