XP Pro no longer recognizes my camcorder

[Uncle Henry]

At first, I had no problem using my digital camcorder with
the IEEE hookup. Now, Windows totally ignores it. I saw
where this was a problem with an earlier version of
Windows (Win98, I believe). Unfortunately, I can find
nothing concerning XP.

I was going to get into making videos of various events.
I have enough money sunk into this PC and camera to buy a
small car.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

 

[PapaJohn \(MVP\)]

Maybe delete it from your hardware configuration, reboot and let Windows
re-detect it and setup the 'drivers' again....
--
PapaJohn

Movie Maker 2 - www.papajohn.org
Photo Story 2 - www.photostory.papajohn.org

..

 

[Uncle Henry]

Thank you for getting back to me.

For a while, the camera worked perfectly. Then - nothing.

It is no longer listed among my devices. Restarting does
no good. I tried to manually install it by going to
Scanners and Cameras. Canon is not listed among the
Cameras. I tried Imaging Devices, but nothing there for
Canon, either. I did find one group that mentioned Canon,
but it was only scanners and printers.

I tried just loading it from the disk. It wouldn't "take."

Could I have accidentally moved a jumper some where or
changed something in my BIOS?

This is a pure mystery to me.

Thanks again for your input.

Henry

 

[Graham Hughes, MVP Digital Media]

Unless you have been playing in teh bios it should all be fine.
When you connect the cam do you get the xp ping, found new hardware?
Does device manager show any yellow ! marks?
Try uninstalling the firewire card and then rebooting the machine to see if
that helps, as it finds the drivers again.
Have you installed any other software/ downloaded any codecs etc since it
was working well? If so try using system restore or uninstalling the apps.
Can you try the cam and cable on another pc? To see if either has developed
a fault.

Graham

 

[Guest]

I have been going around and around trying to find out
what I have done to my PC.

The main ingredients:
ASUS P4C800-E Deluxe Motherboard with the IEEE 1394 built-
in.
Windows XP pro with SP1
Pinnacle Studio 8 (with the recent update)
Canon GL2 DV Camcorder
1 Meg Corsair Ram

Loading movies into the PC worked fine for about three
weeks - then nothing. Device Manager does not show any
conflicts - nor does it show the DV Camcorder. I have
tried every way I can think of to get the driver re-
installed. The PC does not recognize the camcorder and
will not take the driver off of the CD when I try to force
it in.

From what I can read, the camcorder's driver has to be in
the inf Folder under WINDOWS. Actually, it has to be in
an oem file within the inf folder. The oem files have a
number as their last digit; e.g., oem0, oem1, etc. The
computer will automatically put an oem.PNF file
immediately under the oem.inf file when there is a driver
inside the oem.inf listing. The best way to understand
what I am trying to say is to use Explorer and look at
what is on your machine.

In looking at my PC, I see that oem3.inf and oem6.inf are
empty. I am led to believe that, in my case, the unzipped
version of CANDV_XP.INF (downloaded from Canon) goes in
one of the oem files and a driver with a name similar to
MICROSOFT DV CAMERA AND VCR goes under the other.

So, if I'm so smart, why haven't I solved the problem?
First, I don't know where to find the Microsoft driver.
Second, I am not sure of myself in this area. I'm
reluctant to try because I might mess this thing up so
badly that the parts of it that work might never work
again. I paid enough for this PC and the semi-pro camera
to buy a good second-hand car.

I would appreciate any feedback, especially info on how to
find the Microsoft DV camera and VCR driver..

Thank you.

 

[Graham Hughes, MVP Digital Media]

Is the firewire port on a separate pci card or part of the motherboard?
The canon drivers will normally be for using things like the usb connection
for download from the media card, the firewire port should use generic
windows drivers, so long as it is ohci compliant. What does it say for
drivers in device manager for the ieee1394 bus host controller?
Have you uninstalled the device from device manager and then tried
re-installing it? and if it is a pci card, after uninstalling the device,
remove the card, boot up the pc, replace card in a different pci slot if
possible and then reboot and allow windows to find the drivers.
Have you been able to try the cam and cable elsewhere?

Graham

 

[Uncle Henry]

The Firewire port is built into the motherboard. I un-
and then re-installed it. Told the PC to look for a new
driver. Ended up where I started.

The information I copied is this: IEEE 1394 Bus host
controller. Location PCI bus 3, device 3, function 3.
Driver revision 5.1.2535.0 date 7/1/2001.

It worked fine for about three weeks, then just stopped.
I have been looking all over the Internet, and it seems
like this is happening to a lot of people with firewire
cameras - not just those with Canon products.

Thanks for helping me try to solve this mystery.

 

[John Kelly]

Hello there,

No really good news I'm afraid. Your problem is typical for all computer
users where these devices and graphics boards sound board etc etc are built
into the system. You can not remove the device from the operating system
because you cannot properly reboot the system and allow it to settle down
without the device before you re-install.

A solution I used last night when an XP box would not "forget" the device
that in this case had actually been removed was to install a backup made
before the device was ever installed. For me that worked a treat, but only
because it was a full backup.

The problem arises because Windows does not clean up behind itself and most
installed programs do not uninstall properly. As soon as you start the
machine and it discovers a new device it will look for the necessary files
and when it finds it you end up back where you started....

Solutions
=======

1) Remove the CMOS battery backup and wait around 8 hrs, or if you know
which pins to short out do that and reset the CMOS. Then disable the device
in the CMOS so that XP (In theory) will not see the device. Then you go
through the uninstall procedure, reboot the computer for the reason above
and to be assured that XP does not see the device. Then reverse the CMOS
setting simply by enabling the device and go through the new device
procedure. If this procedure fails (not likely but possible) then you need
option 2.

2) Use either your System restore disks or XP install disk and wipe
everything from your system and start afresh

If I can help further let me know.....I would be surprised if option one
fails....make sure you understand what you are doing and why before you
touch it and make sure you have properly earthed yourself before touching
the motherboard.
--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work

 

[Graham Hughes, MVP Digital Media]

I'd go with John's suggestions now and my thought's would be a fresh
install of XP, which is always worth doing now and then, because if you have
installed and uninstalled programmes there is always lots of crap left
behind. This is where you find keeping a ghost image of your initial working
set up very useful, as it's a lot easier to get set up than a complete
installation of lots of apps, and it's only when we meet something like this
that we then decide to do it for next time!!!!!!!!! Well I did anyway. If
you don't have a copy buy either norton ghost or powerquest drive image (my
favourite) and after re-installing xp and all your apps, make a copy of it
all and save it away somewhere safe.
Graham

 

[Rich]

Hello There,

To all of you who sent emails about the website, and for any of you who
might wonder what's going on....I took an overdose of idiot pills some time
this afternoon....and deleted most of the website from the server!!! I
actually sat there watching one directory after another vanish and thinking
"that seems to be taking rather a long time" Well it took long enough for
most of the site to disappear.

The complete web site is now uploading, as it is rather large this will
take some time to achieve So please hang on...service will be resumed as
soon as the idiots pills wear off!

--
Best Wishes.....John Kelly
www.the-kellys.org
www.the-kellys.co.uk
All material gained from other sources is duly acknowledged. No Value is
obtained by publishing in any format other peoples work