The Device Manager
This is the Device Manager From my desk top machine. Each
Device Manager will show the specific hardware installed on the machine.
Device Manager overview (Extracted from MS Help)
Device Manager provides you with a graphical view of the hardware that is
installed on your computer. It also allows you to change the way your hardware
is configured as well as the way your hardware interacts with your computer's
microprocessor. Using Device Manager, you can:
- Determine whether the
hardware on your computer is working properly.
- Change hardware configuration settings.
- Identify the device drivers that are loaded for each device and obtain information about each device
driver.
- Change advanced settings and
properties for devices.
- Install updated device
drivers.
- Disable, enable, and uninstall devices.
- Identify device conflicts and manually configure resource settings.
- Print a summary of the
devices that are installed on your computer.
Most of the time, you will use Device Manager to check the status of your
hardware and update device drivers on your computer. Advanced users who have a
thorough understanding of computer hardware will also use Device Manager's
diagnostic features to resolve device conflicts and change resource settings.
Warning
- Changing resource settings improperly
can disable your hardware and cause your computer to malfunction or be
inoperable. Resource settings should be changed only by users who have
expert knowledge of computer hardware and hardware configurations.
Notes
- You must be logged on as an administrator or a member
of the Administrators group in order to complete procedures using Device
Manager. If your computer is connected to a network, network policy
settings may also prevent you from completing the procedures.
- Ordinarily, you will not need
to use Device Manager to change resource settings because resources are
allocated automatically by Windows 2000 during hardware setup.
- You can use Device Manager to
manage devices only on a local computer. Device Manager will work only
in read-only mode on a remote computer.
Related
Topics
Note the exclamation point in the yellow circle. This ICON indicates that the
device has a problem.
Exploring the Properties of a device.