Manufacturer vs OEM vs Windows 11 drivers?

ddiaconu21 · Jul 22, 2021

So I know this has been in talks for 10+ years, but since the first discussion about this, the MS driver catalogue has become bigger and more and more laptops have become deprecated in terms of support.

Let's take my case for example: ACER Nitro 5 laptop. Drivers have been updated last time in 2019. Since then, my "installation" ritual was the following one: Install W10 without internet connection -> Install ACER drivers -> Update the rest of them through WU -> Update the Intel/Nvidia drivers through their utilities. There was a case, though, related to the integrated GPU (Intel), where the GPU driver was locked (manufacturer driver) and couldn't be updated unless you uninstall it.

Now that W11 is the new kid on the block, and many laptops will lack the W11 drivers, how do you guys see this matter. Should people stick to the manufacturer drivers? Or use the MS ones? Or even OEM through their utilities (even though, beside the GPU from AMD/Intel/Nvidia and storage from Intel, I don't know about other utilities).

NavyLCDR · Jul 22, 2021

Nothing will change. I install Windows, connect to the internet, do all updates, including optional, listed by Windows Update. Then I install the chipset driver for the chipset available from either AMD or Intel. Then install the GPU driver from either AMD, Intel or Nvidia. Then lastly any special drivers from the manufacturer of the motherboard or computer system needed to activate any special features.

At the moment, there is nothing to indicate that drivers will be different for Windows 11 than for Windows 10.

brummyfan · Jul 22, 2021

ddiaconu21 said:
So I know this has been in talks for 10+ years, but since the first discussion about this, the MS driver catalogue has become bigger and more and more laptops have become deprecated in terms of support.

Let's take my case for example: ACER Nitro 5 laptop. Drivers have been updated last time in 2019. Since then, my "installation" ritual was the following one: Install W10 without internet connection -> Install ACER drivers -> Update the rest of them through WU -> Update the Intel/Nvidia drivers through their utilities. There was a case, though, related to the integrated GPU (Intel), where the GPU driver was locked (manufacturer driver) and couldn't be updated unless you uninstall it.

Now that W11 is the new kid on the block, and many laptops will lack the W11 drivers, how do you guys see this matter. Should people stick to the manufacturer drivers? Or use the MS ones? Or even OEM through their utilities (even though, beside the GPU from AMD/Intel/Nvidia and storage from Intel, I don't know about other utilities).

I would suggest you download and install drivers from Acer support site, the drivers are tailored to suit your system, even if they are from 2019, those drivers are more suitable for your device, when new drivers needed for Windows11 the site will have the updated drivers.

ddiaconu21 · Jul 22, 2021

brummyfan said:
I would suggest you download and install drivers from Acer support site, the drivers are tailored to suit your system, even if they are from 2019, those drivers are more suitable for your device, when new drivers needed for Windows11 the site will have the updated drivers.

I sincerely doubt ACER will update their drivers anymore...lol. What about the ones that are overwritten by WU and the utility drivers then?

brummyfan · Jul 22, 2021

ddiaconu21 said:
I sincerely doubt ACER will update their drivers anymore...lol. What about the ones that are overwritten by WU and the utility drivers then?

Yes, I use both drivers because I trust the drivers through WU and let it update the drivers but mostly I use drivers from Acer.

abactuon · Jul 22, 2021

On my MSI laptop, I am not using any oem drivers. Killed the dragon center.

TairikuOkami · Jul 22, 2021

Realtek LAN driver (10.50) has more options than the default driver (1.0.7) provided by MS.

ddiaconu21 · Jul 22, 2021

TairikuOkami said:
Realtek LAN driver (10.50) has more options than the default driver (1.0.7) provided by MS.

That's right! I know you from the seven/ten forums. What's your view on the manufacturer/MS drivers?

TairikuOkami · Jul 22, 2021

ddiaconu21 said:
That's right! I know you from the seven/ten forums. What's your view on the manufacturer/MS drivers?

MS provides the driver, so the device works and that is the end of it, like Windows 10, which still uses the driver from 2015 by default. Manufacturer's driver gives more options, "quietly" fixes bugs and potential security vulnerabilities. They do not update drivers for fun.

barman58 · Jul 22, 2021

There are several levels of drivers available for hardware there is one additional level that may get you out of a jam - the chip level driver

A lot of computer addon hardware, ( especially communications related ), will rely on a specific Chip or Chipset, which the hardware manufacturer purchases from a third party. The chip/chipset manufacturer will often release a set of basic drivers that should work with any hardware that uses the chip/chipset from any manufacturer.

This could be useful if the OEM supplier decides not to support the hardware for a new OS - though it can take a bit of searching around

cereberus · Jul 22, 2021

I have just bought an ASUS laptop i7 with 1 TB optane SSD.

I tried to install W11 from uupdump iso in a dual boot ssd, and it kept crashing not even booting to the installation screen.

After a lot of faffing around, I decided to backup the install with Macrium Reflect and try a clean install of the standard W10 iso.

I found that the standard iso did not contain optane driver and aborted the installation

I booted back into pc (oobe install) and then exported all drives to a usb drive and injected the optane memory driver into the W10 iso (boot.wim and install.wim) and it installed ok but a heap of drivers were missing and I had to manually install from the usb drive. Even those drivers it picked up were way out of date.

This took ages.

So I injected all 150+ drivers into install.wim (and optane driver into boot.wim) and reinstalled and everything was fine.

I then tried the same (1st time only optane driver) with w11 version, hoping the w11 iso was more up to date in drivers, but it basically was same as W10 i.e. most drivers were missing.

I then did same injecting all 150+ drivers and all was fine.

I concluded the standard MS isos just do not have all the drivers needed for my new laptop.

Then I did a really interesting test i.e. I had a Reflect image backup of my old pc that was an AMD based system. I made an iso based on @Kari's tutorials, injected all the modern intel/optane drivers, and created a native dual boot vhd, and it worked fine!

ddiaconu21 · Jul 23, 2021

So we can all agree that MS drivers tend to be somewhat updated from time to time. I used to see on the old versions of Windows (8, 8.1 I think?) that the Intel GPU drivers used to be downgraded during an update. Is that still a thing with W10/11?

Ed Tittel · Jul 23, 2021

My experience with 10 and 11 has been that 90-plus percent of all drivers come from Microsoft without problem or issue. I do still update Nvidia drivers using GeForce, and check on the Realtek (UAD) audio drivers manually, but everything else pretty much takes care of itself these days. Once upon a time, things were different (up through Win7 and into Win8) but no longer. Just my 2 cents' worth, anyway.
=e=

stormy13 · Jul 23, 2021

The driver(s) may come through WU but very few of them (if any) come from Microsoft. The hardware manufacturers submit them to Microsoft and if they passed WHQL (of which Microsoft no longer tests, the manufacturers do), they get put up on WU.

badrobot · Jul 27, 2021

Stick with OEM driver. If it doesn't work, uninstall and Windows will use the stock driver until an updated OEM driver is available or stay with Windows driver if it works okay.

MartinX2 · Feb 10, 2022

Nowadays Windows Update have all the drivers from manufacturers. It's waste of time doing the "manual without internet" method.

Hazel123 · Feb 10, 2022

cereberus said:
I have just bought an ASUS laptop i7 with 1 TB optane SSD.

I tried to install W11 from uupdump iso in a dual boot ssd, and it kept crashing not even booting to the installation screen.

After a lot of faffing around, I decided to backup the install with Macrium Reflect and try a clean install of the standard W10 iso.

I found that the standard iso did not contain optane driver and aborted the installation

I booted back into pc (oobe install) and then exported all drives to a usb drive and injected the optane memory driver into the W10 iso (boot.wim and install.wim) and it installed ok but a heap of drivers were missing and I had to manually install from the usb drive. Even those drivers it picked up were way out of date.

This took ages.

So I injected all 150+ drivers into install.wim (and optane driver into boot.wim) and reinstalled and everything was fine.

I then tried the same (1st time only optane driver) with w11 version, hoping the w11 iso was more up to date in drivers, but it basically was same as W10 i.e. most drivers were missing.

I then did same injecting all 150+ drivers and all was fine.

I concluded the standard MS isos just do not have all the drivers needed for my new laptop.

Then I did a really interesting test i.e. I had a Reflect image backup of my old pc that was an AMD based system. I made an iso based on @Kari's tutorials, injected all the modern intel/optane drivers, and created a native dual boot vhd, and it worked fine!

Optane is certainly a strange beast! Just had issues with that myself.

The-Hive · Feb 10, 2022

I just use Windows updates, Intel and Nvidia gives me a notification and so do most programs but I do check the Win 11 "News" sites which alert me to anything else

MartinX2 · Apr 11, 2022

So how did you end up installing those drivers? What way did you choose?

The-Hive · Apr 11, 2022

I always use Windows Update unless I receive a notification, then I use the program that gave the notification or their website. Many updates are for different machines or programs to mine, especially Nvidia drivers.

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