Definition: A driver is a small piece of software that tells the operating system and other software how to communicate with a piece of hardware. For example, all printers come accompanied with drivers to install that tell the operating system exactly how to print information on the page. Sound card drivers tell your software exactly how to translate data into audio signals that the card can output to a set of speakers. The same applies to video cards, keyboards, monitors, etc. The drivers for each piece of hardware in your Windows computer are centrally managed from Device Manager, available in all versions of Microsoft Windows. Here's How In Vista: 1. Download the latest drivers from the hardware manufacturer's website. Drivers from the manufacturer will be the most current but there are several other driver download options. As part of this driver update process, you can choose to update drivers from a hardware installation disc or from Windows Update but updating drivers manually (as described below) is usually more effective. Note: Many drivers come integrated with software that automatically installs the driver. The manufacturer's website will tell you if the driver download is packaged this way and if so, the steps below aren't usually necessary. 2. Open Device Manager from the Windows Vista Computer Management utility. Note: There are also several other ways of opening Device Manager. 3. With Device Manager open, locate the hardware device that you want to update the drivers for. Note: Navigate through the categories of hardware devices by clicking the [+] icon. Specific hardware devices are listed under the major hardware categories. 4. After finding the hardware you're updating drivers for, right click on the hardware's name or icon and choose Properties. In this Properties window, click the Driver tab. 5. Click the Update Driver... button. Note: The Update Driver Software wizard will begin. 6. On the How do you want to search for driver software? window, click on Browse my computer for driver software. 7. In the next window labeled Browse for driver software on your computer, click on Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer, located at the bottom of the window. 8. Click the Have Disk... button located under the text box. 9. Click the Browse... button on the Install From Disk dialog box that appeared. In the Locate File dialog box that appears next, navigate to the folder that you extracted as part of the driver download in Step 1 above. There may be multiple folders within the extracted folder so be sure to work your way to the one for Windows Vista if it exists. Don't worry if you don't find one labeled for Vista. 10. Click the INF file that displays in the file list and click the Open button. Note: INF files are the only files that Device Manager accepts for driver setup information. See the tips at the bottom of the page for some INF file troubleshooting.