update

[Norvin Gordon]

Has anybody seen or used a "driver update program", it keeps popping up
on my screen and it looks real, just not sure enough to take a chance on
giving it a go.
Any thoughts are appreciated........

 

[Norm X]

Has anybody seen or used a "driver update program", it keeps popping up on
my screen and it looks real, just not sure enough to take a chance on
giving it a go.
Any thoughts are appreciated........

I would never use it. It may be adware. If you want to be sure, install
Adaware and the "driver update program" and find out. If you have a Genuine
Windows Authenticity then you can always get the best drivers from
Microsoft. If you are a pirate, you might try this alternative.

 

[Paul in Houston TX]

Has anybody seen or used a "driver update program", it keeps popping up
on my screen and it looks real, just not sure enough to take a chance on
giving it a go.
Any thoughts are appreciated........

I would never trust such a thing.
Why would you want to update drivers anyways?
No reason to update them as long as they are working ok
for your applications.
However, if was to update them I would get them directly
from the mfgs websites, not from a third party,
and not from Microsoft.

 

[Paul]

Has anybody seen or used a "driver update program", it keeps popping up
on my screen and it looks real, just not sure enough to take a chance on
giving it a go.
Any thoughts are appreciated........

If it "keeps popping up on my screen", that's a sure sign it's not working
in your best interests. Look in Task Manager, get the name of the
executable, and Google the name to find out more about the unwanted program.
If the dialog box has a product name for this "driver update" thing,
so much the better. It might not even be a driver update program,
but some kind of malware.

Drivers need to be updated, if some aspect of the operation of the
computer is not right. Or, if you know a specific feature (like
TRIM for a new SSD you bought), can be acquired in a particular
way. But otherwise, you don't need to update drivers every day,
because that isn't necessary.

For a person playing 3D games, they're the most likely kind of
person to be looking for the latest driver, as games may require
particular fixes for the video card driver. But for the rest
of the driver types, no, you probably don't need them.

I haven't "done a driver" here in a couple years, on this machine.
And it is unlikely they're still actively developing the driver
for my video card. (New driver releases, would have the same old
code, for my old video card. Only the very newest cards, get a
lot of attention. My card is DX9 only.)

Paul

 

[Norvin Gordon]

Has anybody seen or used a "driver update program", it keeps popping up
on my screen and it looks real, just not sure enough to take a chance on
giving it a go.
Any thoughts are appreciated........

Thanks to all, this made it an easy decision. GONE

 

[RJK]

Has anybody seen or used a "driver update program", it keeps popping up on
my screen and it looks real, just not sure enough to take a chance on
giving it a go.
Any thoughts are appreciated........

FWIW, if it doesn't IMMEDIATELY do what it says on the tin, get a refund !
In my experience. there are two types of software driver supplied to make a
corresponding piece of hardware work.

The first type of software driver supplied is simple a heap of crap, with
next to no resources, effort, or expertise applied to it, during driver
development, and whilst it might work on PC hardware and software
environment into which it's thrust, that happens to be VERY similar to that
on which it was developed, it won't work on almost every other type of PC in
the world.

The second type of software driver supplied with a piece of hardware, has
been expertly & EXPENSIVELY, and thoughtfully crafted, and has been tested
on MANY brands and models of PC hardware, and most recent Windows platforms,
and when STUFFED into the hideous software mess, (which is most peoples
PC!), it can cope with this environment 999 times out of a thousand !!!!

In short, if you install it, (hardware and software), as per installation
instructions, and it doesn't work, and especially if it collapses your PC,
(that was most likely on the point of collapsing anyway), GET A REFUND.

regards, Richard

 

[Norvin Gordon]

I will never understand why using a program to update drivers.
Updating drivers is a very rare operation. It's necessary every some years.
Why using a dedicated program that can even do the WRONG job? Is it so much
hard to download manually the RIGHT drivers every some years from the RIGHT
website?

After a few years, this senior cannot remember all of the programs that
use a driver, let alone remember where to go for an update. As an
example: my computer used to be able to play DVD movies, and suddenly it
did not play any more. I did go to MS to check my update and it said
everything was OK. Since I didn't make any changes to my computer, I
assumed that one of the auto updates from MS made a change.
Thanks for your response.

 

[Norm X]

"Paul in Houston TX" wrote

However, if was to update them I would get them directly
from the mfgs websites, not from a third party,
and not from Microsoft.

Bad experiences with nVidia and others have taught me to get my driver
updates from Microsoft for Vista & Win 7 - 64 bit. For WinXP, mfgr is better
than Microsoft. However the simplest way to update drives is in Device
Manager which queries the Microsoft database. If you have the latest device
drivers Device Manager lets you know.

 

[Paul]

After a few years, this senior cannot remember all of the programs that
use a driver, let alone remember where to go for an update. As an
example: my computer used to be able to play DVD movies, and suddenly it
did not play any more. I did go to MS to check my update and it said
everything was OK. Since I didn't make any changes to my computer, I
assumed that one of the auto updates from MS made a change.
Thanks for your response.

In general terms, playing a DVD "uses CODECs" or coder/decoder software.

What is special about the DVD CODEC, is it is covered by a patent.
The licensing body that owns the patent, gets software developers
to pay so much per customer using the software. Someone has to pay
for that.

With Microsoft, that means they have to decide whether they will
bundle such a CODEC with the OS or not. On Windows 8, the decision
was to only provide the necessary CODEC with the Media Center upgrade.
I have such an upgrade (it was free at the time) for Windows 8, and
the "useful part" of the upgrade, was a grand total of two files with
the CODEC stuff in it.

Now, that's the "official" route. You have to check what the
DVD support is like, for each OS. (Whether it's only via Media
Center, or is baked into the OS.)

You can get commercial player applications, where you're paying for
the CODEC with your purchase of the product.

At one time, you could also get the CODEC from a third party
provider. (I think NVidia sold a CODEC package for OS level playback
of a movie.)

There are *free* applications, where the CODEC is included. If the
software is authored in a country, where no legal remedy is available,
the software can be made available to the rest of the world.

For example, you could try VLC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VLC_media_player

I can't verify VLC plays commercial DVDs here... because I don't
have any commercial DVDs.

*******

If you wanted to examine the actual CODEC situation on a machine,
you can use the GSpot program. But that will not tell you that VLC
could play a movie for example (so it doesn't know anything
about CODECs that are baked inside a player program). What GSpot
does, is use the OS CODECs if available. GSpot also makes it
possible to list all the CODECS installed in the system.
And yes, it takes a while to figure out how to use this.
But still, a very useful program.

http://gspot.headbands.com/v26x/GSpot270a.zip

v2.70a 22 Feb 2007 20070222 Vista compliancy, WMV, MOV,
extended MP4 & more

*******

Since there are multiple means by which you may have
gained a CODEC (and probably a few means to break them),
I don't know if I could give a recipe as to how you'd
hunt down what just broke. It would probably start with
a review, of what software had been installed on the machine.
For example, if you bought a recent copy of Nero, which
smothers the computer with 100MB of install files, you
could end up getting movie CODECs from it.

HTH,
Paul

 

[Buffalo]

I would never use it. It may be adware. If you want to be sure, install
Adaware and the "driver update program" and find out. If you have a
Genuine Windows Authenticity then you can always get the best drivers from
Microsoft. If you are a pirate, you might try this alternative.

Drivers from MS are rarely the best. Download the drivers from the mfg or
even the computer maker.
I sure wouldn't use that driver update program that keeps popping up.
Use the free versions of MalwareBytesAntiMalware (MBAM) and/or the free
version of SuperAntiSpyware (SAS) to scan your system (neither will charge
you for fixing anything they find).
Buffalo