Windows Vista was heralded as an advance developmental project over prior operating systems from Microsoft. While many people have expressed a general level of satisfaction with Windows Vista, other users have not been particularly satisfied with the system itself. Of course, the reality is that when new operating systems come out, there oftentimes are complaints and concerns associated with the recent issues. Many of these issues or snags end up being resolved fairly promptly.

When it comes to Windows Vista, there have been some ongoing reports of problematic interactions between the operating system and certain drivers. This provides you with a generalized overview of some of the problems that the new Windows Vista has had on certain device drivers.

Perhaps the most fundamental problem associated with the new Windows Vista and certain drivers involves how the new operating system deals with unsigned drivers. The new Windows Vista only allows signed drivers to be installed in what is known as kernel mode.

Windows Vista is set up in such a manner that this particular feature cannot even easily be overridden by a duly authorized system administrator. The fact is that there are many drivers that people desire to install and utilize that are not signed as defined and required by Windows via its Vista system. While tools exist within the Vista system that can be used to allow the installation of unsigned device drivers, only very skilled and well versed or experienced technical experts are normally capable of using these tools properly.

In order for a particular device driver to be signed as required by Vista, a developer will have to pay Microsoft a certain amount of money in order for the driver itself to be tested and deemed suitable for Vista and so forth. If the device driver does pass the Microsoft testing, Microsoft will then issue what is known as a digital signature, which works to verify the driver itself. With this Microsoft-issued verification, the device driver can then be installed via the Vista operating system.

Another problem that has been known when it comes to the new Windows Vista and device drivers is that the process that has just been described has rendered older hardware and device drivers less likely to be compatible with the Vista system – even though this hardware and driver worked appropriately with prior Windows operating systems. Indeed, this is true even with all of the other Windows operating systems still in use today.

Microsoft contends that the aforementioned process has been created and implemented for security purposes. Other people have countered that this may not be the case at all. Rather, these analysts and observers are contending that Microsoft has developed these hurdles associated with the Windows Vista operating system in order to deploy digital rights management policies to the benefit of Microsoft products and to the exclusion of products (including device drivers) developed and manufactured by other companies.

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