Back Up All Drivers Before Reinstalling Windows with DISM
The classic reinstall trap: Windows is fresh, the desktop is clean — and there is no Wi-Fi, because the Wi-Fi driver was on the old installation you just erased. One command, run before you format, prevents the whole story.
✍️ Technical Anshu🪟 Windows 10 / 11⏱️ 9 minute read
🎥 Watch the full process in the video — safe driver installation and updates, step-by-step
DISM, a tool built into Windows, can export every third-party driver installed on your PC into a folder of your choice. Keep that folder on a USB stick or another drive, reinstall Windows, and then feed the drivers back — the PC returns to full hardware health in minutes, even with no internet at all. This is the technician's habit that turns reinstall day from a scavenger hunt into a routine. The commands below are exact and copy-paste ready.
Admin Terminal — the export command and what success looks like
✅ One folder per driver appears inside DriversBackup (oem1.inf, oem2.inf...)
✅ "The operation completed successfully" at the end of the list
⚠️ Destination must NOT be the drive you are about to format — use USB or another partition
👆 Example shown with D: as the backup drive — your letter may differ. Match it to your USB stick.
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Run the Export — One Command
Plug in a USB stick or pick a drive/partition that will survive the reinstall
Open Terminal or Command Prompt as administrator
Run: dism /online /export-driver /destination:D:\DriversBackup — replace D: with your backup drive's letter
Wait while DISM lists each exported driver, and confirm the folder filled up (often a few hundred MB to a few GB)
What you get: every third-party driver — the ones from manufacturers that Windows does not carry itself. The standard Microsoft drivers are already inside every Windows, so they need no backup.
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What This Backup Does and Does Not Cover
It covers the driver packages in the Windows driver store — network, display, audio, chipset, printers and the odd specialist device
It does not include the companion software — the fancy control panels and utilities that came with some drivers install separately
It preserves the driver versions you have now — perfect if the PC works well today; if a driver is currently broken, its broken version is what gets backed up
So export from a healthy system. A backup made on a good day is the whole point.
Windows installs every driver in the folder that matches your hardware; restart when done
Route two — per device in Device Manager: right-click the unknown device → Update driver → Browse my computer → point it at the DriversBackup folder with subfolders included. Slower, but precise when you only need one or two devices — start with network, so the fresh PC can reach the internet and help itself afterwards.
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Make It a Standing Habit
Keep the DriversBackup folder with the PC's other essentials — a labelled USB that lives with the machine
Re-export after any major driver change you are happy with, so the backup stays known-good
For a second PC of the same model in the office, this same folder is a gold mine — identical hardware, instant drivers
Two minutes of exporting buys you the calmest reinstall you will ever do.
🔴 Check the destination twice: exporting to a folder on the same C drive you are about to format is the one way to do this perfectly and lose everything anyway.
🎥 Watch the Complete Video Guide
Safe driver installation, Windows Update and Device Manager — the full process shown live, step-by-step.
It exports all third-party drivers from the driver store — the manufacturer drivers Windows does not ship itself. Built-in Microsoft drivers are not exported because every fresh Windows already contains them.
Can I use this backup on a different PC?
Only if the hardware matches — ideally the same model. Drivers install against hardware IDs, so a backup from one model mostly ignores a different model's devices. Same-model office PCs are the sweet spot.
The restore installed an older driver than Windows Update offers. Problem?
Not necessarily — your backup is the known-good set from a working system. Restore it first for a stable base; afterwards Windows Update can offer newer versions in the normal way, one at a time.
This guide is based on the Technical Anshu driver safety video • Stuck on any step? Ask in the video comments — you will get a reply there 🙏