Uninstalling old video drivers, why?

[mushroomboy]

I've been running video since the old voodoo 3 cards, though technically it's been longer but I got my own computer when the voodoo 3's were out. =P Anyways, I've been working with drivers since then, and I usually update every time a new update comes out and never uninstall. Heck, I don't even re-boot after installing!!! From my understanding, drivers are the same as kernel modules (, or at least what we talk about in our linux world)... And so shouldn't they just work after loading? I mean in linux... Well lets say in linux removing driver's is a lot more of a pain than windows and so I really want to know what all the fuss is about. But I can't find it anywhere that says exactly why you should do it, and if it's even worth doing. I've always seen it as a waste of time, and all the old files should be overwritten or cleaned out. Idk, I've just never ran into errors from just installing, I've never seen any real evidence that proves uninstalling has any gains.

 

[torrentg]

Uninstalling is good and necessary for Creative drivers. Not only that, manual removal necessary too.

As for NVIDIA and ATI drivers - I've never uninstalled them since XP days and it probably wasn't even necessary then either.

Sometimes noobs get themselves into situations being "creative" with installing drivers for NVIDIA or ATI. Then they have to use something like driver sweeper to clear the system. Basically, the need is from user created problems only.

 

[Crispy]

People have problems when they uninstall a display driver for eg, Once unstalled left over files and reg (as you know) but when they install the new drivers the left over files confict with with the new drivers there for causing problems.

 

[mushroomboy]

People have problems when they uninstall a display driver for eg, Once unstalled left over files and reg (as you know) but when they install the new drivers the left over files confict with with the new drivers there for causing problems.

That should all be overwritten as the .dll's have the same name. And as for registry? The registry shouldn't cause some of the ****tarded errors I've herd of. And Creative blows now. =( I'm angry with some of their decision. lol

[edit] See torrentg that's what I've always thought. But everybody yells at me when I say "you don't need to uninstall drivers, it's a waste of time" and then everybody tells me I'm wrong. =( I went to school for CS, heck I usually run linux, I think I have an understanding of how the different functions of the os goes. =P And yet It boggles me how people seem to think that when they write a new driver it's all brand new. Though usually they have a lot of old files, and even if they have new files all the names are the same. It's done this way not for us users, but for them as coders. =P It's a lot easier to release something with the same names, structure and routine are good when programming.