Dear Elizabeth,
Thank you so much for all the work you put into the Ask The Computer Lady newsletter. Your efforts are so widely helpful.
Is there any place to download “free” drivers. I have a Gateway Computer with XP and no sound. Every place I have found leads to a site that charges $29.95 for drivers.
Thanks in advance, Merri in Michigan
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Dear Merri,
If you still have the Driver CDs that came with your computer, the sound drivers would be on there. If not, you should always be able to get free drivers from the website of the company that manufactured your computer, or the company that manufactured your device.
In your case, you should be able to get the drivers from Gateway.
Head on over to www.gateway.com and click on the “Support” tab.
If you can find the sticker with the serial number of your computer, you can enter that on their site, or just select the model of your computer.
Once you have found the model you are looking for, click on the link for “Driver Downloads”
If you can’t find your model, or you can’t find sound drivers for your operating system, click on the link to send Gateway an email.
I have downloaded drivers for customers many times, and never had to pay for them.
A good way to prevent this kind of situation is to make a backup of your current drivers. Programs like Driver Detective have a built in wizard that allows you to copy your drivers to a CD or DVD for future use.
Elizabeth
I also have a Gateway and when I had to re-load it discovered that the audio device and drivers were not on the recovery disc. I went to Realtek’s website and was able to download the device and drivers for free.