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| Thread ID: 40915 | 2003-12-23 11:17:00 | genius VideoCam Live camera dont work! | dan1234 (5028) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 202506 | 2003-12-23 11:17:00 | My Genius VideoCam Live web cam has decided not to work. In the system properites dialogue box, under USB controllers it shows it as "%USB/UNKNOWN.DeviceDesc%" I've already uninstalled and then reinstalled the driver that came with the camera & windows still doesn't recognise that it's there. I've also tried removing the device in the Device Manager tab of System Properties, and then plugging in the camera again and letting windows recognise the camera and select a driver for it, however it comes up with the same thing ("%USB/UNKNOWN.DeviceDesc%"). Also downloaded a driver from the Genius website, just in case it needed an update but it is exactly the same as my version from the CD. Can anyone out there help me get my web cam working again? any help much appreciated. I'm using Win98SE |
dan1234 (5028) | ||
| 202507 | 2003-12-23 19:06:00 | Are you able to test your USB port with another USB device to determine whether it has become faulty? | tommy (2826) | ||
| 202508 | 2003-12-23 22:17:00 | yeah, I've got a scanner in the other port, so I've tried swapping them over but still no luck. A cause could be that my sister has a Sony P8 digital camera & has installed the driver for that, maybe this could have caused a conflict between the drivers? I've tried uninstalling the two drivers, then reinstalling the genius driver, but it comes up with the same result. The two devices were working fine together until 2 days ago, when the problem just came up out of nowhere... beats me. |
dan1234 (5028) | ||
| 202509 | 2003-12-23 23:31:00 | If no one can come up with any solutions a last resort could be to remove all drivers and devices and reinstall Windows. | Fire-and-Ice (3910) | ||
| 202510 | 2003-12-23 23:40:00 | before reinstalling i would go try it on another pc just to make sure the camera hasn't died. | tweak'e (174) | ||
| 202511 | 2003-12-24 01:09:00 | It's suspicious that the USB controller is saying "unknown" device. Before any device drivers are involved, plugging in a USB device causes some messages to go between the controller and the device. The device sends a message giving: manufacturer code number, model number, version number. The controller driver looks at a list which shows what devices it knows about (has drivers for). It then loads the appropriate driver, and away it goes. If it doesn't know a device, it can't do anything useful, so it says so. So either the camera is broken, so it can't identify itself to the controller, or the controller's device table is corrupted, or the camera-driver has be wiped/corrupted. |
Graham L (2) | ||
| 202512 | 2003-12-24 06:27:00 | Hmm, interesting. So how can I find out if the USB controller's driver table is corrupted and/or the webcam's driver is corrupted? And therefore, where can I get a new USB controller driver? |
dan1234 (5028) | ||
| 202513 | 2003-12-26 11:13:00 | The mystery is solved. I feel like a bit of a loser writing how I fixed the problem, but it might help out others who have problems with USB periphials...make sure there are batteries in the device if it takes them when you connect it to the computer! My camera works after it has been plugged into the computer without batteries, but for the initial sending of data to the computer after it has been plugged in requires power (which comes from the batteries) so if the batteries are flat, then computer just comes back with "unkown device" or something similar. so in the end there was no big deal. lesson learnt is to check the simple things first, then look further a field. |
dan1234 (5028) | ||
| 202514 | 2003-12-26 20:24:00 | Thanks for letting us know what the solution was, it could very well help someone else with a similar problem in the future. It is easy to overlook simple things but we all do it at sometime or other. :-) | Susan B (19) | ||
| 202515 | 2003-12-27 01:49:00 | At least you had plugged it in. :D That's an interesting one. I suppose it's so that the USB interface can set itself up even if the camera is turned off when it is plugged in. That might indicate that the interface is pulling a bit from the battery even if it's turned off, so it would be a good idea to have batteries removed while the camera's not in use. |
Graham L (2) | ||
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