Driver Management

Last Updated: April 07, 2026

A driver is software on a device that converts the data that needs to be printed into a format that a printer understands.

Each printer manufacturer has unique drivers for specific printer models and operating systems (OSs), and each driver has customizable profile settings (color, duplex, etc.), which can be time-consuming to manage. The Admin Console simplifies driver management by providing a central location to add, update, and remove drivers and profiles.

The Admin Console provides three methods to upload a new driver to the database:

• Uploading drivers while creating printer objects.
• The Drivers / Profiles tab on the printer object.
• The Driver / Profile Repository option in the Tools menu.

All drivers that you upload to the Vasion Print instance appear in the Driver / Profile Repository and can be attached to other printer objects.

Key Points

Review the following key points:

• When you upload a driver with the printer's Drivers / Profiles tab, it attaches directly to that printer. We recommend using this method when uploading new drivers for existing printer objects.
• When you update a driver, use the Replace button in the Driver / Profile Repository, which updates all printer objects using the old driver to the new driver.
• You can upload Windows drivers with only a Windows device.
• You can upload macOS drivers with only a macOS device, and you must install them on the device.

Type 4 Drivers

Understand that Type 4 drivers are incompatible with TCP / IP printer objects when implementing Vasion Print because they turn off port monitoring, which is a key feature for the app. A TCP / IP printer that is installed on a device and uses a Type 4 driver can affect printing. Other printers, such as Universal Serial Bus (USB) and software printers, like Adobe and Microsoft XPS Document Writer, can still use Type 4 drivers without issue.

Universal Drivers

Printer manufacturers provide "universal" or "global" drivers that are compatible with multiple models. Rather than uploading printer-specific drivers for each model in an environment, you can upload a single compatible universal driver. If a printer is incompatible with a universal driver, upload the driver that the manufacturer recommends.

OSs with different bit types, 32 bit or 64 bit, require different universal drivers.

Driver / Profile Repository

The Driver / Profile Repository, which you can locate by going to Tools Driver / Profile Repository, is the management hub for all drivers and profiles in your environment. The repository lists all drivers uploaded to your instance, and you can use it to add, modify, replace, and remove drivers and profiles. For more details refer to Driver / Profile Repository.

After you upload drivers to the repository, you still need to assign the drivers to printers using their Drivers / Profiles tabs.

Driver Profiles

Driver profiles are customizable settings, like color, black and white, duplex, simplex, etc., that you assign to a driver and include during printer installation. For more details refer to Profile Management.

Annotation Strings

When you upload a driver, Vasion Print uses the name of the printer model as the name for the driver. However, you cannot have multiple drivers in the repository with the same name. Each driver that you upload must have a unique annotation string. The annotation string appends to the driver name so that you can store multiple versions of the driver.

Add a New Driver

Download the driver from a trusted source, and follow the steps below:

Replace Drivers

The Driver / Profile Repository contains all the drivers that you upload to your instance, related driver profiles, and additional functions to sort, replace, and delete drivers.

Use the Replace button to change one driver to another, automatically update all related printer objects with the new driver, and remove the old driver from the repository. The best use of this button is to update a driver or migrate printers to a universal driver.

Do the following to replace a driver:

1. In the Admin Console, go to Tools Driver / Profile Repository.
2. Select the driver that you want to replace.
3. Select the Replace button in the upper-right corner.

4. Choose either Replace With Exisiting Driver or Replace With New Driver.

   

Replace With Exisiting Driver

Replace With New Driver

1. A modal appears showing all the printers that are using that driver. If the change is acceptable for all the affected printers, select OK.

   

2. Select a new driver to upload in the Choose a driver to replace the existing driver in the repository modal.
3. Navigate to the driver or INF file that you want to upload, and select it.
4. Modify the Annotation String with a unique identifier.
5. Select Upload.

This action removes the old driver from the repository and attaches the new driver to the printer objects that were using the old driver.

Delete Drivers

The Driver / Profile Repository lists all uploaded drivers and is where you can delete unused drivers.

Remove a driver from all printer objects before you delete it. You cannot delete a driver from the repository if it is attached to printer objects.