Downloading Printer Drivers from the Print Server

This article describes how a Windows client decides whether printer drivers should be downloaded from the print server to the client.

The client uses the following information, in the order listed below, to determine whether or not to download a printer driver from the print server:

• If the client does not have the driver, it is downloaded from the server.
• If the client and server have the same drivers and the drivers are the same version, the date of the driver files on the client and server are compared. If any one of the server driver files is newer than the file on the client, the drivers are updated.
• If the client and server have the same driver but with a different version, the server's drivers are downloaded and the client uses the driver with the latest version.

For printer driver date comparison, the modified date can be used. See the Modified Date line on the General tab in the file's properties in Windows Explorer.