funkyy Posted June 20, 2020 Share Posted June 20, 2020 Hope one of you whizz kids can clear this up for me. I'm using Win7 (x64) since around Oct 2018. The audio drivers are Realtek HD Audio and obviously during the last couple of years I have updated the drivers periodically. Usually they were FF00, but I've had FF03 and FF04 in the recent upgrades. Anyway, the point is that after a recent upgrade the audio didn't work and while investigating (sticking my nose in where I shouldn't!!) I noticed that in C:/ Program Files and C:/Program files (x86) there was an INTEL folder in each of these...and inside EACH of the INTEL folders were two folders:- WIN32 and WIN64. I also saw that my used disc space was just under 2GB more than before I did the latest upgrade. I poked around looking for the reason and I kept coming back to these folders. I couldn't remember if they were always there since I first updated the audio drivers. Each pair are 763mb giving a total of 1,526 MB which is close to the increase in used space. Ok, so after searching unsuccessfully for details about these 4 folders I decided to copy them onto a pen drive then delete them from their location and reboot my computer. I know, I know this was a risky thing for a novice to do!! Anyway, my computer is working fine, audio is working, checked various programs and they are all working, no error or alert messages etc. Now the INTEL folder in Prog files = 59.4 MB, and in Prog files (x86) = 270MB. Neither of the INTEL folders have WIN32 or WIN64 folders. Device manager shows Realtek HD Audio driver v.6.0.8967.1 "working properly" So, can I assume that the WIN32 and WIN64 folders had appeared due to one of my various driver updates during the last two years, and can I delete them from the pendrive? Many thanks for your patience in reading this guys. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lurch234 Posted June 20, 2020 Share Posted June 20, 2020 3 hours ago, funkyy said: I know, I know this was a risky thing for a novice to do!! Not such a novice anymore if you took the time to backup what was necessary. Experimenting is good! Well, with a modicum of prevention I would have gone a step further tho and made a backup of the partition. My Win7 PC works fine since it's last 2018 update and I have developed a compulsion to make a partition backup of my OS before updating anything. Not that I find it necessary since my hardware is all 2011 except the SSD and GPU. Audio comes from my old Sound Blaster live 24 bit external. Which also works fine on Win10 if anyone is interested in knowing. Sound Blaster provides a driver. Maybe there was a cleaner way of doing things but at the end of the day it's the results that count Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkyy Posted June 20, 2020 Author Share Posted June 20, 2020 Thanks lurch234. As a matter of fact I had made a an image of my complete system just a few days before I started this "surgery" so I felt very secure that if something awful happened I would be able to restore everything (God bless Macrium Reflect!!). So by your comments I guess I haven't done anything that I shouldn't have (?). I've come a long way from the guy who didn't know how to play a disc in a computer...it's still a long and winding road ahead though!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lurch234 Posted June 20, 2020 Share Posted June 20, 2020 7 hours ago, funkyy said: So by your comments I guess I haven't done anything that I shouldn't have (?). Exactly. The last time I used a driver updater it found an update for Renesas usb 3.0. After installing it my usb 3 was kaput! No problems tho, a compulsive backup made beforehand solved the problem. My restore was somewhat longer because I couldn't use the faster usb 3 ports but: Quote (God bless Macrium Reflect!!) As you say Even when you are careful you can get screwed. A few years back I grabbed a giveaway that was posted here. I don't remember what the app was but I wont forget what it did. It f**ked up my browser that's what it did. For some unknown reason it changed all my browser graphic customizations. All the time I put to make it the way I like and whooosh!! Back to basics, Just like that, no warning and from what seemed to be a legit app. Go figure... In my posting days I made a point of testing the stuff I moved along. And I used Norton Ghost at the time so I always hoped nothing would go wrong because Ghost is damned slow. What I'm really saying is that it's only software not hardware. So experiment and be merry, my son Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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