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Games not functioning due to lack of drivers

As the computer industry has continued to advance, engineers, developers, and programmers have consistently pushed the boundaries of what these machines are capable of. One of the most visceral ways in which we can experience this continuous advancement in the capability of our computers is by playing the latest 3d games available. Just ten years ago, the graphics quality of the average game was quite crude; models were "blocky" and jerkily animated while lighting effects were extremely basic, making achieving a realistic shadow a serious accomplishment. Today exists video hardware which can calculate extremely realistic physical interactions between objects in real time, all the while rendering incredibly accurate geometry and high resolution textures. These leaps and bounds in potential are the result of an enormous amount of hard work by developers, but also due to the drastically increased complexity of the hardware itself.

This physical complexity requires drivers of similarly complex structure as the increasing number of intricate components within the graphics hardware requires more specific instructions for correct interfacing with the rest of the computer, as well as the software which takes advantage of it. Drivers in general are susceptible to errors just as any other form of software might be, and this massive increase in complexity obviously increases the chances that some errors will be made. Because of this, graphics drivers are the most often revised type of drivers in use today, without doubt. These purpose of these revisions are not always necessarily to correct glaring problems, either; in the gaming world especially, any extra performance increase means a smoother frame rate which is extremely important during the fast paced interaction common in many games today. Often official driver revisions are released to "clean code up" for an increase in efficiency.

Sometimes, a driver discrepancy can be so significant that a game will malfunction or refuse to operate at all as a result of it. When a game will not run due to incorrect, old, or poorly programmed drivers the problem usually manifests itself as one of a few different things. In some cases, upon attempting to run the game the screen will flicker and then quickly return to the computer's normal desktop; sometimes this is accompanied by a specific error message, and other times without any message at all. If one is especially unlucky, when attempting to run the game their entire environment will crash, resulting in a memory dump and necessary reboot. If you do happen to receive an error, write it down or take a screen capture so that it can be searched for online. Chances are, others have experienced the same problem and applying their efforts to fix their problem to yours can be a big time saver. When the game will run but is experiencing driver errors, more subtle symptoms may manifest which include screen distortion and artifacts, improper rendering of geometry, incoherent or missing textures, or even a sluggish frame rate. If experiencing any of these symptoms, ensuring that one has the most up to date drivers for the necessary components of their computer is paramount.

As noted before, since graphics driver revisions are so common, the website of the manufacturer of the graphics hardware being used should be the first destination one visits. Navigate to the driver page of the model in use; revisions will be clearly marked at the top. Install the latest files available, restart the computer, and try to duplicate the problem. If this doesn't completely eliminate the problem, to ensure that the hardware's interaction with other components is not the source of conflict, check that the motherboard being used in tandem with the video hardware also has the latest drivers available. Discrepancies can be caused by interaction problems between these two components. Once this is accomplished, reboot again and try to duplicate the issue. It will most likely be resolved, and if not the likely culprit is defective hardware. Do a web search of your symptom, hardware, and the game experiencing it to see if it is commonly found and related to something else. If the results you find lead you nowhere, your next best bet is to contact the manufacturer to resolve the issue, possibly with a physical replacement.