Old Camcorder Drivers.

I have an old JVC GR-D50EK camcorder which stopped recording a few years
ago but will platy to the camera screen.

As a lock down project I tried to transfer some of the DV tapes to my PC
via USB, I don't have a FireWire port on this PC, I did buy a FW to USB
converter but this throws up a surge error.

The GR-D50 is listed in Device Manager but with no drivers, trying to
update them fails as non available.

I've searched with Google for drivers without success, any help
appreciated.

Mike

--
Michael Swift We do not regard Englishmen as foreigners.
Kirkheaton We look on them only as rather mad Norwegians.
Yorkshire Halvard Lange

Mike Swift wrote:
I have an old JVC GR-D50EK camcorder which stopped recording a few years
ago but will platy to the camera screen.

As a lock down project I tried to transfer some of the DV tapes to my PC
via USB, I don't have a FireWire port on this PC, I did buy a FW to USB
converter but this throws up a surge error.

The GR-D50 is listed in Device Manager but with no drivers, trying to
update them fails as non available.

I've searched with Google for drivers without success, any help
appreciated.

Mike


I don't want to gum up your system with the wrong crap.

There is mention here of a legacy driver, but why isn't the OS
just installing this for you ?

Maybe the FW to USB converter is expected to cough up the right kind of driver ?

https://www.startech.com/ca/faq/fire...cy-driver-swap

"Download the Microsoft Firewire 1394 Legacy Driver Installer"

https://download.microsoft.com/downl...gacyDriver.msi

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...ndows-8-1-or-w

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/...-actually-work

https://www.vegascreativesoftware.in...idv-s--115133/

https://www.studio1productions.com/A...Firewire-1.htm

The couple of off-hand comments I see, nobody seems to
like the idea of that Firewire to USB adapter.

At the very least, you should use a 6-to-4 adapter, so there
is no possibility of Firewire attempting to draw power from
the two power pins on the 6 pin firewire. If a firewire cable
is used, at some point the interface should use just four pins.
That "breaks" the power path to Firewire bus power.

Firewire bus power is somewhat flexible. It consisted of +12V on
WinPC. It might have used +25V on Apple computers (as the higher
the voltage, V*I, allows more power to be available to the
end device which runs off a switching [SMPS] power conversion
of the bus power). Nothing runs directly off bus power, because
it's kinda dirty. Devices "contributing" bus power to the bus,
do so with diodes, and the highest voltage device wins and the
other devices then don't contribute power. Peripherals typically
use switching power conversion, to convert +25V to 5V or 3.3V for some chip.

But that's all avoided if the camcorder has its own battery,
and then just the four Firewire pins are necessary for DV transfer.

The USB to Firewire adapter, whatever is in there, should be
breaking the bus power path on its own, and not connecting
to those two pins.

You can see in the above, that an OHCI driver is used. The
driver stack had several interfaces. SBP-2 might have been
for hard drives. There was something for DV. There was
something for IP over Firewire. IP over Firewire was
discontinued around Vista timeframe or so. DV might work
with the Legacy driver.

Firewire has always been "somewhat of an archeology project".
Even back in the day, I had to look that stuff up and refresh
my memory.

The AV stack is 61883.sys or so. In some older OS, you could
see such an animal in the properties.

http://www.ieee802.org/802_tutorials...ntroTo1394.pdf

"Higher layer" protocols

– NCITS.325-1998 SBP-2 integrates DMA into I/O process
• RBC (for mass storage) and IEEE 1394.3 PPDT (for printers)

– IEC 61883 and 1394TA AV/C standards define control and data for A/V devices

– RFC 2734 defines Internet Protocol (v4) over 1394
• IPv6 and DHCP also as RFCs

– Digital Transport for Content Protection ("5C"/DTCP)
– IEEE 1394.1 for bridges, IIC for instrumentation and industrial control,
DPP for consumer cameras/printers, etc.

*******

Camcorders with HDMI output, you can use HDMI capture for those.
Otherwise, you'll be fiddling with DV capture. In the capture
application, you hit "record", then start the camcorder in
its playback mode. And the transfer over Firewire should
then pick up.

And this is what reading a DVD in the year 2300 is going to be like... :-)

Paul

On 07/09/2020 08:50, Mike Swift wrote:
I have an old JVC GR-D50EK camcorder which stopped recording a few years
ago but will platy to the camera screen.

As a lock down project I tried to transfer some of the DV tapes to my PC
via USB, I don't have a FireWire port on this PC, I did buy a FW to USB
converter but this throws up a surge error.

Hate to be the bearer of bad news but from what I've read (got an old
Canon XL-1 with Firewire I used back when it was ubiquitous and have
occasionally researched how to use it now) there ain't no such animal as
a FW to USB converter-at least one that really works.

I'm given to understand that a modern Thunderbolt port CAN be adapted to
Firewire but machines with those are a bit above my means-especially for
something I haven't used in years. The last time I had it out I just
connected it to an analog capture device and used that. Anyway if push
comes to shove I have an ancient Mac that can do DV. You might consider
picking up an older laptop with a Firewire port-or if you're using a
desktop, look at whether you can add a legacy Firewire card. Good luck.

In article , none
wrote:

I have an old JVC GR-D50EK camcorder which stopped recording a few years
ago but will platy to the camera screen.

As a lock down project I tried to transfer some of the DV tapes to my PC
via USB, I don't have a FireWire port on this PC, I did buy a FW to USB
converter but this throws up a surge error.

Hate to be the bearer of bad news but from what I've read (got an old
Canon XL-1 with Firewire I used back when it was ubiquitous and have
occasionally researched how to use it now) there ain't no such animal as
a FW to USB converter-at least one that really works.

due to the differences between firewire and usb, the only adapter that
existed was *just* for video.

I'm given to understand that a modern Thunderbolt port CAN be adapted to
Firewire

very easily, but you'd still need software to talk to the camera.

but machines with those are a bit above my means-especially for
something I haven't used in years.

they're not that expensive and a lot of new computers have thunderbolt,
including dell and lenovo.

The last time I had it out I just
connected it to an analog capture device and used that. Anyway if push
comes to shove I have an ancient Mac that can do DV. You might consider
picking up an older laptop with a Firewire port-or if you're using a
desktop, look at whether you can add a legacy Firewire card. Good luck.

that could also work.