Windows 7 has been on the shelves for about a year and a half. Prior to that, Windows Vista was the current operating system. While Windows Vista and Windows 7 have a lot in common, not everything about the two operating systems is compatible. One of the standard pieces of troubleshooting advice for Windows 7 drivers is to look for a Windows Vista driver for the same piece of hardware. While that can work at times, there are instances where you’ll need to find a working Windows 7 driver to get the features and performance you’re looking for.

Same Idea, Different Operating Systems

Sometimes a driver made for Windows Vista will indeed perform well in Windows 7. And if you can find a Windows Vista driver for a piece of hardware, there’s at least a decent chance that your hardware will also have a Windows 7 driver available. That doesn’t always mean that the Windows Vista driver and the Windows 7 driver are interchangeable.

The best approach is always to look for the driver that was written for your operating system and for the specific version of your hardware device. Generic drivers for some pieces of hardware – like displays – may be helpful for initial setup or for troubleshooting purposes, but ideally you always want to use the latest driver that was designed for both your operating system and your device.

Failing that, you can look for older drivers, or drivers that were written for earlier versions of the OS or your device. They may not always work well or completely, but they may enable the functions you need.

Having said that, older or out-of-date versions of the operating system can cause problems, including device misbehavior and system crashes. If you begin to experience these symptoms when you use a particular device, or if your device begins to exhibit behavior it didn’t experience previously, your device driver could be at fault.

Go to the manufacturer Web site and download the current version of the driver. Reinstall your driver to see if that corrects the problem. The installation process should disable the existing driver. Even so, some users prefer to uninstall the old driver before installing the new one.

If this happens to you, first attempt to install the new driver. If you still experience problems, you can uninstall the old driver and re-install the new one.

As a long-term strategy, try a driver management software product I recommend: Driver Detective. Driver Detective manages all aspects of driver maintenance, from location to installation to backup and restoration. It takes the effort out of driver management and enables you to spend more time doing what you want to do on the computer. It can also reduce the number of driver-related problems you experience.

Photo Credit: Enter The Story, via Flickr