What is Driver Toaster, and why is it giving this error message?

margrave55 · 08 Jan 2018

I updated to FCU 1709 a few days ago, and now I periodically get this popup error:

What is Driver Toaster, and why is it giving this error message?-drivertoaster.jpg

The picture, above, has poor contrast.
The title bar reads:
C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\DriverToaster_1.5.0.0_x86__rqs2nt378nwsp\DriverToaster.exe

The body of the popup reads:
Windows cannot access the specified device, path, or file.
You may not have the appropriate permissions to access the item.

What is Driver Toaster?
Why does it give this error?

antspants · 08 Jan 2018

I am pretty sure it is a legitimate part of the Dell Support Assistant. Seen it on my Dell Laptop a few months ago, but my memory being bad I forget the circumstance. Check out the Dell Support Forums maybe?
I recall having to update the Dell SupportAssist application

Berton · 08 Jan 2018

I see that Windows Apps Folder was added to my ASUS Notebook w/Intel CPU on 1/6/2018 [haven't checked my other computers yet] but it is marked as Read Only and Hidden, won't allow access. It is an empty Folder.

EDIT: I just checked my ASUS Desktop w/Home and my Custom Desktop w/Pro, both have AMD CPUs and both now have that empty Folder.

margrave55 · 08 Jan 2018

It seems that DriverToaster is part of Dell Support Assistant.

Like you, I don't have access to that DriverToaster folder ... nor to the WindowsApps folder above it ... at least not when using Windows Explorer. Maybe that's the symptom referenced in that popup error. That program cannot access the DriverToaster folder any better than I can.

Anyway, I can access those folders from a bash shell. So I tried to use icacls to give myself permissions ... but these folders are "hard-locked". I cannot change permissions.

Anyway, it seems there have been lots of problems with Dell Support Assistant ever since people got FCU some months ago. I only got FCU a few days ago so I'm late to the party.

A search of DriverToaster on dell.com turned up nothing. So I don't know whether there's an updated version available.

Anyway ... when I start Dell Support Assistant, the tile for Drivers is grayed out ... and then comes that error/popup, which I dismiss. Then the Driver tile becomes active. So I clicked on Drivers it and I found (and installed) a Dell drive management update. (Whoopee!)

There's also a BIOS update waiting for me. I'm guessing that's part of the Meltdown/Spectre fixer-upper? I'll get to that later.

But still nothing about that popup/error.

margrave55 · 20 Jan 2018

Update: I opened up the ACL permissions on the folder where this program resides.
So now (I guess) the program has permission to run.
But now I get a different pop-up error message. This one complains something about wrong parameters being used ....

What is Driver Toaster, and why is it giving this error message?-x0.png

It tries to run automatically every morning somewhere around 9:00 or 9:30 AM, and it pops up that "wrong parameters" error every time.
I don't know what is the cause.

I can run DriverToaster directly from its Start Menu shortcut ... and I get that same message ...

What is Driver Toaster, and why is it giving this error message?-x1.png

But in this case the error message goes away when I click OK ... and the Dell "Support Assist" application is there.

What is Driver Toaster, and why is it giving this error message?-x2.png

The app works fine this way.
I can click on the Drivers/Downloads ... and that works.
I got the latest BIOS update there (probably the Spectre fixer-upper).

It's just that the 9 AM pop-up error keeps appearing every day, and I don't know why.

Bree · 20 Jan 2018

Berton said:

I see that Windows Apps Folder was added to my ASUS Notebook w/Intel CPU on 1/6/2018 [haven't checked my other computers yet] but it is marked as Read Only and Hidden, won't allow access. It is an empty Folder.

EDIT: I just checked my ASUS Desktop w/Home and my Custom Desktop w/Pro, both have AMD CPUs and both now have that empty Folder.

You mean C:\Program Files\WindowsApps ? It is not empty, you just aren't allowed to see inside it.

This is the folder that contains all your installed Windows Apps, like Photos, Groove Music, News, Weather etc. Permissions are highly restricted to protect these apps from tampering. The owner is TrustedInstaller and the only permissions Users have are to Read and Execute the files. Even signed in as an administrator you'll be running File Explorer as a standard user - that's why it says the size is zero, it doesn't have permission to see the files!

The Administrators group has List permission. From a Command Prompt (Admin) you can at least list the files. If you CD into WindowsApps and type DIR /S you'll list all the files it contains. Mine contains about 2GB...

Code:

C:\Program Files\WindowsApps> DIR /S
...
...
     Total Files Listed:
           12936 File(s)  2,100,641,768 bytes
            4824 Dir(s)  172,493,045,760 bytes free
C:\Program Files\WindowsApps>