OSNews: http://www.osnews.com/story/20513/Microsoft_Reveals_Vista_SP1_Driver_Installation_Failure_Rates Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Thu, 26 Nov 2009 08:20:32 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif OSNews.com http://www.osnews.com Open Speced HW... http://osnews.com/thread?336827 http://osnews.com/thread?336827 is good for MS too!!! Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (fithisux) Comments go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336829 http://osnews.com/thread?336829 from my experience... the most universal pain in the ass to install are printer drivers... they're terrible (to not say something worse) and, even if install correctly, they perform badly, slow controls, slow response time... and ugly as they can get!

fortunately printer drivers don't give much problems as motherboard (specially IO) and video drivers that may prevent you from actually booting the system (or repairing the system...)... but for those I have to admit that the quality got a LOT better since real x64 drivers came (that includes ia32 drivers too...)

I hope open HW specs gets more popular soon, this means better drivers for everyone... Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (JrezIN) Comments RE: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336830 http://osnews.com/thread?336830 A quote from your fellow OSNews reader, Kroc:

A Printer driver is a folder with one '.ini' file, and a couple of 'dll's and that's it.
It is not a 50 MB download. It is not an IE Toolbar, and Side Pane. It is not half-baked photo software. It is not a splash screen when your computer starts. It is not a tray icon.


http://camendesign.com/blog/stop_writing_softwareEdited 2008-11-10 16:02 UTC Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Adam S) Comments RE[2]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336835 http://osnews.com/thread?336835 This is the very reason why I refuse to buy a new printer. Mine broke like 18 months ago, but the amount of total and utter crap software and drivers the likes of Canon and HP put out simply stops me from buying their crap.

When I need to print, I either do it at university, or at my parents'. Until these guys learn to give me a driver download that's under 5MB in size (preferably under 1 MB in size) I will not buy a new printer. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:08:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom_Holwerda) Comments RE[3]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336840 http://osnews.com/thread?336840
Until these guys learn to give me a driver download that's under 5MB in size (preferably under 1 MB in size) I will not buy a new printer.

Does Windows not offer some sort of generic postscript driver? You could always just pick LaserJet 3, or LaserJet 1200 (PS) from the built in drivers, or something. You might not get one button, triple-sided, multi-duplex, ultraviolet printing with an automatic spin cycle every 20 pages, but it should work pretty well for what you really need.

And yeah, HP wants to get all intrusive in Linux, too. I just pick generic postscript and go on. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (sbergman27) Comments RE[2]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336842 http://osnews.com/thread?336842 Kroc is spot on.

Same with some Wifi drivers where there seems to be 2 paths...
1. Install the driver using the auto run application on the CD and have some crap installed.
2. Let Windows search for the ini on the CD and just have the driver installed without all the crap.

Why can they not have just have the simple driver and a PDF or RTF on the CD to tell you what to do. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (aaronb) Comments RE[2]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336848 http://osnews.com/thread?336848 I've been saying this for years...
I don't need a CD full of crap just to get a mouse working!
And once I finally managed to remove flash from XP, Yahoo Messenger installed it back without asking...

The only time I saw driver installing in Vista it was like, the first one:
"This driver requires Windows XP or later."
and the 2nd one even worse:
"The software has detected that the operating system is not Microsoft Windows." Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (mmu_man) Comments RE[3]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336850 http://osnews.com/thread?336850 I usually buy an HP and just use the Windows provided LaserJet 4 driver. I have never found an HP LaserJet that it wouldn't work with.

I never by multifunction. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:55:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (BluenoseJake) Comments RE[3]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336857 http://osnews.com/thread?336857 you can download the driver and not use the .exe program to install all of HP's or Cannon's garbage software. my print server for my work has all of it's drives about 4 megs or under just because when i download the file frmo the site i just tell windows where the folder with the .ini file is and its dll's that it needs. I instal the printer manualy in windows. when you do that its a rather small install. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 17:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (poundsmack) Comments RE[2]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336863 http://osnews.com/thread?336863 While I agree with almost everyhthing Kroc says one thing is not correct.
Once upon a time, in a galaxy far away (also known as late 80's, early 90's) Norton made some solid products, chiefly Norton Commander.
Of course, all that good software came to an end when Symantec showed up on the scene.
McAfee was also good back then, before they became Network Assholes or whatever the hell they called themselves.Edited 2008-11-10 18:22 UTC Mon, 10 Nov 2008 18:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Soulbender) Comments CUPS? http://osnews.com/thread?336864 http://osnews.com/thread?336864 What I want to know is how to get Vista Ultimate 64 to use my old HP 950C that is networked via CUPS. HP's docs just say "it's built into the OS", but the OS doesn't seem to detect it very well...

Any tips? Mon, 10 Nov 2008 18:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (TemporalBeing) Comments RE[3]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336867 http://osnews.com/thread?336867 How does that knowledge help consumers buying a new Dell right now?

It doesn't. So put your memories safely back in the box.

As it stands, Norton & McAfee are terrible, atrocious, unbearable products. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 18:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Kroc) Comments RE[4]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336868 http://osnews.com/thread?336868 How? I can't find anyway to install a printer with Vista and pick the wrong driver you a know a similar HP would work but Vista won't let you use it. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 18:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Gone fishing) Comments RE: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336871 http://osnews.com/thread?336871 Yes, I think when comparing drivers issue one should keep in mind the result for the user:
1) disk driver, motherboard, video: the user can't boot: very annoying.
2) network/modem driver: the user can't connect to Internet: annoying especially when you know that the solution is probably available on Internet!
3) other drivers you just loose the functionnality of the hardware but the computer work and have access to Internet, so you can search if anybody has a solution. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 19:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (renox) Comments RE[3]: go open hw specs, go http://osnews.com/thread?336873 http://osnews.com/thread?336873 You can take out the cruft out of the drivers. At least it used to be in HP's Mac drivers case. Takes some time, but eventually you strip that onion down to just the bare drivers. Those even have their separate installer. You may try downloading the driver package for your prospective printer and see if this still applies. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 20:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Buck) Comments Microsoft is doing blame game http://osnews.com/thread?336875 http://osnews.com/thread?336875 What MS is essentially doing with posting these non-comparable figures and other publications about the drivers issue, is to blame others.

My perception is that MS is trying to tell "Our Vista OS is great, but was broken by third-party." What MS has to ask themselves is, why is Windows driver quality that bad? Drivers in other OSes like Linux almost always just work fine, out of the box, w/o any hassle.

It is the same with user-space software. The Windows platform suffers most from its heterogenically trashing Application base. Trashing in a sense of DLL-hell, privilegue abuse, etc.

MS needs to realize that blaming others won't help. The vendors of both drivers and applications are just trying to be nice citizens in a specific environment. MS makes the rules and gives example (with own applications), others just adhere to them.


One recent example regarding drivers: MS presented this new "my hardware" platform where for example a digital camera vendor could include his own crappy bling-bling interface and stuff. This is exactly what MS should teach them not to do. This bling-bling stuff is a real usability killer. The User should exactly _not_ be made aware of what kind of hardware he has. It should just work for him. Mon, 10 Nov 2008 20:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Ford Prefect) Comments Drivers not working in Vista http://osnews.com/thread?336887 http://osnews.com/thread?336887 Microsoft requiring the hardware manufacturers to write drivers for their hardware for Windows (and quite often refuse to release Linux drivers for the same hardware) is a practice that Microsoft themselves introduced.

Some time ago the norm would be for the OS vendor to write software (including drivers) for the OS, from specifications published by the hardware manufacturer. This sensible scenario of course allows a situation where many different OSes can compete in the marketplace, since any software vendor may write drivers.

Microsoft turned all that around completely, I would suggest in yet another attempt to get "exclusivity" for Windows. "This hardware only works on Windows". The idea is to try to force the consumers into buying this product over that one.

It is nice to see Microsoft's own anti-competitive practices turn on them in this way, and leave Vista with a dearth of working drivers, due to manufacturers not writing new drivers for equipment they no longer sell (amongst other reasons). Why should Microsoft get to sell a new OS on the back of efforts of manufacturers to write new drivers for zero recompense, BTW?

Microsoft's business model of selling closed-source binary-only copies of core OS and application software, and getting hardware OEMs to write drivers, is under quite a bit of strain here.

I feel that printers are amongst the worst in this situation because they most often remain in use long after the model is no longer made. Video cards (for example) are most often sold with a machine and never replaced, and the machine's OS is also never upgraded. So in contrast the way that printers are bought and used hightlights the weaknesses of Microsoft's business model more dramatically than other hardware.

It will be interesting when Microsoft tries to move exclusively to a 64-bit OS. They will be in such a mess with lack of hardware drivers it won't be funny.

BTW: are there any doubters left about the article of a little while ago that claimed that "Linux has more drivers than any other OS ever"? For Linux, where the source code is available, a 64-bit driver is very often just a simple re-compile away.Edited 2008-11-10 23:38 UTC Mon, 10 Nov 2008 23:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (lemur2) Comments RE: CUPS? http://osnews.com/thread?336944 http://osnews.com/thread?336944 You either have to share the printer via Samba (ew) or use XP's built-in IPP (Internet Printing Protocol) support:

http://www.owlfish.com/thoughts/winipp-cups-2003-07-20.html

When I still had an XP machine, I had it connected to a CUPS printer running on FreeBSD through this technique, worked great. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 12:55:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (chrish) Comments RE: Microsoft is doing blame game http://osnews.com/thread?336946 http://osnews.com/thread?336946 One thing that's always really ticked me off is the double standard.

If hardware doesn't work with Windows, it's the hardware manufacturer's fault for not writing a driver.

If the hardware doesn't work with {Mac OS X, Linux, BSD, BeOS, Solaris, etc.} it's {Apple, The Linux Community, The BSD Community, Be, Sun, etc.}'s fault.

What would be nice is if hardware followed specs (impossible for "new" devices, but those are rare) and you could just plug it in and get basic functionality with a built-in driver. Want to access advanced functionality or get the best performance? Then you install a driver from the manufacturer. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 12:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (chrish) Comments RE[2]: Microsoft is doing blame game http://osnews.com/thread?336948 http://osnews.com/thread?336948 Its simple. From the users point of view, they don't care WHY it is not working, or whose "fault" it is, they just care that the thing that they bought doesn't work right on operating system x. From a technical point of view, there are many reasons why something could or could not work, so saying it is because of a vendors driver is a fine thing to say.

I don't see how there is any double standard, it works the same for everyone. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 13:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE: Drivers not working in Vista http://osnews.com/thread?336949 http://osnews.com/thread?336949
Some time ago the norm would be for the OS vendor to write software (including drivers) for the OS, from specifications published by the hardware manufacturer. This sensible scenario of course allows a situation where many different OSes can compete in the marketplace, since any software vendor may write drivers.


That was a very, very long time ago, long before microsoft. Someone has been feeding you bad history. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 13:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[3]: Microsoft is doing blame game http://osnews.com/thread?336950 http://osnews.com/thread?336950 The double standard is that MS is absolved of blame for hardware not working. Other OS vendors are not. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 13:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (chrish) Comments RE[2]: CUPS? http://osnews.com/thread?336952 http://osnews.com/thread?336952
You either have to share the printer via Samba (ew) or use XP's built-in IPP (Internet Printing Protocol) support:

http://www.owlfish.com/thoughts/winipp-cups-2003-07-20.html

When I still had an XP machine, I had it connected to a CUPS printer running on FreeBSD through this technique, worked great.


I have it installed on Win2k with IPP, which is what I want to use with Vista64, but it doesn't detect the printer and I can't find the driver in its listing.

Yet, HP just tells me that the "driver is included with the OS" so I can't download a driver either or go the "Have Disk" route. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (TemporalBeing) Comments RE[4]: Microsoft is doing blame game http://osnews.com/thread?336954 http://osnews.com/thread?336954 Absolved by who? Their marketing department? Popular opinions about vista show they aren't absolved at all. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[3]: CUPS? http://osnews.com/thread?336957 http://osnews.com/thread?336957 Eep, drivers might be your issue; I skimmed and didn't notice Vista 64 before. There are a lot of missing drivers for Vista 64 still.

Vista should have a generic PCL or PostScript driver (depending on what mode your printer is expecting) that will work if you follow the IPP setup instructions... Tue, 11 Nov 2008 15:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (chrish) Comments 100% Open Source drivers mean 100% support. http://osnews.com/thread?336961 http://osnews.com/thread?336961 Consumer advocating and advice. Business and home owners. When you ask for a quote or you go to your local computer shopping center make sure the sales person can answer these two questions: Does it have an open source driver. Does it work with Macintosh, Windows Vista, Linux, Sun, etc. etc.

Why! You ask. Options. Potential.

1. Mac, Windows and Linux support gives you the option to switch from your initial choice to one of the others.
2. Multi OS support leaves you in better position to bargain on price.
3. If a driver is open and written for a Mac or Windows then someone will rewrite it for Linux. Open for Linux then re-written for Mac and Windows. etc. etc.
4. Got a good old piece of hardware that you've replaced. Give it to someone in need or send it overseas. Its really sad that so many good computers are scraped so Microsoft and its hardware buddies can replace your current setup. Open source drivers makes this old hardware really valuable.
Note: there are a lot of places in this OLD world where a years salary is no more than $200 US. Your old Pentium II would be a big step up from NOTHING!
5. You would think that old computers, printers and etc. that still worked after 10/15 years would be a great selling point. You'd think that instead of destroying them IBM, DELL and etc. would be sending their almost new returned for environmental reasons computers somewhere they would do the most good. Still working computers would be great advertisement if they just reached the home or business of someone that couldn't even afford the shipping costs. New users, new programmers. New customers. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 15:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (carlleigh) Comments RE[2]: Drivers not working in Vista http://osnews.com/thread?337007 http://osnews.com/thread?337007
That was a very, very long time ago, long before microsoft. Someone has been feeding you bad history.


Not at all. All major CPUs, for example, to this very day, have a published specification for their instruction set. All software vendors of compilers use this information to write their compilers in order to target specific CPUs. It is not practical to try to introduce a new CPU into the marketplace today without publishing the instruction set specifications for compiler writers. Just not on.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Compiler_Collection

GCC is the premier compiler in the world today. It supports more architectures than any other. It arguably has compiled more of the code (in terms of unique lines of code, not binary copies of executables) that is actually running somewhere right now than any other compiler.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Compiler_Collection#Architectures

All because, to this very day, the manufacturers of CPUs publish their instruction set specifications.

As recently as the introduction of USB 1 in 1996, then again for USB 2 in 2001, and now (2008) yet again for USB 3, the hardware designers (in this case, largely Intel) publish the specifications against which OS authors can write drivers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usb#History

Some more examples:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT_Attachment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scsi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEE_802.3
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesa

I'm sorry, but these examples are not "from long ago", nor are they in any way "bad history". It appears rather that YOU are too enveloped by "Microsoft think" to be able to actually see the reality of things.Edited 2008-11-11 22:30 UTC Tue, 11 Nov 2008 22:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (lemur2) Comments RE[3]: Drivers not working in Vista http://osnews.com/thread?337012 http://osnews.com/thread?337012 I didn't take objection to you saying open specs for hardware didn't exist. I did take objection to you saying nothing but open specs to hardware existed before microsoft.


I'm sorry, but these examples are not "from long ago", nor are they in any way "bad history". It appears rather that YOU are too enveloped by "Microsoft think" to be able to actually see the reality of things.


I also take exception to that. I'm not a microsoft guy, I'm a .net guy (or more specifically an ALT.NET guy) who doesn't have the simplistic groupthink ideas about the company that tend to propagate places like this. I work every day with people who are enveloped by "Microsoft think" (which in reality is probably really different from what you think it is), and I spend a great deal of time both with them and in the greater developer community in my city trying to get people to take off the "redmond only" blinders.

I'm pretty passionate about .net, if you count the DLR it is hands down my favorite platform at the moment. I am probably more passionate about ruby, agile forms of software development, software architecture, and alternative operating systems. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 22:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[4]: Drivers not working in Vista http://osnews.com/thread?337024 http://osnews.com/thread?337024
I didn't take objection to you saying open specs for hardware didn't exist. I did take objection to you saying nothing but open specs to hardware existed before microsoft.


Quote please?

Don't bother ... I'll quote myself.

Some time ago the norm would be for the OS vendor to write software (including drivers) for the OS, from specifications published by the hardware manufacturer. This sensible scenario of course allows a situation where many different OSes can compete in the marketplace, since any software vendor may write drivers.


Gee, I don't know about you, but to me there is a significant difference between an actual claim saying "the norm would be for the OS vendor to write software for the OS, from specifications published by the hardware manufacturer" and your allegation that the claim was "you saying nothing but open specs to hardware existed".

Your resposne is a strawman ... I made no such statement as you claimed.

Try again.Edited 2008-11-12 01:35 UTC Wed, 12 Nov 2008 01:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (lemur2) Comments RE[5]: Drivers not working in Vista http://osnews.com/thread?337033 http://osnews.com/thread?337033
Your resposne is a strawman ... I made no such statement as you claimed. Try again.


I think I now see where this confusion has come from.

Here is (slightly more of) what I originally said:

Some time ago the norm would be for the OS vendor to write software (including drivers) for the OS, from specifications published by the hardware manufacturer. This sensible scenario of course allows a situation where many different OSes can compete in the marketplace, since any software vendor may write drivers.

Microsoft turned all that around completely


OK ... what the "completely" refers to is "turned around". This means the situation now is the opposite to what it once was.

OK, it was claimed to be: "Some time ago the norm would be for the OS vendor to write software (including drivers) for the OS, from specifications published by the hardware manufacturer.".

"Turned around completely" was meant to indicate that "the norm now would be for the OS vendor to expect the hardware manufacturer to write closed source drivers from secret, internal, unpublished specifications".

"Completely" wasn't meant to refer to all hardware ... it was meant to refer to "completely opposite". "Norm" means "normally" in both instances ... not "in every case" but just "normally". I can however see how my meaning wasn't very clear, so I shouldn't have snapped back at you.

In support of what "the norm" has become now, I would refer readers to the trouble that ATI seems to be having right now to let simple information about the registers on their chipsets to be published these days:

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Njg0Mw

"In Matthias Hopf's blog post he has stated that they are getting close and there's just very few registers they now don't understand. "

...

"The R600 3D documentation has yet to be released due to legal troubles and such, but at least we have mode-setting support."

It is ATI's own hardware for goodness sake. Why on earth should there be any "legal troubles" associated with ATI publishing the details of the chipset register map of their own chips?

I find this quite annoying, because one of my systems happens to have an R600 series ATI graphics chip.

... I wonder what other company might be getting in the way here, BTW? Hmmmm?Edited 2008-11-12 02:55 UTC Wed, 12 Nov 2008 02:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (lemur2) Comments Comment by marcp http://osnews.com/thread?337038 http://osnews.com/thread?337038 Yeah, collect information, MS! do it and ignore these bugs in the same time, neglecting to fix it. Wed, 12 Nov 2008 05:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (marcp) Comments