Device Verifier
Drivers are specific to the hardware in the computer. Without knowing what hardware is in your computer, we cannot know exactly which drivers will be used.
Drivers written for Windows Vista are not backwards-compatible with Windows XP. Most hardware that has a driver for Vista should also have a driver for Windows XP.
WHQL- Windows Hardware Quality Labs testing
Theoretically, yes. Windows update can be set to downloaded the newest hardware drivers. And new drivers could easily resolve some kind of hardware issue. I would need to know more about the situation.
Find the drivers from the hardware manufacturer or use different hardware.
Since this has been posted under Windows 98, I presume the hardware is rather old. Usually, any drivers made specifically for Windows XP will work with all of the Service Packs. However, as regards to Windows 7, I highly doubt that the hardware will be supported. There are also probably specific drivers for Windows 7, as there usually are.
No. Hardware support and drivers between different editions of Windows 7 are identical.
A common problem with computer hardware involves the drivers. Many people will install new hardware (video card, sound card, network card, card readers, web cams) without installing the proper drivers. A driver tells windows how to use the hardware, and where it located, when not installed windows will not be able to use the newly added hardware, and may give many alerts on starting windows.
Install and uninstall drivers for new hardware already present in a Windows XP system.
WHQL. Windows Hardware Quality Labs testing and have received the windows logo.
device manager
It should do. Each time a new version of Windows is released, it usually incorporates the hardware drivers from previous versions. If not, there's likely to be drivers available on the internet.