However, you’ll notice there’s not a download link on this page to direct you to the actual installer. This is because we don’t recommend using this program to update drivers. Below is a look at how Free Driver Scout works in case you do want to use it, but further down the page is a look at why you should think twice about it.
More About Free Driver Scout
Support for most versions of Windows, along with a nice feature that’s helpful prior to a major Windows upgrade, are a few of the features you’ll find in Free Driver Scout:
Finds and installs device drivers for Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP. Although not officially supported, it seems to work fine in Windows 10 as well Once it has found hardware that requires driver updates, you can disable any of them from showing up in a future scan, which is helpful for any hardware that you don’t want to be updated all the time You can see the version number and release date of the currently installed driver, as well as the new, updated version date, helpful for verifying that the driver update is really what you wanted It can back up and restore some or all of the installed drivers for free OS Migration Tool is a feature included in Free Driver Scout that lets you download device drivers for a different version of Windows (such as Windows 8 if you’re running 7), which is helpful if you plan on updating Windows to a newer version
Free Driver Scout Pros & Cons
Automatic driver updating is of course one of the bigger benefits of using Free Driver Scout, but there are some other things to consider as well:
Is Free Driver Scout Safe?
We used to provide a download link for this program, and we used to recommend it in our Best Free Driver Updater Tools list. But, we suggest you use a different program to check for or to install drivers. (Check out that list for our current recommendations.)
Free Driver Scout no longer updates to include new drivers, so while it might work for some of your hardware, chances are you won’t get the latest drivers with all the bug fixes and features that these kinds of updates are meant to provide.
Also, and more importantly, some virus scanners have identified this tool as a threat. We tested two downloads from two separate websites, and both of them triggered a virus warning. One of them didn’t even finish installing, but instead opened a strange website in an attempt to get us to install another program.
In short: use something else. Driver Booster and Snappy Driver Installer are great options that both provide up-to-date drivers for free without the threat that something malicious will end up on your computer.
Thoughts on Free Driver Scout
After reading the pros and description from above, it’s obvious Free Driver Scout sounds like a really nice choice for a driver updater program if you don’t want to have to think about running scans and downloads yourself. On top of that, you can back up drivers and even download drivers for a different OS, which is really great.
However, as we mentioned above, it simply didn’t find as many outdated drivers as some other driver updater tools. This is obviously a turn-off because even though the software does all the heavy lifting for you, it’s hardly the best tool available if others are able to provide more information about outdated device drivers.
Also, we simply can’t recommend it because the developer has quit releasing updates to the program and there’s no longer an official, virus-free download link available.
