So I installed a program known as the "Bluestacks App Player" a few months back. It's basically an emulator designed to run Android apps on a PC. When I first downloaded it, it told me it needed a more up-to-date driver. I thought this was weird, since Windows update is supposed to keep my drivers up-to-date automatically, but decided to go along with it anyway (because, you know, those Flappy Bird urges...). Anyway, as soon as it installed the driver, my entire screen went black for about 10 seconds. Then the screen reappeared, but with a really old Windows design that I had previously only seen when I booted my Windows 7 laptop in safe mode. After a minute or so however, the screen disappeared and then reappeared with the normal Windows 7 design and layout. I started up the Bluestacks program, and it worked fine and I was able to play some of my favorite Android apps on my laptop (Temple Run, Flappy Bird, Cut the Rope, etc). I thought this was really cool and decided to not do a system restore, despite the scariness of the screen blacking out / displaying the safemode style of Windows. After a month or so I had basically forgot about it.
However, the other day when I was watching some videos on Youtube, my screen blacked out for a few seconds before reappearing. An error message appeared, which I ignored assuming it was a one time glitch. However, a minute later when I was watching another Youtube video, the screen once again blacked out for a few seconds. This time I read the error message. (see attached image).
My first thought was "What the f***! I don't even have Windows 8 installed. My machine came with and has always had Windows 7."
So my question is, why do I apparently have a driver for Windows 8(R) installed on my machine? Could a compatibility issue between this Win 8 driver and my Win 7 OS be causing my intermittent screen crashes? Also, is there a way to tell what drivers I am supposed to have on my machine?
Here's another pic. of the "programs" that were installed with
Bluestacks. Some of them sound like they may have installed drivers.
Any help / advice would be appreciated. (But DON'T just tell me to do a system restore / repair install.)
P.S.: The youtube crashes have become more frequent recently; usually my screen blacks out either when trying to load a Youtube video or midway through a Youtube video. It happens on average at least once or twice a day. The screen usually only blacks out for a few seconds, then reappears with the error message shown above.
Also, I have checked my computer manufacturer's website. I already tried downloading what i believe is the correct driver.
However, after downloading nothing actually happened. When I checked downloads, it had downloaded an intel folder with a bunch of files inside it. How do i make it install the driver?