Barry said:
I've installed XP3 and all the updates and LG reports they do not
provide a device driver (only a firmware update, which I have) as MS's
device driver is used and they don't know if MS has updated the 2001
Device Driver.
Well, that's the cool thing about some drivers.
They got it right, the first time. So a date of 2001 should not scare you.
If a driver is at a low enough level (just passes commands from a higher
level, and doesn't do anything clever), then the same driver can last
for years and years.
In fact, they design hardware, like disk controller interfaces, to
an existing standard, so those old drivers will continue to work.
They've made hardware, so that existing drivers still work. In fact,
some chipsets, would have hardware support, so drivers in Windows 98
will still work. (That's how I got Windows 98 installed, on a Core2
motherboard here.)
It's the "drivers with brains" that need more frequent changes
(like a graphics driver). A graphics primitive, may have more than
one way that the hardware can implement it, and new drivers can
do things like trade off visual quality for speed (like if the
driver designer wants a higher 3DMark for the hardware).
*******
The firmware in a burner, includes information on the handling of
new media tags. It allows the burner, to have a policy for that
new Tao Yuden or Ritek blank discs you bought. The CD/DVD/BluRay
burning software, is the complicated part. In the past, an
ASPI layer was used to talk to the burner, but I think they
have some other way to do it now, as I seldom see questions
about replacing ASPI any more.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspi
"A number of CD/DVD applications also continue to offer
their own implementations of ASPI layer."
So if the bottom driver layer, doesn't know anything about that,
and the burner program installs its own ASPI, that may account
for issues being resolved by updating a burner program.
You really have to walk through the names of the individual
driver components, to get some idea of whether their function
is simple enough, to never need updates, or complex enough,
to need constant attention. Where good, agreed to standards
exist for hardware (like, some part of USB), there is frequently
no need to do anything of that nature. The OS built-in driver
is loaded, and... it just works. USB Mass Storage, is an example
of a pretty damn good standard.
Paul
