My nephew did something that caused XP to lose it's recognition of the graphics and ethernet cards. I found them in device manager with the yellow question mark beside them. I removed them and rebooted hoping that XP would find the drivers and reinstall them. It didn't. They just came back with the yellow question marks. So I started trying to update the driver manually in device manager. I picked the "don't search" option and was presented with a list of about five driver. I searched Dell's website to determine which was right and was sucessful in updating it. I tried the same thing with the ethernet card but was unsuccessful. Then I told it to search a specific location and while browsing found a directory in the windows system directory call c:\windows\dell\drivers. I pointed to this directory and XP installed the proper driver. I am a little confused by the process and have the following questions

1. On a new install of XP it seems to have all the drivers it needs. Does it store(post installation) these in a specific location that can be pointed to if the drive becomes damaged

2. Why couldn't XP find the right drivers automatically like it does on a new install

3. Under what kind of circumstances might XP lose track of the right driver

4. When I removed the driver from device manager why didn't XP find the right one after the reboot

5. In a bigger sense how does all this work in XP

Thank
Michae

Michael_Largent wrote:
> My nephew did something that caused XP to lose it's recognition of
> the graphics and ethernet cards. I found them in device manager with
> the yellow question mark beside them. I removed them and rebooted
> hoping that XP would find the drivers and reinstall them. It didn't.
> They just came back with the yellow question marks. So I started
> trying to update the driver manually in device manager. I picked the
> "don't search" option and was presented with a list of about five
> driver. I searched Dell's website to determine which was right and
> was sucessful in updating it. I tried the same thing with the
> ethernet card but was unsuccessful. Then I told it to search a
> specific location and while browsing found a directory in the windows
> system directory call c:\windows\dell\drivers. I pointed to this
> directory and XP installed the proper driver. I am a little confused
> by the process and have the following questions.
>
> 1. On a new install of XP it seems to have all the drivers it needs.
> Does it store(post installation) these in a specific location that
> can be pointed to if the drive becomes damaged?

I wouldn't know - I suggest you ask Dell.


> 2. Why couldn't XP find the right drivers automatically like it does
> on a new install?

I've no idea. Ask Dell.

> 3. Under what kind of circumstances might XP lose track of the right
> driver?

No idea. Ask Dell

> 4. When I removed the driver from device manager why didn't XP find
> the right one after the reboot?

Not the foggiest. Ask Dell

> 5. In a bigger sense how does all this work in XP?

Not a clue. Ask Dell. Getting the idea?
>
> Thanks
> Michael