HP Creates Own Windows OS to Get Printer Drivers Working

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.bbspot.com/News/2006/02/hp-printer-driver.html' target='_blank'>http://www.bbspot.com/News/2006/02/hp-printer-driver.html</a><br /><br /></div><i>"HP announced that instead of getting their printer drivers to work with Windows they had created their own operating system. "It was a lot easier to do that than to figure out why our drivers kept crashing systems," said HP software engineer Harold Wong. "Our drivers were at 300 MB and still didn't work, so we said 'screw this' and made our own OS." Wong said their OS is "99% compatible" with Windows. "Users should not see any problems unless they load new programs after the drivers are installed, or if they try to print a large PDF." The HP OS is called Windows. "We didn't want to confuse the consumer with new names, but we wanted to distinguish our product, so we italicized the 'o'," said HP marketing director Sarah Wankins."</i><br /><br />A little humour to lighten your Friday - if you've ever had trouble with printer drivers (I have), and stared with shock and awe at the seemingly insane size of the printer software downloads (I have), this is a sarcastic story for you. :lol:

[Kris Kumar]

:lol: I have been on both sides of the printer driver. As someone who uses them and someone who has written one. I haven't been able to figure out why I can't print when I want to. Not to mention those PDFs and PowerPoints that get messed up.

I think it's time I told my boss, I want to develop my own OS - Windaws

PS: I don't work for HP. ;-)

[Kacey Green]

I regularly help people download and install printer drivers, they're getting better but HUGE! I think part of the problem is Windows, when you have to reboot after purging the print queue to actually get it to purge, running a healthy XP system with plenty of ram and all the updates something's wrong.