Which Driver do you use when......

Dyre Straits · Jun 16, 2003, 03:34 PM

...in Windows XP there are no XP specific drivers?

I have a couple of devices that have only 9x/ME or NT/2000 drivers, but no XP specific drivers.

What do you do?

***Veridian3*** · Jun 16, 2003, 03:38 PM

Seems like a good excuse to upgrade

Keeps the world turning really...

Stu

***Zardon*** · Jun 16, 2003, 03:42 PM

if you dont have XP specific drivers you should fall back to 2000 drivers, as they are designed for roughly the same NT core code, they generally work. you will find a much lower success rate with 9x (98/ME) drivers on XP if any at all.

**MIG-31** · Jun 16, 2003, 03:50 PM

2000 drivers would mostly work especially now xp has been around for something like 1.5 -2 years now.

i had in tne past with a couple of devices never got to work with 98 drivers even though xp has a compatability software in built.

Dyre Straits · Jun 16, 2003, 05:18 PM

Now that the answers are coming in, one of the devices I mentioned is my Belkin UPS that i've had for 3+ years now.

In XP there's an option in the Control Panel/Power Options to setup a UPS. However, Belkin isn't listed among the choices. You can use a Generic one and manually select the COM PORT. But doing this doesn't give you any access to the device (that I've found) that allows you to do any testing or to check the battery status.

Belkin does not supply any XP drivers for this device, but they do for the other OSes. I selected the NT/2000 and have successfully gotten the app to run now. It works great and shows the battery status as well as all the other data.

So, the NT/2000 drivers did and do work just fine.

THX to all for replying...and for all the votes.

Matth · Jun 17, 2003, 11:51 AM

For many devices (though probably not this one), it can also be useful to look for re-branded or original versions - most often, digging back to the original manufacturer may be useful, if a re-brander fails to keep their support up to date.

Win2000 drivers usually work in XP, but if you have to go any lower, the risks increase - I've known an old SCSI card driver (NT) that will cause a STOP error - and you have to correct it from DOS (woe betide if you use NTFS format!)