Windows needs manufacturer-provided hardware drivers before your hardware will work. Linux and other operating systems also need hardware drivers bef

How to Install Hardware Drivers on Linux

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2021-05-29 14:30:03

Windows needs manufacturer-provided hardware drivers before your hardware will work. Linux and other operating systems also need hardware drivers before hardware will work — but hardware drivers are handled differently on Linux.

The good news is that, if a device will work on Linux, it’ll probably “just work” out of the box. You may sometimes need to install drivers, but some hardware may just not work at all.

When you install Windows, you’ll need to install hardware drivers provided by the hardware’s manufacturer — motherboard chipset drivers, graphics card drivers, Wi-Fi drivers, and more.

Windows does try to help. Microsoft bundles a lot of these manufacturer-provided drivers with Windows, and hosts many of them on Windows Update. When you plug in a new device to your Windows computer and you see the “Installing Driver” bubble pop up, Windows might be downloading a manufacturer-provided driver from Microsoft and installing it on your PC. Microsoft doesn’t write these drivers on its own — it gets them from the manufacturers and provides them to you after vetting them.

If hardware isn’t working on Windows, there’s usually a driver to make it work. Unless you have an ancient device that only works with older versions of Windows, the manufacturer has done the work of making it work with Windows. Hardware that doesn’t work is usually just a quick driver download away from working.