how often do drivers stop a game playing?

[EnterTheStory (aka tolworthy)]

This morning I got an email from someone, saying my game wouldn't play. The first frame of the game would show, but not change. Music would play fine throughout, but the mouse (in the game) would freeze after about a second. She was using a Dell Inspiron laptop with Vista. My game is 640 x 480, 16 bit, 2.72, graphics on default settings (no DirectX).

It sounds like straightforward case of a driver problem. But she tried changing color depth and running in a window but still no joy. Every time I've seen a driver problem before, windowing or changing color depth fixed it. But not this time.

I realize that driver problems are inevitable sometimes - I've read about a few cases in the forum -  but I'm wondering how often this happens? One time out of a hundred? More? And if there's anything I can do about it?

[Pumaman]

It's hard to know, because we'd have to know what percentage of players had a problem. That sort of data is hard to come by -- especially because most people who have a problem starting a game will just delete it and give up, rather than reporting the issue.

[EnterTheStory (aka tolworthy)]

most people who have a problem starting a game will just delete it and give up, rather than reporting the issue.

Good point. Thanks for the reply.