How Important Are Device Drivers?

What is a Computer Device Driver? According to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, "A device driver or software driver is a computer program allowing higher-level computer programs to interact with a device. A driver typically communicates with the device through the computer bus or communications subsystem to which the hardware is connected. When a calling program invokes a routine in the driver; the driver issues commands to the device. Once the device sends data back to the driver, the driver may invoke routines in the original calling program. Drivers are hardware-dependent and operating-system-specific. They usually provide the interrupt handling required for any necessary asynchronous time-dependent hardware interface."

The Device Driver Purpose "A device driver simplifies programming by acting as a translator between a device and the applications or operating systems that use it. The higher-level code can be written independently of whatever specific hardware device it may control. Every version of a device, such as a printer, requires its own specialized commands. In contrast, most applications access devices (such as sending a file to a printer) by using high-level, generic commands, such as PRINTLN. The driver accepts these generic statements and converts them into the low-level commands required by the device." Wikipedia further explains.

Signs that your drivers aren't working properly include:
- System instability
- Malfunctioning hardware
- Unresponsive hardware
- Computer errors