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Onchip drivers?

Chaotic42

Chaotic42

Lifer
Hey.

I was wondering what you guys think about having a universal driver chip on hardware? This could be accessed on all hardware and the chip stores drivers for that hardware and can be flashed with the latest versions.

So if I buy a Sound Blaster Audigy 3, I plug it in, the computer looks on the driver chip, loads the drivers, and I'm in business. No CDs, no downloading, it just works.

What do you think? Am I stupid?
 
Originally posted by: Captain_Howdy
Drivers are getting too big nowadays to be able to implement that affordably.
Click to expand...

exactly ... think of all the possible devices you'd have to have stored up. it'd be absurd.
 
like the idea in principle, but my uninformed guess is it would take a total rethink in the way OS's & drivers work, because i think the drivers you download from the manufacturer arent the complete thing needed. At any rate I doubt you'd get rid of downloading, since thats where the up to date version comes from, and i'd assume it might be expensive and rather tricky to get drivers in there for all supported OS's... then there's the need for on-chip backups that can be reinstated like clearing CMOS, because you have to assume they could be corrupted or hacked...

nice idea, but cant see it being practical, and especially not appealing for the producers.
 
Originally posted by: joecool
Originally posted by: Captain_Howdy
Drivers are getting too big nowadays to be able to implement that affordably.
Click to expand...

exactly ... think of all the possible devices you'd have to have stored up. it'd be absurd.
Click to expand...

What?

Not one big 45GB chip with every driver for everything on it.

One ROM with one driver on it. The Radeon x800 has its driver on its chip of one size, an Audigy has its Audigy driver on its chip of another size.
 
No point... you always want updated drivers anyway, so why would you want 6 month old drivers from a piece of hardware sitting on the shelf or in a warehouse for 6 months? It's a good idea in theory... but with driver optimization and modification being so popular now it just won't work.
 
Originally posted by: Jeff7181
No point... you always want updated drivers anyway, so why would you want 6 month old drivers from a piece of hardware sitting on the shelf or in a warehouse for 6 months? It's a good idea in theory... but with driver optimization and modification being so popular now it just won't work.
Click to expand...

That's why you could flash it.

I don't think I'm making myself clear here.

The driver chip would just be a storage area. The OS would copy the driver off of the chip and then use it exactly like a regular driver.

When an update comes out, you use an update utility, exactly like a BIOS flash utility, to put the new version of the driver on the chip.
 
Originally posted by: Chaotic42
Originally posted by: Jeff7181
No point... you always want updated drivers anyway, so why would you want 6 month old drivers from a piece of hardware sitting on the shelf or in a warehouse for 6 months? It's a good idea in theory... but with driver optimization and modification being so popular now it just won't work.
Click to expand...

That's why you could flash it.

I don't think I'm making myself clear here.

The driver chip would just be a storage area. The OS would copy the driver off of the chip and then use it exactly like a regular driver.

When an update comes out, you use an update utility, exactly like a BIOS flash utility, to put the new version of the driver on the chip.
Click to expand...

Why? Why not just download it and install it? You're adding an extra step that's pointless. Want to keep an updated driver after a reformat? Put all your latest drivers on a CDRW.
 
The cost of having a memory chip big enough to store the drivers on hardware would just add to the total cost of the hardware and with hard drive storage space being cheap nowadays, it doesn't make out to be a financially viable option.

Plus what was already said above.
 
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