The Operating System software needs a set of instructions, a program, for every single piece of hardware that is installed on a computer. These little programs are called device drivers. The drivers provide the interface between the operating system and the device. [1]
In this post:
Required knowledge:
1. Plug’n’Play
The driver for a particular pice of hardware must be installed on the computer. Operating systems such as Microsoft Windows ship with hundreds of device drivers, which means the driver is already available for the device when it is installed. This is how Plug’n’Play works: when you install new hardware, the OS recognises it and installs the correct driver automatically.
2. Generic
Generic drivers are available devices like the mouse and keyboard. This means a device will function using the egenric drivers. The user can install the OEM driver to obtain full functionality of the installed device.
3. Device Manager
The Windows Device Manager allows you to view installed devices and their details, including driver information.
See more in the post The Windows Device Manager.
4. driverquery
For full g33k value, you can use the driverquery command at the Windows Command Prompt to list all the installed drivers on your computer!
References:
- Device driver (2023) Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Device_driver (Accessed: 7 November 2023).