In tip 2703, we discussed how an ordinary users can install 3rd party device drivers.
If you wish to centrally store these device drivers, create a share on your server with sub-folders, such as \\ServerName\Drivers\NIC, where Drivers is the share, and copy the driver to it. On each Windows 2000 computer, edit the registry, using a .REG file, Regedt32 (remotely from your desktop), REG, or the freeware REG. You must append the \\ServerName\Drivers\NIC path to the DevicePath value name at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion. The default value of this REG_EXPAND_SZ data type is %SystemRoot%\Inf. Amend it to be c:\WINNT\Inf;\\ServerName\Drivers\Nic.
NOTE: You MUST manually expand the %SystemRoot% variable.
When the new hardware is installed and a user logs on, the new Plug and Play hardware is detected and the drivers are automatically installed from the DevicePath path.
