Joyce wrote:
>What's the benefit?  Or the harm?>>


The benefit is that it might work better---maybe have more functions.

The harm is that it might be designed for a different system than yours and 
therefore work badly or not at all. You could have great difficulty 
restoring the previous driver if the new one is badly written. A bad driver 
can cause the system to be slow to boot, and a driver which refuses to 
unload is probably the most common cause of shutdown problems.

Printer drivers can be notoriously troublesome if they don't work properly. 
(And--no---despite all their experience, printer manufacturers still DON'T 
always get it right!!!  Although they're much better now than they used to be).

As far as I'm aware, security is not an issue with printer drivers. So no 
need to update for that reason alone.

In short, my general practice with anything, especially drivers, is that 
unless there's a clear advantage, don't update anything which is working 
satisfactorily. It's not worth the risk of trying to fix it if it ends up 
going wrong.

Unless, of course, you're happy to hang out there on the cutting edge of 
technology.

Finally---a caution: If the software is trying to guide you to sites that 
are actually selling new drivers, (or you have to pay a fee for the 
privilege of downloading) leave it alone. It's probably nothing more than a 
misleading marketing ploy. Printer manufacturers don't charge for genuine 
new drivers.

Don Penlington

      "Hold No Punches.." Rode brings you great shareware/freeware
        programs with his honest opinions in this weekly column.
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