Ugrade from vista to 7 on laptop driver question

[toolbag]

Hi all

I want to upgrade a laptop to 7 from vista. it's not my laptop so i don't want to mess it up.

My question is will the drivers for the system board and video be moved over to windows 7 seamlessly?

Thanks

 

[postmortemIA]

usually yes, windows 7 will have its own drivers for video. which video chipset you have ?

 

[corkyg]

I've done it twice now, and the answer is 'yes' in both cases. Vista to 7 is fairly easy because many of the drivers are the same.

 

[almer]

Be careful with intel built in video. If it is an older laptop, you may be out of luck and will not be able to use proper resolution. I've had this problem with Dell older laptop. Intel does not have W7 video driver for "older" cheapsets.

 

[JackMDS]

Make sure that you have the most updated drivers for the Network card.

Why?

Cause after the upgrade the computer will be functional even if Video and some other components need to be optimized with new drivers.

But if the NIC drivers do not work there is No Internet to download more driver and update the current.

 

[Paperlantern]

Make sure that you have the most updated drivers for the Network card.

Why?

Cause after the upgrade the computer will be functional even if Video and some other components need to be optimized with new drivers.

But if the NIC drivers do not work there is No Internet to download more driver and update the current.

While good advice... this isnt a show stopper by any means. Drivers are not big and can be moved from a computer WITH network connectivity via a few different methods (CDR, USB Stick, firewire cable in a pinch assuming THAT has drivers, hehe).

Win7 also does just fine with even the most ancient machines. I have put it on a laptop as old as a PIII 600MHz with very little effort, and more than likely any driver that was released for XP (which should be any laptop in the last 10 or 11 years, any older then that, seriously, put it back in front of the door it was holding open) should work in Win7 without too much praying needed.

Basically, yes, you should have no problem with the transition.

 

[gorobei]

my hp tablet has a folder on the c: drive that has all the vista drivers and preinstall software. Some manufacturers put it there for those who do clean OS installs.

though i have yet to see vista/7 not automatically download newest/latest drivers after a clean install. but YMMV.

 

[Lifted]

I've run into one issue - make sure the wireless NIC has a Windows 7 driver that works. I've seen cheap notebooks (bottom of the line HP's) that came with Win 7, yet they still had horrible drivers that wouldn't work with certain wireless routers. Do a quick check of the chipset/laptop and the wireless router being used, if there is one, before doing the upgrade.