What To Do If Windows Doesn’t Install Correct Drivers?
When you install Windows 10, it will automatically download and install the necessary drivers needed to run your system. This includes the basic set of drivers; WiFi, display, sound, etc., so that when you boot to your desktop, you have something of a usable system. Once you boot up, Windows 10 will find more specific drivers for you. All this is done seamlessly bu sometimes Windows doesn’t install correct drivers.
In the event this happens, you have to manually install drivers. There are two ways to do this. The first is to just go to your PC/laptop manufacturer, and download drivers from there. In most cases, these drivers will work but Windows 10 can find more up to date drivers which is the second method to go about it. Here’s what you need to do.
Force Driver Check
Open Device Manager with administrative rights. Expand the list of devices that you want to install the driver for. If you don’t see the type of device that you need to install drivers for, you’re going to have to install it from your PC/laptop manufacturer, or you’re going to have to check the website of whoever manufactured the hardware e.g., check the Nvidia website for GPU drivers if you have a Nvidia GPU.
If the device is listed, right-click and select ‘Update driver’. Do this even if you have no drivers installed.
On the window that opens, click the ‘Search automatically for updated driver software’ option. The ‘Browse my computer for driver software’ option is for manually installing drivers, not automatic Windows driver search.
Allow Windows to search for available drivers. If Windows hasn’t installed the correct drivers, this will force it to search for them, and download them.
The driver downloads and installs right away.
In some cases, you may have to restart your system for the driver to start working. Normally, Windows will tell you if you need to restart your system but if it doesn’t say you need a restart and your driver doesn’t start working right away, you should restart it anyway.
For devices that aren’t listed, you should look for drivers from the device manufacturer and install them. This will not give you the latest, most suitable driver but it will get the device to show up in Device Manager, and you can then look for an updated driver.
In some cases, you might have to enable the hardware. This happens mostly in the case of Bluetooth. Some laptops have a setting in the BIOS that can enable or disable it. The same may hold true for other devices and if that’s the case, you will need to enable the device and then search for drivers for it. Generally speaking, this isn’t going to be the case for display or sound devices.
