FolderRisk: Do not touch

INF C:\Windows\INF

INF files for the drivers built into Windows and copies of installed third-party drivers (oemNN.inf), along with the setupapi logs.

Updated on 12 November 2026 By AltF4 Formation

What it’s for

C:\Windows\INF holds the INF (setup information) files of every driver Windows knows about, built-in ones and those added later. An INF is the text file of a driver package that tells the system what to copy, which registry keys to write and which devices the driver supports.

What it contains

The .inf files of in-box drivers and, as oemNN.inf, copies of installed third-party drivers. The driver’s own files are in the driver store (DriverStore\FileRepository).
.PNF files, precompiled versions of the INFs, regenerated as needed.
Device installation logs, including setupapi.dev.log (Plug and Play and drivers), setupapi.app.log and setupapi.setup.log: see their pages.
Language resource subfolders.

Risks and best practices

Do not delete INF or .PNF files by hand: the devices concerned would no longer be detected, updated or reinstalled properly. To remove a third-party driver, run pnputil /delete-driver oemNN.inf, which also cleans the driver store.
Editing an INF invalidates the driver’s signature. If a driver has to be adapted, republish the package with a signed INF.
A device that fails to install leaves its trace in setupapi.dev.log: read it before anything else.

Useful commands

# As administrator: installed third-party drivers (published name oemNN.inf, provider, version)
pnputil /enum-drivers

# Same list, as objects
Get-WindowsDriver -Online | Select-Object Driver, OriginalFileName, ProviderName, Version

# Find which driver an oemNN.inf is (version and date)
Select-String -Path "$env:windir\INF\oem12.inf" -Pattern 'DriverVer|^Provider'

# Remove a third-party driver (as administrator)
pnputil /delete-driver oem12.inf

Folder contents

Logs 3

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