How Outdated Drivers Affect the Performance of Your PC

A lot of users face issues with their PC speed and performance despite having the best configurations and resources. If you, too, are facing a similar situation, outdated drivers might be the primary factor causing the issue. Wondering what drivers have to do with it? Well, this is what we are going to discuss in this article. In this post, we will understand what driver updates are and why it is crucial to keep drivers updated. 

Why are Driver Updates Important

Drivers are the fundamental programs that support the performance of connected components on a PC. Without these programs, no connected device, be it an external or internal component, will be able to perform its task. 

Surely, drivers are crucial for a PC to function properly. All these drivers come embedded in the devices themselves, so whenever these are connected to a PC, drivers are installed automatically. But that is not where the story ends.

You see, just like a smartphone, these devices do have the potential to be updated later to add better features. This is also the reason why there are driver updates and firmware updates available. 

While it seems a straightforward concept, it can affect the performance of your PC. Yes! Using outdated drivers can slow down your PC in no time. Want to know how? Let’s find out!

Impact of Using Outdated Drivers on a PC

Since all the components on a PC play a different role, drivers for them also impact their performance differently. The fundamental role of a driver is to establish a connection between the device connected and the motherboard of the PC. 

The updates you have pending on your PC also contribute to some of the features and functionalities of the connected devices. Hence, it can be said that by using the outdated drivers, you are practically lacking a few features that you could use after the updates. 

Some of the ways that outdated drivers affect a PC’s performance are given below – 

1. Lack of compatibility with the device

The first thing that bothers a user trying to work with outdated drivers is the lack of compatibility. Instantly, when you have updated your OS or have introduced a new task for the device, you can see lags and stuttering. That is because your connected device is not getting the instructions instantly. Neither can it understand the task, nor can it function properly. 

For those who have observed that their printer used to work faster earlier, but after the update, it has become slower in terms of processing, an outdated printer driver that was not updated with the OS update is the reason behind it. This is the case for other crucial drivers, such as your audio drivers, system drivers, GPU drivers, etc.

2. Errors that are unknown to a user

When you have outdated drivers, you get prompts that you have never had before. While trying to launch a function, you get error codes and prompts that stop you from using a particular feature. Sometimes, these errors are too difficult to understand as they only give up the code, and there’s no description of why it’s happening. 

You see, no component or device shares directly that the driver is outdated, which is one of the biggest challenges for any user. You will come across errors such as the device not responding. Sometimes, you do not even get a warning. Instead, the functionality is cut off. 

A perfect example of this is your network adapter driver. If it gets outdated, your PC will be connected to the PC but the internet won’t work. You will get disconnection errors but it will not tell you the issue is because of an outdated network adapter driver. Strange but true!

3. Uninvited system crashes

Yes, these drivers have enough control over your PC that they can lead to crashes and freeze your PC. You may have heard of the Blue Screen of Death errors on Windows. Outdated drivers are a primary reason behind such BSOD errors on Windows. If your system or graphics drivers are not functioning properly or are outdated, you may face serious crashes that sometimes become unrepairable. 

A user is left with no choice but to reset the entire PC, which results in data loss. The issues get even more severe when you are using an external hard drive for recovery, and the driver for your USB controller fails. As of now, you are practically stuck in the middle of a process that you neither complete nor reverse. 

All in all, outdated drivers can cause chaos on a PC. 

Advanced Driver Updater – Your One-Stop Solution to Outdated Driver Issues!

Knowing the impact of outdated drivers on a PC, some may be wondering why these drivers stay outdated and how one can install the updates regularly. 

Well, as far as the why is concerned, it is because of how the Windows OS is designed. To fetch updates, you have to use a manual method that involves an average user to explore Device Manager and then initiate an update process.

No one is directly concerned about these updates, as there are no prompts to tell you these are running out of date. Not to mention, the majority of the users keep additional updates rolled out by Windows on hold, making it impossible to update drivers with regular system updates. 

All of this can only be solved with Advanced Driver Updater, one of the best driver updating utilities for Windows. The software has a scheduled scan ability, which allows you to schedule a search for outdated drivers now and then. This way, the tool searches for outdated drivers and helps update them quickly!

Here’s how the tool works – 

1. Download and install it on your PC.

2. Run the search for outdated drivers by clicking on the Start Scan Now button.

3. Once the scan has listed all the outdated drivers, click on Update All to finish the update process.

It is that simple! Not only that, it has added features that allow you to – 

• Take a backup of your device drivers
• Roll back device drivers to previous versions
• Schedule a scan for a specific time.
• Save driver files in a folder for easy access.

Download the tool today to minimize the impact of outdated drivers on your PC’s performance. Hope this post gave you the answer that you were looking for. Thanks for reading, all the best!

Next Read: 12 Best (Free & Paid) Driver Updater Software To Fix Driver Issues on Windows