How To Roll Back A Device Drive In Windows XP

Is one of the devices connected to your Windows XP computer not functioning properly? Let’s think of a situation where you suddenly start to have problems with your computer monitor. All was fine till yesterday and now you have annoying flickering on your computer display! What could have gone wrong? 

Often the problem could be with the device driver for that particular hardware component. If strange things happen, you can easily fix it by updating the device driver. Device drivers are small applications, which allow hardware devices such as sound cards, video cards and network devices to work on your computer. However, at times, an updated driver can cause problems and system instability. 

Here, in this section, you will learn how to restore a previous version of a device driver if a newly-installed driver causes system instability. This process is known as "rolling back" the driver to an earlier version. 

How to Roll Back to the Previous Version of a Device Driver

Device Driver Roll Back reinstalls the driver you were using previously and restores any driver settings that were changed when you added the new driver. Note that you cannot restore printer drivers with Device Driver Roll Back. The following Windows help guidelines will help you roll back a device driver to a previous version: 

• Log in as Administrator into your Windows XP machine.
• Go to the Start menu and click on Performance and Maintenance. Further, click on System to launch the System Properties window. 
• From the System Properties window, click on the Hardware tab. Locate the Device Manager button and click on it. This will display the list of devices connected to your computer. To expand the list, click on the “+” sign next to the device type branch you want to work with. If you want to view video display drivers, click on the “+” sign next to Display Adapters.
• Right-click the driver you want to adjust under the device type branch you selected and choose the option Properties. This will bring up the Properties window.
• Click the Driver tab and then click on Roll Back Driver. You will now get a dialog box asking for your confirmation. Click Yes to confirm and restore the driver to a previous state. Repeat the same process to restore additional drivers. Close the Device Manager when you are done. 

Now that you have successfully restored the previous version of the device driver, you should no longer have any problem with the particular device. If this doesn’t fix your problem or in case you need any Windows help, contact the Microsoft Support Center.