Going crazy because you can’t find the proper device driver? Drivers HeadQuarters can help.

Drivers, of course, control printers, disk drives, keyboards, monitors, controllers, network interface cards, and lots more. Without a proper driver, you can run into some really nagging problems. In fact, device driver failures are a leading cause of hardware problems. Why? The story is an old one: You install a new piece of hardware and the included drivers don’t work, or the drivers that came with your original operating system don’t work with your new device. Or maybe you installed a new device driver for a piece of hardware and it conflicted with an existing driver. For this reason, you should always keep a copy of a current driver, just in case you need to revert to the previous version.

But what if you didn’t keep the old version or you need an update? Then you’re left with a common conundrum: where to find a driver to solve the problem?

The Drivers HeadQuarters Web site is a directory of hundreds of device drivers for Windows 3.1x, 95, 98, 2000, and NT operating systems. The site links to driver resources for hardware manufacturers and is organized in 27 convenient categories.

Need a printer driver? Just click the printer category, then the printer manufacturer’s name, and you’ll find yourself looking at the manufacturer’s software download page. You spend almost zero time looking for the manufacturer’s site or tracking down its software, driver, utilities, updates, patch, support, or whatever-they-choose-to call-it page.

Drivers HeadQuarters has standard driver categories for everything from printers, modems, monitors, plotters, audio devices, and disk drivers, as well as drivers of special interest to system administrators for such items as networking cards, SCSI drives, and IDE controllers.

Finally, in the event that you’re having trouble locating the driver that’s giving you problems, Drivers HeadQuarters offers a free software utility called Driver Detective v2.0. It’s a powerful little tool that helps you locate .drv, .dll, and .vxd files on a computer and then displays the filename, a short description, company name, and the version number.

AdminRepublic WebReview rating
WebReview ranks a Web site in seven categories on a scale of 1 to 5. Sites hitting home runs within a category receive a 5, while a site that strikes out receives a 0.

Bruce Spencer covers e-commerce and other information technology topics regularly for TechRepublic. His WebReviews appear weekly on AdminRepublic.

There’s no reason not to get exactly what you want from TechRepublic. By becoming a volunteer member of AdminRepublic’s Virtual Advisory Board, you can help guide our Web site by giving us your opinions on the topics and features you need as an elite member of the admin community.Member responsibilities include:

  • Advising TechRepublic on topics of interest
  • Evaluating new features
  • Building the community to answer the concerns that you have

We are currently accepting applications for a limited number of openings. Don’t wait any longer; apply now by sending us an e-mail. We’ll send you an application and more information about our volunteer board.This is an opportunity to play a pivotal role in creating something that will help propel you in your IT career. Plus it’s another great thing to add to your resume!