This article describes how to remove unused drivers that are not shown in Device Manager

Introduction

After using Acronis Universal Restore to transfer a Windows system from one computer to another, all the drivers for devices present on the original system also migrate to the new one. In most cases this means that they stay there even though there is no hardware corresponding to those drivers.

To improve the performance of the new system and to prevent possible driver conflicts, one may remove those unused drivers.

Solution

To remove unused device drivers the following should be done (See also Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 315539):

1. Boot the restored system;

2. Click Start -> Run and type cmd:
   

   

3. Click OK, and enter the following commands in the command-line:

   set devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices=1
   start devmgmt.msc
   

   

4. In Device Manager window, select View -> Show Hidden Devices;
   

   

5. Expand the device tree branches to look for the washed out icons that indicate unused devices;
   

   

6. To remove an unused device driver, right-click the icon and select Uninstall;
   

   

7. Once you are done, close the window and type exit in the command-line.

More Information

Microsoft states that the drivers installed for devices that are not present in the system are not loaded. However it still is a possible situation that unused drivers may conflict.

Using the solution provided in this article you can also delete all the unused network adapters, which will reset all the occupied interface numbers. (E.g, if you want your new adapter to get the name of Local Area Connection without a number)