Hi Brad,

  Speaking in general, the "generic" drivers that come with OS usually use
only the lowest common denominator which all compatible cards support. For
example, "Soundblaster-compatible" uses only the standard SB interface and
does not use any additional features that may be present but are not
exposed via SB-compatibility logic on the card.

  Therefore, manufacturer drivers are generally preferable over standard
drivers. And they are usually more recent (not always, though, and I
speak only of those that you download from the Internet, not those on
the CD which came with the hardware). But they can be buggier as well.

  And, since you use XP which does a very decent job of managing drivers
and removing old ones, you can simply try both options and pick the best
one for you :-)

  Yours,

<> Max Timchenko [MaxVT]
<>
<> [log in to unmask]

On Thu, 17 Jan 2002, Brad Loomis wrote:

> Hi all,
> This may open a can of worms, but it is a legitimate question that I have
> been pondering. I recently upgraded my motherboard, processor, sound card,
> and video card. I reused my SCSI cards, hard drives, and NIC. I did a clean
> install of XP Pro full OEM. Upon getting the OS installed as I usually do I
> went to Device Manager and the only thing that was incorrect was the SB
> Audigy. No surprise, installed the driver and update from Creative and no
> negative marks in Device Manager. Now for the question. Is there any
> advantage to using drivers from manufacturers vs. the drivers that were in

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