How to clear driver cache

Question

_{Tuesday, June 19, 2018 3:28 AM}

Hi,

I have been facing issues with driver installation. The issue occurs when I try to install my driver but driver installation fails with error 0x800f0203 with the description: "There is no driver selected for the device information set or element.".
"<g class="gr_ gr_19 gr-alert gr_spell gr_inline_cards gr_run_anim ContextualSpelling" data-gr-id="19" id="19">pnputil</g> -e" does not list the driver. So, I am not able to clear it using the command "<g class="gr_ gr_20 gr-alert gr_spell gr_inline_cards gr_run_anim ContextualSpelling" data-gr-id="20" id="20">pnputil</g> -d <oem_xx.inf>. But, after using process monitor, I found that the installation was still using the cache present in the C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository folder.
This does not happen always. The one common thing I noticed is that they have the Windows.old folder in their C: which means they upgraded their windows. So far I have seen this with Windows 10 only.

Thanks for the Help.
Deepan Negi

All replies (3)

_{Tuesday, June 19, 2018 7:56 AM}

Hi Deepan,

You have done many things

The driver store is a trusted location of inbox and third-party driver packages. Before a driver can be installed, it must first be injected into the driver store which is located under C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository. If you're having issues with the File Repository taking up a large space, you can try running the disk cleanup tool to free up some space on your PC

Considering your PC is upgraded from previous Windows, run disk cleanup tool will delete many files and Windows.old folder.

Regards

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_{Tuesday, June 19, 2018 1:21 PM}

Hi Teemo,

My issue is not with disk space but I want to integrate the cache clean functionality inside my application. Is there a way to programmatically delete the cached folder from Driver Store?

Most of the time, pnputil.exe is able to list and delete the cache but in some cases, it fails. I need a more dependable way of cleaning driver cache.

Regards

_{Wednesday, June 20, 2018 1:22 AM}

>>programmatically delete the cached folder from Driver Store

You need to use script to achieve it, but sorry I am not familiar with scripting.

How to delete all files and folders in a directory?

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1288718/how-to-delete-all-files-and-folders-in-a-directory

Please Note: Since the website is not hosted by Microsoft, the link may change without notice. Microsoft does not guarantee the accuracy of this information.

Regards

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