Snappy Driver Installer

I'm the developer of Snappy Driver Installer.

I used to work on DriverPack Solution but I wasn't happy with the fact it was written in JavaScript which means that it's very slow, depends on version of IE and I also didn't like that users had to deal with changing their homepage, OEM logo, software being forced down their throat. For my part, I tired to make these things easy to disable but even though I made major contributions to the project, I wasn't successful in convincing making it disabled by default. I haven’t been involved in the project for a long time, and now that I have my own project(Snappy Driver Installer), I no longer have to support DriverPack Solution.

Snappy Driver Installer isn't just a fork. It’s a complete rewrite from scratch and was initially supposed to be a new version of DriverPack Solution but I decided to split off from it so that it wouldn't end up being filled with adware. Since I left DriverPack Solution, they have no developers who understand how driver ranking algorithm works so no one works on improving it. People keep complaining about adware, scripting errors, incorrect driver picking such as installing touchpad drivers on desktops but the only things that are changing are GUI and adware being updated to newest version. The known issues aren't likely to be addressed because the team is too busy optimizing the website in order to maximize profit from users downloading DPS and installing adware.

Driverpacks are being put together by SamLab. He also releases his own SamDrivers that includes both Snappy Driver Installer and DriverPack Solution. It should be noted that his version of DriverPack Solution has most adware disabled by default but at this point I wouldn't bother with it anyway because DPS is left too far behind SDI in terms of how it picks driver for installation. DPS can no longer pick the correct driver on its own and has to rely on markers which are put by SamLab and some trickery to force DPS into installing the correct driver, but it doesn't works all the time. I wish SamLab wouldn't have to spend so much effort on making sure that his driverpacks work with DPS but for now he has to support the lowest common denominator.

Snappy Driver Installer is written in C/C++ which makes it fast, compact, standalone.

Size
DPS - 34 MB (291 files)
SDI - 1.3 MB (42 files) Without localization and themes - 1 MB(one file).

Indexing time
DPS - 280 secs (4:40)
SDI - 19 secs (13 secs on indexing and 6 secs on compressing)

Start up time
DPS - 10 secs
SDI - 0.5 sec

I know there were some issues with updating via torrents but it should be fixed by now. It should start up much faster now and also you can change port in settings.cfg.

If you have issues with driver installation, you can post logs so that I can look into it.
 
BadPointer said:
I'm the developer of Snappy Driver Installer.

I used to work on DriverPack Solution but I wasn't happy with the fact it was written in JavaScript which means that it's very slow, depends on version of IE and I also didn't like that users had to deal with changing their homepage, OEM logo, software being forced down their throat. For my part, I tired to make these things easy to disable but even though I made major contributions to the project, I wasn't successful in convincing making it disabled by default. I haven’t been involved in the project for a long time, and now that I have my own project(Snappy Driver Installer), I no longer have to support DriverPack Solution.

Snappy Driver Installer isn't just a fork. It’s a complete rewrite from scratch and was initially supposed to be a new version of DriverPack Solution but I decided to split off from it so that it wouldn't end up being filled with adware. Since I left DriverPack Solution, they have no developers who understand how driver ranking algorithm works so no one works on improving it. People keep complaining about adware, scripting errors, incorrect driver picking such as installing touchpad drivers on desktops but the only things that are changing are GUI and adware being updated to newest version. The known issues aren't likely to be addressed because the team is too busy optimizing the website in order to maximize profit from users downloading DPS and installing adware.

Driverpacks are being put together by SamLab. He also releases his own SamDrivers that includes both Snappy Driver Installer and DriverPack Solution. It should be noted that his version of DriverPack Solution has most adware disabled by default but at this point I wouldn't bother with it anyway because DPS is left too far behind SDI in terms of how it picks driver for installation. DPS can no longer pick the correct driver on its own and has to rely on markers which are put by SamLab and some trickery to force DPS into installing the correct driver, but it doesn't works all the time. I wish SamLab wouldn't have to spend so much effort on making sure that his driverpacks work with DPS but for now he has to support the lowest common denominator.

Snappy Driver Installer is written in C/C++ which makes it fast, compact, standalone.

Size
DPS - 34 MB (291 files)
SDI - 1.3 MB (42 files) Without localization and themes - 1 MB(one file).

Indexing time
DPS - 280 secs (4:40)
SDI - 19 secs (13 secs on indexing and 6 secs on compressing)

Start up time
DPS - 10 secs
SDI - 0.5 sec

I know there were some issues with updating via torrents but it should be fixed by now. It should start up much faster now and also you can change port in settings.cfg.

If you have issues with driver installation, you can post logs so that I can look into it.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the info and welcome to the forums. I'm sure you will get some questions asked.

Harold
 
Snappy Driver Installer can be used in many ways. I suggest getting familiarized with command line switches and popup hints. I'm going to tell about some useful but not very obvious use cases. There some features which are hidden but you may come across them by accident. Maybe I should document them or make them more prominent.

Driver backup
  1. Enable "Expert mode".
  2. Tick the "Current" checkbox.
  3. Click on the "Extract to.." button.
  4. Select folder for driver backup.
You can make a backup copy of drivers somewhere on PC before returning PC to the client. This way they'll be able to restore drivers themselves and won't be needing to keep DVD with drivers.

Finding drivers on DVD
Some DVDs with drivers don't have an installer and you have to try installing drivers from different folders till you find a driver which works. In this case you can use the "Select driver dir..." button to find compatible driver on DVD.

Helping people with driver problems remotely
You can send the application with a file runme.bat with the following content: "SDI_R156.exe /nogui", ask them to execute runme.bat and send the log folder which contains a snapshot(*.snp file) of their pc.
Once you have the snapshot, you can load it with the "Load snapshot..." button or just drop the file on the app window. You'll see all devices and drivers that the user have and you you'll be able to prepare drivers for them with the "Extract to..." button.


You can help the project by translating it to other languages or making corrections in translations, reporting bugs, etc.
 
I'm a convert.

Ok, I finally downloaded Snappy Driver Installer yesterday (including the full driverpacks) and have used it several times already.

I'm a convert. Fast, easy, accurate, fast, clean, simple, fast, written in english, fast.

Previously, I used Drivermax for a few years, then switched to Driverpack Solution for the last 2 or 3 (it's ok, but the ESL aspect is offputting and bundled crapware irritating).

Using Snappy Driver Installer was an eye opening experience in discovering how easy and straightforward the process SHOULD be.


EDIT: Just read BadPointer's usage tips a couple comments above this one. Snappy gets more and more awesome the more I learn about it.
 
Last edited:
I want to know if there is anything we can do other than translate? Its that great! Maybe nick can look at d7 integration - do you need seeders? A customised update report would be cool to show off to customers
 
It's seeded by users from three major torrent websites and I made sure that users are alerted when a new version is available and they know what to do to make it populated as soon as possible. You can join the seedbox by seeding the torrent which is posted under the link named "Download SDI with driverpacks".

SDI is an Open Source project, so anyone can contribute to it by submitting patches.

You also can report problems and make suggestions.

I don't mind integrating SDI into other 3rd party apps. People don't have to ask for my permission to do so, but sometimes changes must be done to SDI in order to make integration seamless so I advice contacting me via Skype.

Using SDI as a device identifier app
Run the application, click on the update bar, make sure only "Indexes"(7 MB) is checked, click OK. You don't need to have any driverpacks.

Using SDI without driverpacks(like Driver Genius)
You also have to download indexes beforehand. You can choose drivers you want to install and click on the install button. SDI will download the driverpacks which contain the chosen drivers and install them automatically. It is similar to Driver Genius but you have to download a complete driverpack to get only one driver from it. It still beats downloading all driverpacks because there's no point in updating all driverpacks if SDI isn't used very often.
 
A new version of SDI is available: R159.


All driverpacks have been updated so you should be able to download them. Some driverpacks have been renamed this time, so you have to run the following script to delete old driverpacks:
http://www.mediafire.com/view/fcdzz71nf48ifbl/del_old_driverpacks.bat


If you get a chance to test the app, I would appreciate it if you write about your experience using it.


I also would like to make an instructional video. I can record my desktop and show how to get started using the app. I don’t want to bother with preparing a script, doing multiple takes or do any other editing, so I’m going be doing commentary as I show the program instead of adding the sound track after the video is recorded.

Is anyone interested me doing this video? What which topics should I cover: getting started, overview of features, detailed explanation of information on popups?
glennd said:
isn't SDI that thing that Reagan did in the 80s?
Click to expand...
SDI can means a lot of different things in different contexts like pretty much any other 3-letters abbreviation. Is it the most common meaning or something?

It was very difficult for me to come up with a name for my app. It didn't have a name the day before it was released a year ago. I'm still not fully satisfied with it(snappy sounds almost like sloppy) but I'm not gonna go through the pain of picking another name. I also noticed that English speaking users tend to drop the last part of its name and call it just "Snappy Driver"(a person who drives recklessly?) instead of "Snappy Driver Installer".
 
BadPointer said:
A new version of SDI is available: R159.


All driverpacks have been updated so you should be able to download them. Some driverpacks have been renamed this time, so you have to run the following script to delete old driverpacks:
http://www.mediafire.com/view/fcdzz71nf48ifbl/del_old_driverpacks.bat


If you get a chance to test the app, I would appreciate it if you write about your experience using it.


I also would like to make an instructional video. I can record my desktop and show how to get started using the app. I don’t want to bother with preparing a script, doing multiple takes or do any other editing, so I’m going be doing commentary as I show the program instead of adding the sound track after the video is recorded.

Is anyone interested me doing this video? What which topics should I cover: getting started, overview of features, detailed explanation of information on popups?

SDI can means a lot of different things in different contexts like pretty much any other 3-letters abbreviation. Is it the most common meaning or something?

It was very difficult for me to come up with a name for my app. It didn't have a name the day before it was released a year ago. I'm still not fully satisfied with it(snappy sounds almost like sloppy) but I'm not gonna go through the pain of picking another name. I also noticed that English speaking users tend to drop the last part of its name and call it just "Snappy Driver"(a person who drives recklessly?) instead of "Snappy Driver Installer".
Click to expand...


I'm always up for instructional videos!

Thank you for a great program.
 
The big thing for me, is that it runs off a Write-protected USB stick.:)

I've used it a few times recently, and I've yet to see any adverse effects.

Nice One !
 
bertie40 said:
The big thing for me, is that it runs off a Write-protected USB stick.:)
Click to expand...
I also have my trusty QUMO Yin & Yan but I wish there would be more USB flash sticks with such a switch.

By the way, you don't have to worry about viruses as much as you used to before because SDI will alert you if something fishy is going on. Try creating autorun.inf or hidden folders and see what happens.
 
I have my snappy database on my Kanguru 16GB, along with my d7ii folder and a few other bitz.

Obviously as it gets plugged into the great-unwashed'd machines (unwashed, I should talk, blimey I need a bath, anyway, I digress again), I'm wary of transferring nasties around with me.

Re : autoruns and hidden folders.
Oh I see, it comes up with a warning within the program.Obviously you need to run the prog first.
Image2.jpg
 
16k_zx81 said:
Just tested it on 3 machines.

All of them came up with installed drivers with 'driver signature enforcement' issues. (code 52)

Anyone else get this?
Click to expand...

I have seen this too. the software shows you before you install a driver or not if its been signed or not. The few times I have used Newer or better match drivers I have gotten that error or it blue screened on me. I have used it on new system builds to install all missing drivers and it worked great. not sure if it was a coincidence when I had issues (new or better drivers) and no issues when using it to install from scratch or not.
 
So far, I am loving SDI. Excellent work, I like it very much, I've already shared it with many of my tech friends, it's been excellent for me save for one very problematic system at work which I'll describe in a minute, I wish I'd thought to dump the hardware IDs at the time. My real question is, if I just keep the torrent seeded, am I automatically going to get updates?

The ONLY machine I've had issues on was a brand new Dell Ultrabook, an Inspiron 7450, maybe? In my normal process for work, I image the new machine and it slams in its own drivers from the image, then away I go. This is a one-off for us, so the drivers weren't in the image. I imaged it and almost nothing was picked up, so I thought hey---I'll use SDI. I plugged it in, it recognized all the missing stuff, I set to "all" and install and away it went. It failed bluetooth, no biggie that was like the one thing windows picked up. Everything else went fine, EXCEPT that as soon as I rebooted the machine, USB was totally dead. I even went as far as to uninstall all the USB related devices (root hub, usb 3 controller, etc) and reboot, and still, dead usb. I already had to reimage the machine because of an unrelated crypto issue, and on reimage I deselected all the usb related drivers and everything worked and was fine. Again, I should have dumped the hardware ID's in question, but I was more than a little slammed and there were other things going on, so I didn't.
 
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