Computer Query - 3rd Party Driver & Software Updater?

I have my ex work Sony Vaio desktop that I want to let the children use for homework, games etc.

It has a recovery disk so I have done a clean install however all of the pre-installed software is now out of date.

The machine is too old for Sony support to provide updates but looking for drivers etc on line, I see a number of 3rd party sites offering driver / software support and updates. Are there any that are both good and trustworthy?

Many thanks

Depends on the site. Something like Softpedia will generally provide genuine drivers, but some sites do have all kinds of nasty stuff in the driver packages.
Drivers can usually be found on the website of the components' manufacturers. GFX card drivers will be at either Nvidia or ATI, SD card reader drivers at whoever built that card reader for Sony, etc etc.

Sometimes you need to think outside of the box. Other manufacturers may use the same components and provide new drivers for them.
Packard Bell wouldn't provide Vista drivers for my netbook, so I ended up getting some of them from the Samsung and Toshiba sites.
Sure, it takes quite a bit of research and some trial and error, but in the end it can be very satisfying. I did it in about a day on mine, but then again I'm pretty good at these things.

Mind you, you don't need the latest drivers in order to make it function properly.
If it works, don't fix it. My desktop PC's drivers haven't been updated in over a year.

Thanks for replying.

The main problem was with Microsoft - I couldn't get any updates until I had found an service pack 1 or 1.5 for XP. nor would my Security package - Kaspersky run.

I use XP sp2 on an Itronix, dell precision and a Panasonic laptop, the drivers windows loads when it installs work fine on all three.

ubuntu?

Check thoroughly before updating any NVIDIA video driver.

I had an old donated Sony Vaio that my son was hoping to use. Went through updating the drivers. This was successful until we updated the NVIDIA video driver. NVDIA website automatically identified the card and we duly updated the suggested driver. On reboot we had a blank screen. Sony and NVIDIA provided no useful help. After some online searching it would appear that only the Sony video driver could be used. Ended up binning it in the end.

Windows update no longer supports XP with no SPs. Download XP SP3 from here:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download ... aspx?id=24

This is a standalone installer and has no pre requirements.

Then use windows update to bring everything else down. They will have all the newest drivers for your laptop.