Install Drivers for Hardware from a Website
Many times in our lives we come across a piece of hardware that we have to have. You may think that the only way to get hardware is to buy it off the shelf new, but you can take a risk and get it used or second hand. Many times when bought new, the hardware doesn't include the "drivers", the protocol the computer uses to communicate with the device, so you have to go through the dreaded website run to get the best out of your computer gadgets.
Steps
- Know that if you are not using Microsoft Windows, seek instructions other than the following ones;
- Find the brand and model number of your piece of hardware. There are several ways of doing this, the easiest is to see if it came in a box and that will give all the information you need. Sometimes the hardware has the brand and maybe even the model number if you can find it.
- Go to the manufacturer's website. Usually the website is just the manufacturer's name plus a ".com" For example, if you had an hp 1100 deskjet, you would go to hp.com. Also, if you had a Msi ATI 1300 video card, you would go to the msi website. If the manufacturer's website plus ".com" doesn't work, go to a search website such as google.com, and type in the manufacturer's name and usually the first result is the website you want to go to.
- Find information and drivers for your hardware. Once you are at the website, find the support section, this is typically at the top of the screen, and click. Find the text box that tells you to find support for your product or something like that. Type in the product model number and select your product from the search results. Once you are at the product home page, find the section for the list of drivers.
- Choose which drivers that are best for your computer. There are probably many driver downloads available, so you have to be careful about which ones you are going to download and install. First, find all the drivers that have your operating system listed. To narrow it down more, choose which driver is the higher version number for your operating system. Sometimes it shows 32 bit and 64 bit on the drivers, determine if your computer is 32 or 64 bit and choose from there.
- Download the drivers. Once you have found the driver for your system, click the download button right next to the driver. Sometimes you will have to go through a series of download links to download it. If you click the download button and your website browser shows the website is trying to download the file, have the browser accept it. In a few seconds, depending on your computer, a box will show up asking if you want to save the file you are downloading or possibly run it, choose save and find a location you can easily find on your hard rive.
- After the download is complete you must go through the complicated phase of being able to run the driver installation. Go to the wikiHow article on how to burn files to a disk and follow the instructions to put all the driver files you created onto a blank CD-ROM.
- After you have put the drivers on the disk and finalized it, you must run the drivers off the disk. This step is necessary on most driver applications because when searching for the driver files, it only looks on the disk drive, not the hard disk drive where you would try to run the application from. Insert your disk into the CD-R CD, Combo, etc bay. Go to computer or my computer and right click your CD drive and then click open. Double click the file in the driver's folder that is and application and it will start the installation for your wonderful piece of hardware.
Tips
- You can also save the drivers on a USB flash drive instead of a CD-ROM.
- If you can, ask the seller of the hardware if he has anything to go with it, such as, the original drivers disk.
- In case you need help with the physical installation of your hardware, the hardware's home page usually has a manual you can download and read, typically in a .pdf format.
- After an installation of hardware, you have to restart your computer, so be ready.
Warnings
- Make sure the drivers you install are the ones for your computer, Usually the application automatically detects the hardware and the system, but it is better to be safe then sorry!
- When you install the hardware physically, make sure that you are statically discharged before touching any of the computer components, including your new piece of hardware.
Things You'll Need
- Microsoft Windows operating system
- A patient mind
- A blank CD-R disk
- A fast Internet connection at your house or at the library etc.
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