If you’ve recently acquired a new monitor or are having problems with your current one, you might be asking if displays have drivers. Drivers are software applications that allow your computer to interface with hardware such as a display. In this blog post, we will look at the role of drivers in monitor functionality and whether monitors have drivers.
Do All Monitors Have Drivers?
Before the use of LCD monitors, big old CRT monitors didn’t have drivers. However, they are not relevant anymore, as I can’t even remember when was the last time I saw one in use anywhere.
All LCD monitors used to come with drivers, although some didn’t need them to work correctly. In recent years, most monitors are “plug and play,” which doesn’t require particular installation, and those monitors with drivers available usually work fine with windows 10 automatic configuration.
The Difference Between Monitor Driver and Graphics Driver
Before we begin discussing monitor drivers, it is critical to grasp the distinction between monitor drivers and graphics card drivers. Monitor drivers are meant to maximize the performance and functionality of your monitor, whereas your graphics card is responsible for generating graphics, 3D rendering, video decoding, and so on.
Monitor drivers regulate your monitor’s display resolution, refresh rate, and color calibration. They also aid in the solving of monitor-to-computer compatibility difficulties and may provide additional capabilities and options not available through your computer’s basic display settings.
How to Know if My Monitor Has Drivers?
The best indicator of having drivers is noticing that your monitor doesn’t work correctly. For example, sometimes the colors will be wrong, or it won’t display some of the default resolutions that are typically available.
If you are unsure about that, you can always look up which model of monitor you have and visit the manufacturer’s website to look up information. Unless the manufacturer’s website has a specific driver section, you can usually find a driver download link next to a user manual download link when you find the exact model you have.
Additionally, you can always check the “device manager” section in the Windows control panel and see if the monitor is recognized correctly.
Note that for some monitors, it may say “Generic PnP Monitor,” which can mean two things:
- Windows automatically configured your monitor, which may or may not work as intended.
- Your monitor automatically transferred the information needed for configuration through the DDC channel, and it should work as intended.
Are Monitor Drivers Really Necessary?
As discussed above, most monitors will work perfectly fine without additional installations.
However, if you are unsure or suspect that the colors or resolutions aren’t how they are supposed to be, you might want to install available drivers just to be sure.
In addition to the supplied color profiles, a driver will instruct the operating system on handling this specific monitor.
While a display driver does not affect your win rate in any game, it offers the operating system information, such as which refresh rates to list, suitable resolutions, and color depth.
Sometimes it may seem like a monitor is displaying colors just fine. Still, only when you install the drivers and the operating system gets the necessary ICC profile do you realize you’ve been missing out on even better colors, brightness, and contrast ranges.
Although, in rare cases, drivers can even break certain functionalities of the monitor if they are outdated. This mostly happens with several years old monitors that aren’t supported anymore while the standard configuration methods have changed.
In this case, you can simply uninstall the driver and let Windows configure it once again, as their configuration is better optimized to work with display hardware.
Do You Need to Update Monitor Drivers?
Contrary to popular belief, you don’t need to update your monitor driver unless you observe some problems appearing out of nowhere.
Monitor driver updates rarely bring anything new to the table, and you may mess up the configuration by installing monitor drivers over already present configuration by Windows default drivers.
However, monitor driver updates are very beneficial if the monitor comes with whole configuration software, which deserves its own chapter up next.
Importance of Drivers for Monitors With Software
Most monitors have a built-in configuration menu that you can access via buttons usually placed on the monitor’s side.
Alternatively, some monitors come with configuration software, also known as on-screen display software, that allows you to adjust the monitor’s settings, such as brightness, contrast, and color temperature, from an on-screen menu.
That software is almost certainly a superior configuration tool to built-in configuration and usually relies on drivers.
On-screen-display software sometimes has additional features, such as multiple display applications with many valuable shortcuts and user-friendly characteristics.
For example, I had software on my old monitor that completely changed the functionality of how the mouse cursor interacts with two different screens.
What I mean is that you may notice that two monitors require you to click each time you swap the cursor to another display to “tell” the system which application you are using. The software that came with the monitor allowed the system to know based on which monitor the cursor was at that time. It was a complete game-changer for me.
So if your monitor comes with software like that, keep track of monitor driver and software updates to experience newly added features and keep them working as intended.
Do Monitor Speakers Need Drivers?
No, monitor speakers don’t require drivers more than any other speakers, but if the software tool comes with your monitor, it may still have some interesting tuning options for monitor speakers.
If that’s the case, you will likely have to install the drivers as well for it to work.
Do Monitors With Smart TV Need Drivers?
No, smart TV monitors don’t need drivers. They are always “plug and play,” just like TVs and smart TVs.
Most of the time, the smart TV operating system in the monitor doesn’t even communicate with your laptop or PC. Instead, they have built-in WiFi for smart TV to work with.
Monitor Not Being Detected: Is It a Driver Issue?
Driver issues can cause monitors to not get detected by the operating system. However, it’s improbable that drivers cause such a situation.
If it happens, you can quickly clear out the driver as a potential suspect in the problem. Just unplug the monitor, uninstall the driver or the device itself from the Device Manager, plug back the monitor, and let the Windows configure it on its own.
Windows configuration will always at least detect the monitor and display everything on it, even if it is unable to configure everything properly.
If the problem persists, here is a list of things you can try to solve the problem:
- Perform a quick system restart to fix issues occurring due to temporary glitches.
- Click on the Action Center/Notifications at the bottom right, then click on Project and ensure you have “First/PC screen only” for a single monitor or Extend/Duplicate if it is your secondary monitor.
- Verify that your monitor is powered on and linked to a power source. The power button is normally found on the bottom right-hand side of the device.
- Double-check that the cable is securely attached on both ends. You should also detach the HDMI or DisplayPort cable, wait a few seconds, and reconnect.
- Examine your connection cable for signs of wear and strain. Check the Display or HDMI port for any problems as well.
- If your system has numerous ports, change and connect to a different input/output port.
- You can also connect your monitor to another computer to see if the problem is with your computer or monitor.