Hello dear visitors! I decided to write a small but useful note and tell you how to remove the driver. A computer is an unpredictable thing, so anything can come in handy, even removing a driver for a specific device. For what? That different happens, perhaps the driver was installed crookedly, or not quite the one you need. And it's not always possible to install a new one over the old one, so you can remove the device driver and install a new one.

After uninstalling and rebooting, the system should find a new device, the driver of which you uninstall, and will offer to install for it new driver... Perhaps you have another reason why you need to carry out such a procedure. In fact, everything is very simple, now you will see for yourself.

We will remove the driver through the device manager, it seems to me that this is the only correct and reliable way. But nevertheless, it is worth understanding that this is dangerous, near the “Delete” button it even says “Removing drivers (for experienced)”, I think that it was written for a reason. Well, it's okay, we are experienced :).

First, we need to launch the Task Manager. To do this, right-click on the icon "My computer" and select “Properties”. A window will open in which on the left click "Device Manager".

In Device Manager, select the device whose driver you want to remove, right-click on it and select “Properties”.

A warning appears about uninstalling the driver. If any programs were installed with this driver, then you can check the box next to "Uninstall the driver programs for this device" and click the "OK" button.

Hello, friends. Today you will find out how to uninstall a driver from your long-suffering computer. We will completely remove only unnecessary drivers that you do not need. This may be necessary if you got rid of some equipment or are going to install the most new version"Firewood" clean.

The fact is that there are many computer cleaning programs and we have already examined some of them in detail (such as CCleaner , FreeSpacer ...). They are great workers and do their job, but they are not meant to uninstall drivers. They simply do not have this function.

You changed the video card or something, installed new drivers from the disk, but what about the old ones? But these old, unnecessary, unused drivers are lying on the sofa in the depths of the system, smoking your cigarettes, drinking tea with your own cookies and feeling, scoundrels, completely safe.

So not only do they lie like a dead weight, but also steal computer resources. After all, when connecting any equipment, a search is made across the entire database of drivers, whether it is old or young. The whole service is invoked, the registry is viewed ...

So let's visit these radishes along with the free one, safe program Driver sweeper... It is intended precisely for this noble purpose.

Learn how to uninstall a driver - in detail, thoroughly, step by step and in pictures ...

First, let's define what a driver is. In a nutshell, this is a mini-program that helps the system to interact, control equipment, be it a mouse, keyboard, monitor, printer or video card.

Drivers are desirable, which is what the system does by default, thereby speeding up and making life easier for yourself and your users. But with this update, automatic or manual, broken drivers are not always removed by the system. So we will deal with them.

How to uninstall a driver - download Driver sweeper

Honestly, I confess to you - I was worried when launching the program for the first time, and suddenly it removes the driver incorrectly or crookedly and I cannot then connect to the printer, for example, or the sound disappears. But my worries were in vain. Driver sweeper delicately threw out the old and unnecessary drivers indicated to him by me, without touching the actual and involved ones.

I tested it on very rarely used equipment. I connected the scanner, which has been idle for a year, mice from my other computers, the monitor… everything flies! Beauty! True, I forgot to notice how much space will be freed up on the hard drive, but that's not the point. Not much, because the driver is a mini-program. The main thing is to get rid of the ballast.

And yet, you will use the program at your own peril and risk!(read the comments to this article). Some antiviruses are also triggered by Driver Sweeper, but I checked it personally - so far, everything is in order with the computer and the system.

Let's get started with the installation and cleaning ...

Now, if you have not checked the box by creating a shortcut on the desktop, go to the "Start" menu, find our program and run it ...

We are met by a discrepancy - the program on English language... With a slight movement of the hand, we switch the interface to the native and powerful, Russian language ...

... not forgetting to click below ...

Here it is, the reward for the killed several thousand nerve cells and burned kilocalories with three clicks.

Now you can customize the program a little for yourself. Even appearance change by looking at "Miscellaneous" and "Topic" ...

Now, finally pushing "Analysis and cleaning" ...

Before us is a list of the main manufacturers of equipment. Install the checkboxes opposite the manufacturer whose driver you want to completely remove. By the way, I was really surprised when Driver Sweeper found and removed the drivers for Nvidia graphics cards with my Intel integrated. Where did they come from - I don’t know.

Now "Analysis" on the right, below and then "Cleaning" ...

It happens that you stop using the device. But it should be remembered that a certain number of files that control it remain in the system. It is part of the driver program. The question arises: is the driver correct?

The easiest way is to use the standard tool of all operating rooms. Windows systems- "Device Manager". Just left-click the device to be removed from the system, right-click, selecting the menu, and go to "Properties". Go to the "Driver" tab, select the "Delete" button. After that we take out the device. This is the answer to the question of how to remove the driver correctly, but there are also more advanced and convenient methods.

Now turn off the PC if required to remove the device. But, as already mentioned, these are not all the existing solutions to the problem, since after this procedure some files still remain in the system, which may turn into problems in the future. Therefore, to clean the system of unnecessary drivers, it is advisable to use specialized programs, especially for people with whose kind of activity this is connected - service engineers and system administrators as well as specialists technical support.

This will slightly speed up the performance of a system where such software is used. We are talking about an automated mode, so how to remove a driver cleanly is a matter of the program's algorithm, and you will no longer care about it. It should be noted that miracles should not be expected. Such programs are all the same that the Benefit that can be obtained using them is, at best, + 1-5% to productivity. But all the same, many people who are fond of tuning the system like these "whistles", which give the illusion of great benefits.

In fairness, I must add that many of these programs have much more useful functions than from the system. But we will return to this issue later in the article. For now, we list the most common of paid programs- Driver Cleaner, Driver Sweeper, Drivertool. Free solutions should also be noted (although the above ones are also available with sufficient functionality in the shareware version). Acceptable freeware software options include DriverPack Solution, Drivers Installer Assistant, Drivers Pack Unpacker & Installer, Guru3D Driver Sweeper.

Consider the functionality DriverPack programs Solution, the code of which is distributed under the Opensource license, which provides for the publication of the source code, its modification, as well as use. The developers of this the most useful program did not stop at solving the problem, how to remove the driver. This software allows not only to remove unnecessary drivers from the system on Windows XP / Vista / Seven, but also to find and install them, as well as to update by downloading it from the Internet, thus greatly facilitating the already easy work of the installer.

Note that there are two versions of this software: Full and Lite. The first is distinguished by a solid size of the distribution kit, occupying 3 gigabytes. A very useful little thing, as it solves problems with the definition and installation of drivers in one fell swoop. Just put the disc on and the rest will be done in automatic mode... Drivers will be taken from the largest package database and installed immediately. Note the huge number of laptop vendors, for which especially driver compatibility - Lenovo, Toshiba, Dell, Acer, Sony, HP, eMachines and so on. If you wish, you can make corrections to the database and remove the driver that you do not need, thus changing the considerable size of the distribution.

But why do this if there is a need for a constant availability of a universal collection of drivers? Just write DriverPack Solution to external hard USB disk and take it with us. And now we have no problem how to remove the driver or install Last update... It should be noted that there are Lite version... If you are sure of the future presence of a high-quality Internet channel on all machines where you will install drivers, then take this version. All the necessary drivers will be downloaded after the hardware has been identified, and in the future they will be updated in an automated mode.

When reinstalling drivers, sometimes a very unpleasant situation occurs when old drivers are not completely removed, as a result of which new, newly installed drivers begin to conflict with them. Such a problem is observed quite rarely, but, nevertheless, when it happens, the "tails" remaining in the system can seriously ruin the life of the user, for example, causing BSODs to appear or preventing the launch of some programs. How to remove drivers so that nothing is left of them in the operating system? For this purpose, you will need a special utility.

Driver Sweeper Benefits

A small program called Driver Sweeper from the developer Phyxion can easily, quickly and completely remove the driver of any device. In addition, using this utility, you can clean operating system from junk files left behind by past drivers, as well as get rid of unnecessary driver keys in system registry Windows. In order to work with the Driver Sweeper software conveniently and safely, it has automatic Reserve copy and restoring drivers (in case of unsuccessful removal of the driver, you can always roll back to the previous version).

How to use Driver Sweeper

Driver Sweeper is freeware software, so you can download it absolutely free from any suitable site, for example, from here: techspot.com/downloads/4266-driver-sweeper.html.

After installing the Driver Sweeper program, launch it using the shortcut on the desktop and in the main window go to the section Language as the utility runs in English by default. Select the Russian language from the drop-down list and click Apply.

After that, go to the section Analysis and cleaning- here is a list of all installed drivers... To remove any specific driver, you need to mark it with a checkbox and click the button Cleaning.

If you want to be sure that the program does not delete along with the driver required files, you can first select the item Analysis(having noted previously required driver). The next window will display a list of files that will be deleted when uninstalling the device driver. Here you will need to uncheck those files and registry entries that you do not want to delete.

In case of unsuccessful removal of the driver, the Driver Sweeper contains a section Recovery... By going to the tab Recovery, you can undo the changes you made.

Driver Sweeper is a handy and extremely easy-to-use tool. It allows you to easily get rid of the remnants of past drivers in the system or remove the driver, so that later it does not cause any conflicts in the operation of devices. It is worth noting that the need for such functions does not arise often, but in case it does appear, it is better to keep a reliable and proven program, such as Driver Sweeper, close at hand.

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An article about why and how to properly uninstall drivers in Windows.

If you ask me why I do not like reinstalling Windows, then I will answer that reinstalling is not as scary as the subsequent setting up of the computer. It takes two to three times more time to sensibly configure a PC to suit your needs than the reinstallation itself. After all, in addition to the system itself, you need to install a bunch of software, and most importantly, find suitable drivers!

It's good if you have a "native" disk that came with motherboard Your PC. V in this case installation of drivers is much faster. However, if you do not have such a disk, or you are the owner of a laptop (to which no disks are usually attached), then you will have to look for drivers on the Internet and try their operation by typing :)

Naturally, there are ready-made programs and even whole driver-packs, where everything is already assembled for us. But, not always standard and widespread drivers behave correctly. If you are faced with the need to remove a driver that slows down or disrupts the system, read below how to do it.

What is a driver

The driver itself (from the English "drive" - ​​"control") is essentially a utility program that allows a user or a system to control the operation of a device for which this driver is written. It contains a list of commands that a PC component can execute and through which the system can interact with it.

A typical computer configuration requires the following minimum set of drivers:

1. If problems in the driver started to appear after updating it, then the best option restoration of its working capacity will be rolled back to previous version... We press the "Roll back" button and wait for the computer to automatically remove the new driver version and install the archived old one.
2. If a failure occurs in the operation of the driver of one of the peripheral devices, which is not critical for the system (for example, a printer or similar equipment), then the problematic driver can simply be disabled and then activated only for the duration of the connection and use of the device. This will be done by the "Disable" button.
3. Finally, if none of the previous options solved the problem, you can simply uninstall the driver by clicking the appropriate button.

After each procedure (except for shutdown), the computer will need to be restarted and only then try to install new driver versions.

View hidden devices

It is not often, but it also happens that at first glance, problems with the drivers are not detected in the Device Manager, but when a component is connected, system failures begin (). If you are faced with such a situation, then most likely the problem is incorrect work hidden devices.

The hidden components most often include those components that are periodically connected to the computer and run on demand. They are not constantly in random access memory, respectively, before connecting the device does not affect the operation of the system in any way. However, they can also be tracked.

To see a complete list of PC components, in the Device Manager you need to go to the "View" menu and activate the "Show hidden devices" item. The list of types of equipment and the components themselves will slightly increase and in it you can see devices with translucent icons. This is what is hidden from us in normal mode working with the Dispatcher:

Actually, then we check for the presence of red or yellow icons on all hidden devices and fix problems with them using one of the methods described above. Also, by turning on the visibility of hidden devices, you can see the old versions of the drivers that you updated. If the new drivers are working correctly, then these old versions can also be deleted, but in this case you will not be able to rollback.

It also happens that in the "View" menu of the Device Manager there is no option to display hidden equipment. If you are faced with this situation, then you need to do the following:

1. Open the "System Properties" window, as described above (number 2 in the first screenshot), go to the "Advanced" tab and click the "Environment Variables" button there (emphasis on "Y", not on "E" :)).
2. The window for setting variables will open. Here we need to click the "New" button under the first group of variables (User Environment Variables) and in the window that opens, enter the name of the variable "devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices" (without quotes) in the first field, and "1" in the value field. It should look like this:

We save our new variable and the option we need will appear in the "View" menu of the Device Manager.

conclusions

This time the article turned out to be small, but I hope it will be useful to everyone who is faced with the need to perform any manipulations with the drivers.

Finally, I think it will not be superfluous to remind once again that you must always act intelligently and imagine what you want to achieve! After all, violate Windows work removing only one system driver is as easy as shelling pears, and then restoring it can be very problematic. Therefore, you should not be like a monkey with a grenade: you do not know something - ask someone, search the Internet, and only then make important decisions. And everything will work out for you;)

P.S. Permitted freely to copy and quote. this article provided that an open active link to the source is indicated and the authorship of Ruslan Tertyshny is preserved.