Why you shouldn’t update your drivers or clean your registry
While browsing the internet you may see ads that tell you that your computer’s drivers are out-of-date, or that your registry needs to be cleaned. The ads may offer to perform a free scan of your computer to look for driver or registry problems. However you should avoid the free scan because they typically are a come-on to persuade you to purchase a program that you don’t need.
Drivers are files on your computer that provide information about each hardware device – such as the mouse, keyboard, video adapter, DVD drive, etc. On a PC the registry is a database of the settings and preferences of the computer and its programs.
Drivers typically don’t need to be updated nor should they be updated unless you are having a problem with the specific device where a driver update is available.
The registry is complex – a program cannot accurately determine what’s safe to remove and what’s not. Programs that claim to “clean” the registry provide little to no performance benefit to a computer, and often can cause more problems than the things they claim to “fix”.
Internet marketers have placed ads for driver updaters and registry cleaning programs because most people don’t know everything there is to know about drivers and the registry. They are trying to make money from people’s ignorance. We recommend that you avoid the programs.
