How to find unknown devices in Windows and install their drivers

Devices that are difficult to recognize, something rare

Normally, when we buy a new computer, an internal component or a compatible device (a camera with a USB connection, for example), the manufacturer usually includes a CD/DVD or web link to the drivers to make it work properly on Windows.

Sometimes it happens that, once the installation has been carried out in the usual way, we verify that the device does not work correctly and is also impossible to recognizeexactly which device is failing (out of as many as a computer has).

Windows provides us with an effective method to find out the identity of the device in question and even download its drivers quickly.

Step 1: Access Device Manager

To check which or which are the unknown conflicting devices, we will have to go to the Device Manager of the system, which we can access from two different forms:

1. Using the Control Panel:

To do this we will have to access Settings, from the Windows side panel, and from there to Control Panel.

Once inside, we can access the Hardware and Sound section, and here we can enter Device administrator.

2. Using the This PC icon:

If we click on the icon This Team with the right mouse button, a contextual menu will be displayed, we must click on the last option, called Properties Once in the new window, we look at the upper left corner, there we have a direct link to Device Manager

Within the Device Manager we will have access to the list of unknown devices, which for this example is a single case.

Step 2: Identify the problematic device

We already have in front of us the list of devices that we are interested in, but we have to find out their hardware identification code, for this we just have to click on it with the right click of the mouse, and in the new pop-up menu that appears, we must select Properties

In the new window that appears, we must go to the tab Details. In it a large drop-down list appears under the word Property, here we must choose the option Id. .

Now we are faced with a couple of lines of code that usually start with PCI… or USB … and the like. These codes specify, numerically, the type of device that it is, the manufacturer and the specific model.

We will be interested in copying the second line of those that appear by pressing the right button of the mouse on top and hitting copy.

Step 3: Search for the device on the network

Now all we have to do is go to the DevID.info website and search for the unknown device, for this we will have to paste the complete line that we have just copied in the search engine integrated on said website.

If everything works correctly, we should see a list of compatible drivers with said device that finally indicate the exact type device it is, its model and manufacturer.

Step 4: Download and Install Drivers

This process is the simplest, now that we have the list of drivers at our fingertips, with a simple click we will be directed to the download linkof the installable file we need to configure the drivers.

If we cannot find a direct link, simply by knowing the manufacturer and the model we can go to their web page and download it manually in the Support or Driver Download sections of their official websites.

In 99% of cases, we will have executable files that install the drivers automatically, without having to configure anything that other than giving the typical “Siguiente/Next” button several times until the installation is finished and the computer restarts.

If, despite all these facilities, you are unfortunately one of the few users who encounter problems for their computer to recognize the driver already downloaded because of a conflicting device, don't worry: right here at Space Welcome to Windows 8 we have a detailed guide in which we show you, step by step step, how to manually install any driver on your Windows system.