Did Windows 8 Eat My Cameras?

[BillW50]

Maybe just a coincidence. But I purchased two Dell Latitude ST tablets.
They came with Windows 7 Pro SP1. The original plan was to run Windows 7
on one and Windows 8 on the other. Although I was going to purchase
licenses for both to run Windows 8. Just in case the future of Windows 7
becomes obsolete.

Those that have done so before me has stated some problems running
Windows 8. Mainly they are a tad slower than Windows 7, WiFi problems,
and camera problems (these has two cameras). I never seen the WiFi
problems, but the other two I have experienced this too.

Anyway I did get the cameras working somewhat under Windows 8. I backed
up Windows 7 on one machine and installed Windows 8 fresh (as most
people said they had the best luck going this route). Well what I had
working with the cameras went downhill. Now Windows 8 didn't complain,
but nothing showed at all, totally blank.

Ok, backed up Windows 8 and restored Windows 7. Dang, the Dell utility
(which doesn't work under Windows 8) says that something is using the
camera(s). Nonsense! All of my fancy utilities says nothing is using the
camera(s). Even Zentimo would complain if something was using it if I
tried to remove it and it never did.

I really dislike dual booting systems, but this was driving me nuts. So
I copied one Windows 7 backup with one Windows 8 on the same drive in
different partitions. I did this many times before and it isn't that
hard to get both of them bootable. And I used BCD as a third party boot
manager in this fashion. Although that Windows 8 secure boot threw up a
fit. PIA to get around that problem. And like others, booting in Windows
7 after Windows 8 was booted caused Windows 7 to run chkdsk on the
Windows 8 partition. Although still no help. So I abandoned
dualbooting... thank goodness.

So what it looks like to me is everything can see the cameras are truly
there, but nothing can communicate with either of them. Maybe this whole
thing is just a coincidence and that there is just a lost connection
somewhere. But is it? So far the second slate tablet is working
wonderfully under Windows 7. I don't know if I would try Windows 8 just
yet on it. I even cloned the working Windows 7 one over to the
non-functioning camera one and still no dice. So that pretty much
eliminates software as the problem.

--
Bill
Dell Latitute Slate Tablet 128GB SSD ('12 era) - Thunderbird v12
Intel Atom Z670 1.5GHz - 2GB - Windows 7 SP1 and Windows 8

[Paul]

BillW50 wrote:
> Maybe just a coincidence. But I purchased two Dell Latitude ST tablets.
> They came with Windows 7 Pro SP1. The original plan was to run Windows 7
> on one and Windows 8 on the other. Although I was going to purchase
> licenses for both to run Windows 8. Just in case the future of Windows 7
> becomes obsolete.
>
> Those that have done so before me has stated some problems running
> Windows 8. Mainly they are a tad slower than Windows 7, WiFi problems,
> and camera problems (these has two cameras). I never seen the WiFi
> problems, but the other two I have experienced this too.
>
> Anyway I did get the cameras working somewhat under Windows 8. I backed
> up Windows 7 on one machine and installed Windows 8 fresh (as most
> people said they had the best luck going this route). Well what I had
> working with the cameras went downhill. Now Windows 8 didn't complain,
> but nothing showed at all, totally blank.
>
> Ok, backed up Windows 8 and restored Windows 7. Dang, the Dell utility
> (which doesn't work under Windows 8) says that something is using the
> camera(s). Nonsense! All of my fancy utilities says nothing is using the
> camera(s). Even Zentimo would complain if something was using it if I
> tried to remove it and it never did.
>
> I really dislike dual booting systems, but this was driving me nuts. So
> I copied one Windows 7 backup with one Windows 8 on the same drive in
> different partitions. I did this many times before and it isn't that
> hard to get both of them bootable. And I used BCD as a third party boot
> manager in this fashion. Although that Windows 8 secure boot threw up a
> fit. PIA to get around that problem. And like others, booting in Windows
> 7 after Windows 8 was booted caused Windows 7 to run chkdsk on the
> Windows 8 partition. Although still no help. So I abandoned
> dualbooting... thank goodness.
>
> So what it looks like to me is everything can see the cameras are truly
> there, but nothing can communicate with either of them. Maybe this whole
> thing is just a coincidence and that there is just a lost connection
> somewhere. But is it? So far the second slate tablet is working
> wonderfully under Windows 7. I don't know if I would try Windows 8 just
> yet on it. I even cloned the working Windows 7 one over to the
> non-functioning camera one and still no dice. So that pretty much
> eliminates software as the problem.
>

To learn something about cameras, I like to read articles
on using Linux with them. Sometimes, you learn something
technical about the cameras, that explains potential gotchas
with Windows. Like, maybe the camera uses runtime "firmware"
that is loaded by the driver. And it's not communicating,
because the firmware didn't get loaded for some reason.

But searching for details from the Linux world, can tell you
what other cameras are similar, what special features they
might have (loadable firmware) and so on. You don't have to
run Linux, just learn from the experiences of others, getting
Linux to use those particular cameras. Then, once you know what
the special requirements might be, use keywords of such, in
some Windows related searches.

Webcams come in "UVC compliant" and "custom". A UVC compliant
one is supposed to work with the built-in UVC driver (so it works
right away). On my webcam, the top resolution of the camera is
not available via UVC. If I want all the pixels it's got to offer,
I still have to install the manufacturer driver. If all I want
is guaranteed 320x240, UVC will give me that :-( Some cameras
are strange enough, they really need the manufacturer driver,
or nothing is going to happen.

Paul

[Ed]

On 2012-12-15, Paul > wrote:
> To learn something about cameras, I like to read articles
> on using Linux with them. Sometimes, you learn something
> technical about the cameras, that explains potential gotchas
> with Windows. Like, maybe the camera uses runtime "firmware"
> that is loaded by the driver. And it's not communicating,
> because the firmware didn't get loaded for some reason.

Well said. Linux and digital imaging is quite straight forward in
itself, there's a neat little app called gphoto2 which does nothing more
than capture the current image from a device. So, for example, if you
want to take a set of images throughout the day, you can just put this
in cron or leave it running in a loop with a few minutes delay. Perhaps
you'd like to see what your pets get up to whilst you're out of the
house? To be honest, this is the sort of thing that I'd do with a SLR
and a wide angle lens.

--
Regards, Ed http://www.usenix.org.uk/

[BillW50]

On 12/15/2012 2:59 PM, Paul wrote:
> BillW50 wrote:
>> Maybe just a coincidence. But I purchased two Dell Latitude ST
>> tablets. They came with Windows 7 Pro SP1. The original plan was to
>> run Windows 7 on one and Windows 8 on the other. Although I was going
>> to purchase licenses for both to run Windows 8. Just in case the
>> future of Windows 7 becomes obsolete.
>>
>> Those that have done so before me has stated some problems running
>> Windows 8. Mainly they are a tad slower than Windows 7, WiFi problems,
>> and camera problems (these has two cameras). I never seen the WiFi
>> problems, but the other two I have experienced this too.
>>
>> Anyway I did get the cameras working somewhat under Windows 8. I
>> backed up Windows 7 on one machine and installed Windows 8 fresh (as
>> most people said they had the best luck going this route). Well what I
>> had working with the cameras went downhill. Now Windows 8 didn't
>> complain, but nothing showed at all, totally blank.
>>
>> Ok, backed up Windows 8 and restored Windows 7. Dang, the Dell utility
>> (which doesn't work under Windows 8) says that something is using the
>> camera(s). Nonsense! All of my fancy utilities says nothing is using
>> the camera(s). Even Zentimo would complain if something was using it
>> if I tried to remove it and it never did.
>>
>> I really dislike dual booting systems, but this was driving me nuts.
>> So I copied one Windows 7 backup with one Windows 8 on the same drive
>> in different partitions. I did this many times before and it isn't
>> that hard to get both of them bootable. And I used BCD as a third
>> party boot manager in this fashion. Although that Windows 8 secure
>> boot threw up a fit. PIA to get around that problem. And like others,
>> booting in Windows 7 after Windows 8 was booted caused Windows 7 to
>> run chkdsk on the Windows 8 partition. Although still no help. So I
>> abandoned dualbooting... thank goodness.
>>
>> So what it looks like to me is everything can see the cameras are
>> truly there, but nothing can communicate with either of them. Maybe
>> this whole thing is just a coincidence and that there is just a lost
>> connection somewhere. But is it? So far the second slate tablet is
>> working wonderfully under Windows 7. I don't know if I would try
>> Windows 8 just yet on it. I even cloned the working Windows 7 one over
>> to the non-functioning camera one and still no dice. So that pretty
>> much eliminates software as the problem.
>>
>
> To learn something about cameras, I like to read articles
> on using Linux with them. Sometimes, you learn something
> technical about the cameras, that explains potential gotchas
> with Windows. Like, maybe the camera uses runtime "firmware"
> that is loaded by the driver. And it's not communicating,
> because the firmware didn't get loaded for some reason.
>
> But searching for details from the Linux world, can tell you
> what other cameras are similar, what special features they
> might have (loadable firmware) and so on. You don't have to
> run Linux, just learn from the experiences of others, getting
> Linux to use those particular cameras. Then, once you know what
> the special requirements might be, use keywords of such, in
> some Windows related searches.
>
> Webcams come in "UVC compliant" and "custom". A UVC compliant
> one is supposed to work with the built-in UVC driver (so it works
> right away). On my webcam, the top resolution of the camera is
> not available via UVC. If I want all the pixels it's got to offer,
> I still have to install the manufacturer driver. If all I want
> is guaranteed 320x240, UVC will give me that :-( Some cameras
> are strange enough, they really need the manufacturer driver,
> or nothing is going to happen.
>
> Paul

So true Paul. ;-)

--
Bill
Dell Latitute Slate Tablet 128GB SSD ('12 era) - Thunderbird v12
Intel Atom Z670 1.5GHz - 2GB - Windows 7 SP1 and Windows 8