It seems like every day some new security flaw is identified in Microsoft Windows, doesn't it? In this lesson, you'll learn how to use Windows Update to get automatic or manual updates, as well as how to find and install updates to your other software and to essential hardware devices, such as video and sound cards.

What's Windows Update?

Windows Update is a feature in Windows XP that enables you to update it via the internet, so you can receive any security patches and fixes that Microsoft releases without having to buy a new copy.

You can run Windows Update either automatically or manually. If it runs automatically, it's called AutoUpdate. This lesson covers the automatic version as AutoUpdate and the manual version as Windows Update, even though technically they're both Windows Update.

Configure AutoUpdate

Shortly after you install Windows (or start using a new computer with it preinstalled), a globe icon appears in the notification area (to the left of the clock) with a blurb over it that says Stay Current with Automatic Updates. Click it, and it walks you through a one-time setup process via an Automatic Updates Setup Wizard. Just follow the prompts.

Your choices in this Setup Wizard are as follows:

• Download the updates automatically and notify me when they are ready to be installed: This is the default option. The updates are downloaded but you must give your permission each time for their installation. This option is good for systems with high-speed, always-on internet connections.
• Notify me before downloading any updates and notify me again before installing them on my computer: With this option, you select when updates are downloaded as well as installed. This can be useful if you don't want downloads interfering with your internet speed on a slow connection.
• Turn off automatic updating. I want to update my computer manually: Select this if you don't want AutoUpdate. If you do this, you need to use Windows Update as described later in this lesson.

You can change your AutoUpdate settings at any time through the System Properties. As an added benefit, the System Properties settings have an additional choice: You can select to have updates downloaded and installed automatically.

Follow these steps to change your AutoUpdate settings:

1. Open the Control Panel > System to open the System Properties dialog box. (Or, open the Start menu, right-click My Computer and select Properties.)
2. Click the Automatic Updates tab.
3. Click the desired option, as shown in Figure 3-1. Or, to turn off automatic updating, clear the checkbox at the top.

Figure 3-1: System Properties Automatic Updates tab.

4. If you select the last option, Automatically download the updates, and install them on the schedule that I specify, select a date interval (such as Every Day) and a time. Click OK.

If you select to have updates automatically installed (Step 4), the computer may need to reboot after an installation. If you're not at the computer to respond to any prompts to save your work, it's supposed to wait for you to save your work in any open data files before it restarts. To be safe, save your work before you get up from the computer.

Install a Downloaded AutoUpdate

Let's assume for the moment that you've decided to go with the default setting for AutoUpdate -- to allow automatic downloading but to be prompted before the installation of an update.

After you've configured AutoUpdate initially, the AutoUpdate icon reappears in the notification area whenever an update is available. At that point, you can ignore the icon until it's convenient to deal with it, or you can double-click it to begin the installation. Figure 3-2 shows an Automatic Update that's ready to install. You can click Details if you're curious what it is, but you should always install the update.

Figure 3-2: An Automatic Update is downloaded and ready for installation.

Some of the updates require you to restart your computer afterwards; others don't. Sometimes if you click Details, it will tell you whether the current update requires a restart. It's useful to know because you might postpone the installation if you're in the middle of something in another application and don't want to restart right away.

If you select not to use AutoUpdate, you need to check for updates manually with Windows Update. You may also want to periodically check for updates manually to get any optional updates, which do not show up with AutoUpdate. Optional updates might include a new version of Windows Media Player or a new driver for your video card, for example.

To start Windows Update, select Start > All Programs > Windows Update, or open your web browser and go to the Windows Update Web site.

Microsoft Internet Explorer opens and connects to the internet, and a Windows Update page displays. The first time you visit this page, you may be prompted to download and install an ActiveX control from Microsoft; if prompted, you must do this or you can't continue.

From that point, just follow the prompts. Click Scan for updates, and then review and install the updates it finds. Figure 3-3 shows an example of some updates it might find. You should install all critical updates plus any of the other updates that seem like they would be useful for your situation.

Figure 3-3: Install the recommended updates that Windows Update finds for your computer.

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There are three categories of updates that appear in the Windows Update page. You can view the contents of a category by clicking it in the left pane.

• Critical Updates and Service Packs: These are the same updates that you get with AutoUpdate. You should always install these.
• Windows XP: These are nonessential updates, such as updates to accessories including the Windows Media Player or Windows Movie Maker, or add-ons that accommodate special uses of an accessory program or support different languages.
• Driver Updates: These are updates for the device drivers for your installed hardware. It's important to note that this is not a complete set of updates. Only certain manufacturers have made deals with Microsoft to provide updates this way. Later in this lesson, you'll find out how to get driver updates from other sources.

You may have heard in the news recently that Microsoft is getting ready to release a new version of Windows XP that it's calling "Windows XP Reloaded." It's expected to have some new features in addition to patches and behind-the-scenes improvements. It's not yet clear whether it'll be available through Windows Update or whether it'll be a retail product you'll have to buy.

You can click the View Installation History link in the left pane of the Windows Update web page to see the updates you've installed in the past.

As mentioned in the preceding section, not all hardware manufacturers make device driver updates available through Windows Update. Some hardware makers have very good relationships with Microsoft, and some don't.

What's a Device Driver?

A device driver is a piece of software that serves as a translator between the operating system and the hardware. For example, your video card, modem, sound card, scanner, and printer all require device drivers.

All hardware devices require device drivers, but it might seem otherwise on the surface because Windows provides its own generic device drivers for certain classes of hardware. For example, it supports CD drives, hard disks, keyboards, mice, and floppy disk drives in a generic way, and you do not need to install drivers for those devices. These types of devices have been around forever (okay, for at least 10 years or so, but in the computer world that's forever!), and their standards are very well established, to the point where a driver update for one of these devices would not be of much benefit.

On the other hand, some devices rely very heavily on device drivers provided by their manufacturers, and the manufacturers periodically release new versions of those drivers that add features or fix problems. The video card is a prime example. Today's computer games and graphics programs are constantly pushing the envelope in video performance, and it's very common for a video card manufacturer to come out with a driver update for an existing operating system every six months or so.

Is This Really Necessary?

Do you need to have the latest version of every driver? No, not really. In most cases it won't make much (or any) difference in your system's performance. Maybe you'll get a new tab on the device's Properties box, or maybe it will perform just a little bit better, but you probably won't see any miracles.

The main reason to seek out new drivers is to solve a problem or incompatibility. For example, suppose your computer is several years old and came with Windows XP preinstalled. You just bought a new computer game that doesn't play very well on your computer, and the documentation for the game suggests that you make sure you have the most recent version of your video card driver before contacting their technical support department.

Look for Signed Drivers

Windows XP likes to have a signed driver for every device. A signed driver has two things going for it:

• It's been tested and certified to work with Windows XP.
• It's been checked and found to be in the same condition in which it was released (that is, it has not been modified or tampered with).

It's possible to install an unsigned driver, but it's not recommended unless you have no other choice.

Let's back up a minute and talk about how driver signing came about. In earlier versions of Windows, one reason why they crashed so much, and why Microsoft seemed so powerless to fix the problem, was that a lot of the crashing was caused by poorly written or incompatible device drivers. Suppose you buy a cheap sound card, and it comes with a driver disk, but when you install the driver for it, your system starts crashing. Whose fault is that? Is it the sound card driver maker, for writing a bad driver? Probably. But who gets blamed for it? Microsoft does, because it's Windows that's crashing. There's nothing obvious that specifically points to the sound card driver as the source of error.

You can probably see where this is going. Microsoft got tired of being blamed for problems that were not its fault. So it developed this system of driver signing. For companies to release Windows XP-compatible drivers, they have to run them through a certification process controlled by Microsoft. If they pass, they get to be signed drivers. This ensures that if a device driver is installed in Windows, it's not going to cause problems.

Here's how to check on a device's current driver:

This lesson uses a video card as an example, but you can do it for any device (although as mentioned earlier, some devices use generic Windows drivers, so they're going to be pretty boring in this regard).

1. Open the Start menu, right-click My Computer and select Properties.
2. Click the Hardware tab, and then click Device Manager.
3. Click the plus sign next to the desired category to expand it, for example, Display Adapters.
4. Check the exact name of the device. Write it down if you think you'll forget it. (This will be useful later when you're looking for a driver update.)
5. Double-click the device to display its properties, and then click the Driver tab. For example, Figure 3-4 shows the video card's properties.

Figure 3-4: The properties for a device from Device Manager.

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6. Check the date on the driver, and whether it's signed. In Figure 3-4, for example, the date is 10/6/2003 and it's signed by Microsoft Windows Hardware Compatibility Publisher.
7. Click Cancel when you're finished, and then close the Device Manager window.

When searching for a driver, you're looking for one that is signed, and newer than the one you currently have.

Search for a Driver Update

Now begins the big scavenger hunt! Search the web for a better driver than the one you have. The most obvious place to start is the device manufacturer's website. For example, in Figure 3-4, the device manufacturer is NVIDIA.

Once you get to the manufacturer's Web site, look for a Downloads hyperlink, and then wander through their system to find the driver for the exact model you have. A close match is not good enough -- it has to be exact. For example, the device in Figure 3-4 is a NVIDIA GeForce2 GTS video card; you cannot use a driver for a GeForce3 model unless the documentation clearly states that a single driver worked on all GeForce cards (which is in fact the case with that particular line, but don't assume it.)

When you click a link to download a driver, you're prompted to Save or Open. You should always select Save, put the file in a temporary folder (name it anything you want), and then run it from there after saving it. That way if you ever need it again, you have it. In contrast, if you select to Open it, it downloads and the setup program runs, but afterwards it's discarded.

The resulting file you download will probably be an executable file that runs a setup program; if so, great. Run it. If it's a Zip file containing a bunch of files, however, or an executable file that simply unzips files into a folder, you must install the new driver using the procedure described in the following section.

Manually Installing a Driver Update

It's important that you only use this procedure if your downloaded update did not come with its own setup program.

To manually install a driver, follow these steps:

1. Open the Start menu, right-click My Computer and select Properties. Click the Hardware tab, and then click Device Manager.
2. Click the plus sign next to the desired category to expand it.
3. Double-click the device to display its properties, and then click the Driver tab.
4. Click the Update Driver button. The Hardware Update Wizard runs.
5. Click Install from a list or specific location, and then click Next.
6. Click Include this location in the search, and then enter the path where you stored the download (or browse for it if you like), as shown in Figure 3-5.

Figure 3-5: Tell Windows where to find the new driver.

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7. Click Next. Windows checks the new driver against the old one, and if the new one is better, it installs it. Follow whatever prompts appear to complete the process.

In Figure 3-5, you'll see that there's also a Don't Search option, but this is not recommended because it could enable you to install an older driver over the top of a newer one.

Just like with Windows, Microsoft also periodically releases patches and fixes for Office. Office is the most popular business application suite in the world, so most of you probably want this update.

Some versions of Office include a Help > Check for Updates command. Check in your version of Microsoft Word to see if that's there. If so, you can use that command to jump directly to the Office Update Web site. If not, open your web browser manually and go to the Microsoft Office Update website.

From the Office Update web page, click Check for Updates, and then follow the prompts. The exact steps vary depending on your version of Office and depending on when you do this. The available updates appear with checkmarks next to them, as in Figure 3-6, and you can click Start Installation to install them.

Microsoft constantly changes their offerings, so it may look different on the day you do it than it does in Figure 3-6.

Figure 3-6: Microsoft Office Update.

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Update Your System BIOS

The BIOS (Basic Input Output System) is the little program that helps the computer start up when you press the power button. It's hard-coded into a chip inside your computer (on the motherboard), so it can't be accidentally erased. However, this chip's content can be modified with a special utility so that important updates to the BIOS can be made without having to buy a new chip (or worse yet, a new motherboard).

A BIOS update can potentially correct problems with hardware interaction (for example, if your computer won't work with a certain new piece of hardware you've installed), as well as certain startup and shutdown problems. Typically, you would update your BIOS only upon the recommendation of the technical support staff for your computer manufacturer after going through a troubleshooting process over the phone with them.

There's a lot of potential for you to harm your computer by changing the BIOS, so be very careful and only change it if you know exactly what you're doing.

Here's how it works.

1. Check your BIOS version by looking for its code when the computer first starts up. It'll say something about BIOS, followed by a long version number. If it scrolls by too quickly at startup, press the Pause/Break key on your keyboard to pause it while you write it down.
2. Go to the website for your computer's manufacturer and see whether a BIOS update is available. The numbers must match up for the BIOS version.

Putting an update for the wrong BIOS on your computer can disable it.

3. If there's an updated BIOS available, read about the improvements and bug fixes that it implements, and see whether it's something you need. Because of the risk involved with updating the BIOS (which is explained next), you should not install a BIOS update just because it's available. You should do it only to correct a problem.

Updating the BIOS is risky for two reasons. One is that if you install an update that's not designed for your specific BIOS chip, your computer won't work anymore and you'll have to take it in for professional fixing. The other is that if the power goes off during a couple of critical seconds during the BIOS update process, it can render your system unbootable (and again, it's off to a professional shop for fixing).

4. Assuming you want the BIOS update, download it to your hard disk.
5. Find a blank floppy disk, or one containing nothing you need to keep, and insert it. Make sure it is not a really old one (more than 5 years), because old disks are prone to read errors.
6. Run the setup program contained in the file you downloaded. It will prepare a bootable floppy disk from the floppy you inserted.
7. Use Start > Shut Down to restart your computer with the floppy in the drive. The BIOS Update utility runs.
8. Follow the prompts in the update utility to update your BIOS.
9. When the update is finished, remove the floppy and reboot Windows normally.

There -- now you know. Use this information wisely and sparingly.

Moving On

In this lesson, you learned about updates, and how to acquire and install them. Complete your study for this lesson by doing the assignment and taking the quiz. Then check the Message Board to see what your fellow students are talking about.

In the Lesson 4, you'll find out about computer viruses and how to prevent infection.