Nothing Present in Device Manager!!!

[Brian]

Howdy All,

I've been having problems with my WinXP PC.

I went to look in device manager and no list is generated.

Nothing appears there.

Any ideas why?

Thanks,
Brian

 

[Wesley Vogel]

Start the Plug and Play service.

Open Services...
Start | Run | Type: services.msc | Click OK |
Scroll down to and double click Plug and Play |
Set Startup type to Automatic | Click Apply | Click the
Start button | When started, close Services

No Items Appear in the Device Manager List When You Open It
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;311504

--
Hope this helps. Let us know.

Wes
MS-MVP Windows Shell/User

In

 

[Pennywise]

|>Howdy All,
|>
|>I've been having problems with my WinXP PC.
|>
|>I went to look in device manager and no list is generated.
|>
|>Nothing appears there.
|>
|>Any ideas why?

Under view in the menu area select devices by type or some other view,
might help.

 

[Brian]

thanks Wesley.

After looking in Services, I found that all but 1 of XP services was
disabled!!!!

I have no idea what caused this, I'm investigating now.

 

[Kelly]

Hi Brian,

I have seen this behavior many times after cleaning nasties (spyware, etc)
from systems. Seems as though having a particular combo, leaves the system
services disabled. During the cleaning of those types of systems, after you
get the services set properly, you will then need to export the key from the
registry to the desktop.

Finish cleaning, reboot. Depending on how good of a job you did all should
be well. If not, run the reg file, then log off.

Good luck and keep us posted.

--

All the Best,
Kelly (MS-MVP)

Troubleshooting Windows XP
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com

 

[Guest]

Kelly -

Can you explain the "export the key from the registry to the desktop" part a
little more? I have the empty device manager problem. Thanks.

- Quinn

 

[Guest]

Greetings all.

I have the same problem. It's crippling me, as I can't get my scanner to be
recognized, and the problem seems to specifically affect my com ports. Though
nothing is displayed in the dev mgr, other non-com port devices are
functional. I also suspect the issue might be related to spyware (and
registry) cleaup, as I just recently installed and ran AdAware for about a
week. I've also tried the plug N play services recipe (and others fixes), but
to no avail. This problem is frustrating me as my daily bread and butter
revolves around the use of my scanner!

I'd also like to know more about this "export key from registry" business.

Thanks!

 

[Kelly]

What is the make and model of your scanner? Start with their support
forums/faq's. On a side note, not all devices are listed via the Device
Manager.

--

All the Best,
Kelly (MS-MVP/DTS&XP)

Troubleshooting Windows XP
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com

 

[Ludo Willems]

Dear all,
I have the same sad story! Domnloaded from Kazaa, ran AdAware and found 36
spyware/malware. One of them identified as "possible browser hijack".
Cleaned it all out (ran Adaware 3x) deleted the lot and rebooted. Surprise:
LAN icon and WiFi-connection icons gone from the systray. Looking into my
network places: both connections gone! And impossible to create new
ones.Then to the device manager: blank. Spend my saterday surfing the fora
and applied all the good advices from numerous people: PnP, services
start/stop;registering devmgr again, look vorr corrupted registry entries
and security setting etc etc, all witouth any result ! I am considering
re-installing WinXP(sp2) but if anyone would have found a
solution to this problem, i could avoid a clean install. BTW, it does seem a
widespread fenomen considering the number of entries in the varies internet
forums.
Regards,
Ludo

 

[R. McCarty]

Your post would seem to be the 4th or 5th recently with an empty Device
Manager table. One thing you might do, is run MSInfo32.Exe. When it
opens expand Hardware Resources & click on IRQs. Go through the
list and check for normal items like your NIC, IDE Controller and others.
Note the assignments (up to 23 with APICs). I would also examine the
Enum key at HKey_Local_Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum
especially the PCI subkey. Below each VEN_ key will be the actual
hardware on the PCI bus (such as NICs,) If the enum key is populated
then devices exist but aren't being shown via Device Manager.

 

[Ludo Willems]

Thanks for your prompt reply. As suggested, I checked the IRQ's: 16 of them
are populated with the normal things. Going into the registry, I find
"current control set/ENUM" completely empty! And so is CurrentControlSet003.
On the other hand ControlSet 001&002 have 23 entries in the PCI subkey. I
dont understand why. Can I rename the controlset 001 or 002 to
"currentControlSet" or is that playing with fire??
Ludo

 

[R. McCarty]

I'm still researching, but it appears this empty Device Manager table isn't
an isolated issue. The thing that I don't quite understand is the "Empty"
enum table, yet the PC still boots and the MSInfo32 shows the correct
IRQ Mappings. You could probably export a populated enum Key, then
edit it and change it's Key name to CurrentControlSet and import. I'd
probably want to take an image first because this could result in the PC
being unable to boot at all. If I followed the Annoyances.Org post onto
the DSLReports posting and understand it correctly, you might want to
consider the AproposFix. A number of postings in that thread indicated
the tool resolved their issue.

 

[Ludo Willems]

The AproposFix did it!!! All back to normal! But after re-installing
KB905749 (uninstalled previously as suggest in a forum), my WiFi-connection
to my router was lost. So, uninstalled KB905749 again and told Microsoft
they can keep it. Thanks again for your help.

 

[R. McCarty]

Appreciate you posting your results - Do I ever hate Malware. There is no
"Static" solution, everyday something new pops up. You wouldn't believe
the number of sites, tools and links required just to research this junk and
try to stay a few steps ahead.

 

[Guest]

Your solution sounds very promissing. I'm not very familiar with
'AproposFix'. I've found many resources pertaining to this solution and would
appreciate if someone could suggest a link to the best d/l site.

Many thanks.

 

[Guest]

Unbelievable! AproposFix delivered the goods!!! My device manager console is
back with all the usual entries displayed, plus the network connections
window now has returned to normal (I've not realized that nothing was
displayed as well there).

Many many thanks to R. McCarty and company!!!

PS I use to work as a tech support guy for a sexy 3D sw co., and recognize
the added value of discussion lists and am very grateful for the help
provided here. Merci!