View Single Post
  #5  
Old April 17th 12, 05:11 PM posted to microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware
VanguardLH[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 10,881
Default USB 2.0 keeps reverting to USB 1

Mark Gary wrote:

it purchased a PCI USB 2.0 controller


And that would be which brand and model from the hundreds, or more,
available?

Some provide their own driver knowing what's included in Windows won't
work with their device. Others use the Windows-embedded drivers but
require you update Windows to ensure you have the latest set of drivers
so one of them closely matches their product. You said you have SP-3
for Windows XP so that's not the problem but not installing the driver
the *maker* provides for their device could be the problem. Can't tell
if the product has its own driver since you didn't mention brand and
model of the product.

I did manage to find some VIA specific drivers on the internet


Wrong place to look. If the product's *maker* has a driver, get it from
there. If they don't provide a driver, they are relying on those
included in Windows, not some unknown driver for some other brand's
different model retrieved from an unknown source.

When I perform a cold boot the VIA USB2 Enhanced Host Controler has
vanished, and again I get the daft "your device can perform faster".


Possibly the wrong driver as Bill suggested, especially since you didn't
get the driver for THAT hardware from its maker.

If the maker doesn't provide their own driver and is relying on those
included with Windows, have you run through the hardware wizard to see
which drivers are available in Windows?

- Run the Device Management applet (devmgmt.msc).
- Right-click on the USB daughtercard you installed & select Properties.
- Right-click on it and select Properties for your VIA controller card.
- On the General tab, a PCI bus *other* than 0 (zero) should be listed
for the daughtercard (mobo controllers are on PCI bus 0).
- Look under the Driver tab.

Although my PCI daughtercard to add 4 USB ports uses a VIA chip, the
Windows driver gets used. So under the Drivers tab, I see a Microsoft
driver listed, not some VIA driver. While on the Driver tab:

- Click the "Update Driver" button.
- Select "No, not this time" and click Next.
- Select "Install from list ..." and click Next.
- Select "Don't search" and click Next.
- Deselect the "View compatible hardware" option.
- In the Manufacturer column, select "VIA Technologies".
- Look in the Model column to pick what best matches your hardware.

Here you have to do some guessing. For me, the "VIA USB Enhanced Host
Controller" model is preselected. The driver for that will be listed as
from Microsoft, *not* VIA back under the Driver tab in the properties
for the device. You certainly don't want to pick whatever was that
unknown driver you found since it obviously doesn't work with the
hardware you actually have.

Strangly, if I view hidden devices in device manager, it still exists,
but greyed out.


It is not a working device. The device is connected but it is not
usable. Wrong driver.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315539

Because the device is unknown is why you saw it ghosted (greyed out)
when you elected to "Show hidden devices". If you set the environment
variable as noted in the article and start devmgmt.msc from that same
shell (so the env var is defined when devmgmt loads) then you'll see a
whole bunch of devices that aren't currently connected but were known
(enumerated) previously. With this env var used for devmgmt, and say
you previously plugged in a USB camera, it will now be listed as a
hidden device despite that it isn't plugged in right now.

Rather than have to set this env var in a shell and then run diskmgmt
from that shell (so it sees that env var value of 1), you can add this
env var to the System variables. This lets you use devmgmt to see ALL
disconnected devices (that have been previously enumerated because they
were plugged in before). So your device was known before hence showing
its enumerated data for "Show hidden devices" but it isn't considers a
connected device right now (i.e., it isn't usable right now).

You'll need to use the right driver for the device to be usable.
Ads