> Why do we even have that lever

For plug-and-play devices with multiple configuration knobs. It is nice to be able to click through a printer wizard to configure how one wants to print their documents. Likewise with an audio interface: loopback settings, codec, sampling rate, gain and volume of channels, etc. Or consider a USB CNC mill; configuring things like milling revolution rate, setting which bit is installed, what lubricant is used, etc. Or consider the Nvidia/AMD control panels for their GPUs; things like colour depth and space, resolution, scaling, anti-aliasing, vertical synch, power settings, etc.

Some of these settings are device- and even manufacturer-specific; one might argue these are more than a driver or the platform can or should provide. That being said, this stuff should go into a user-mode driver...

That LG have exploited this functionality to install adware is on them.

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