Server platforms Toolkit

Story: Driver shortage could derail 64-bit

Posted by: Anonymous (Saturday 30 September 2006, 7:04 AM)

It has now been a year since this article came out and little has improved. I recently needed a new system (I build my own) and could only find 64-bit parts at a reasonable price. Figuring that it made no sense to have a 64-bit system and a 32-bit OS, I went ahead and bought MS Win XP64, then the fun began. ALL of the drivers furnished by the motherboard manufacturer (BIOSTAR) were 32-bit drivers and refused to load once I had the OS installed (so no on-board audio, no LAN). I decided to do something simple, such as get my printer working but HP had no 64-bit drivers for my printer and stated that they had no intent of EVER providing them. Of course none of the non-Microsoft utilities that I prefer work on the 64-bit system and, in fact, none of the installation programs I have run have recognized XP64 as a legitimate OS!
It seems the ongoing gap between hardware and software development has reached its logical conclusion - none of the available software seems to run on any of the newly available hardware. A ludicrous situation at best.