USB stopped working

SSteve

I fired up my Windows 2000 machine today to spend some quality Spin time and suddenly the Propeller Tool doesn't see the Propeller. I re-ran USBDriverInstallerV2.0.0 and got the message "FTDI CDM Drivers have been successfully installed." I shut down and restarted. When I connect my Propeller demo board, my Propeller Clip, or my Professional Development Board the Found New Hardware Wizard comes up and says "An error occurred during the installation of the device. The installation failed because a function driver was not specified for this device instance."

The blue and red LEDs both flash on the Propeller Clip and Propeller Demo Board when USB is connected.

In Device Manager, the device shows up under Universal Serial Bus controllers as "USB Device" with a yellow exclamation point. It isn't getting installed as a virtual COM port so there is no way to adjust Latency Timer.

I've tried connecting through a powered hub and directly to my computer's USB port.

Connecting to a PropSTICK through a serial port works fine.

The driver worked fine a couple weeks ago. I think the only change since then is that today is the first time I tried to connect the Propeller Clip.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

Mike Cook

I had a similar problem when I went from the Propeller Tool v0.98 to the full installation of version 1.0, a while back. Ended up having to delete all my USB serial ports from XP and then re-install them to fix my problem.

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Mike

SSteve

Hi, Mike. Thanks for the quick reply. I uninstalled everything under USB controllers in Device Manager then restarted the computer with nothing connected to the USB port. I went back into Device Manager and it reinstalled "Intel 82371AB/EB PCI to USB Universal Host Controller" and "USB Root Hub". Then I plugged the Propeller Clip into the USB port and got the same error message.

When I try to reinstall the driver and let Windows search for a driver, it finds c:\winnt\inf\usb.inf. I tried manually selecting ftdibus.inf and ftdiport.inf but neither one worked.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

Mike Cook

It's been a while back since this happened on my setup but I believe with the hardware connected (that is not being detected properly), I first uninstalled any problem devices under 'Ports' (items marked with an explanation point) and then went after it's 'companion' under Universal Serial Bus Controllers. This seemed to fix my problem, however I have/had an old FTDI USB to serial box that still 'Blue Screens' my XP Pro when I plug it up. It used to work up until I installed the full downloaded version of the Propeller Tool 1.0 and answered 'YES' to update drivers.

My setup may be a little unique, I have one real serial port, a 4 port edge/4 USB to serial, two modern FTDI USB to serial adapters, and the Parallax USB scope, that installs as a USB serial port. Also several GSM/GPRS devices that are USB serial. The Propeller Tool will only work with the real com port or the 2 FDTI USB to serial adapters. It will not 'see' my edge port4 even though the Basic Stamp and SX-KEY software will work with the EDGE Port/4

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Mike

SSteve

Mine isn't even getting to the point where it installs something under Ports. It just shows up under USB controllers with the yellow exclamation.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

Mike Cook

Steve,

'Ping' Chris Savage (Parallax), I've seen him on here once or twice today, he's the Windows USB GURU. He'll probably be able to offer more info.







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Mike

Chris Savage

FTDI has a cleaning utility on their website that is supposed to remove all traces of the drivers…I would recommend uninstalling the drivers from the Add/Remove programs, then running the FTDI Clean utility and then restart and see if you have any luck. ·By the way, do you have access to another computer (PC) to see if it works there?

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Chris Savage
Parallax Tech Support

SSteve

Thanks, Chris. I ran the cleaning utility with VID left at FTDI, restarted, and ran USBDriverInstallerV2.0.0. Same problem. I ran the cleaning utility again and tried running the 2.0.0 installer from FTDI's web site, but still no luck. And it's still the same with the Prop Clip, the PDB, and the Prop Demo Board.

After I run the FTDI installer, there is no entry in Add/Remove Programs. Is that normal? I do see FTDI files in c:\winnt\system32\DRVSTORE that weren't there after I ran the cleaning utility, so something is getting installed.

Instead of letting Windows search for a driver, is there one I should manually specify?

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

It sounds like there might be two things going on here. You mentioned the "Intel 82371AB/EB PCI to USB Universal Host Controller" and "USB Root Hub". These are separate from, and a prerequisite for, the FTDI drivers. In other words, they're the drivers that handle the USB hardware inside your computer. The FTDI drivers handle devices connected to your USB ports. All three are necessary to provide a working virtual serial port. From your description, it sounds like the internal USB drivers are causing problems. If that's the case, there's no hope of getting the FTDI device drivers working until these problems are resolved. I have no experience with Win2000, but if it's possible to roll your system back to a point at which the USB ports worked and then fiddle with the FTDI stuff, you might be able to resolve things more quickly.

Also, I recommend trying the older FTDI VCP drivers over the newer combo drivers. I've had trouble with the latter on WinXP.

-Phil

SSteve

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) said...
It sounds like there might be two things going on here. You mentioned the "Intel 82371AB/EB PCI to USB Universal Host Controller" and "USB Root Hub". These are separate from, and a prerequisite for, the FTDI drivers. In other words, they're the drivers that handle the USB hardware inside your computer.

I mentioned them because after I uninstalled all USB devices, those were detected and reinstalled after I restarted. I think they're ok because other USB devices (trackball, memory stick, external hub) are all working fine.

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) said...
Also, I recommend trying the older FTDI VCP drivers over the newer combo drivers. I've had trouble with the latter on WinXP.

I looked for some older drivers, but haven't been able to find any. Do you have a link to them?

Unfortunately, I have had plenty of experience with driver problems under Windows. I used to work in tech support for Emagic (the music software company that was bought by Apple). I think a quarter of my calls were from Windows users with driver issues.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Popping the stack a bit: try not letting Windows look for an appropriate driver. When I install under WinXP-SP1, I also have to disable my network connection to prevent this from happening without being asked. Dunno about Win2000, but that may be an issue there as well. Anyway, download and unzip the drivers from ftdichip.com; then when you plug in the device and Windows gives you the option of locating the driver, point it to the .inf file in the unzipped directory.

BTW, I just double-checked which driver I have installed, and it's 2.00! I thought sure I was using build 2176 of version 1.0 and can't figure out how the new CDM driver snuck in there. Oddly, despite my prior problems with it, it seems to be working fine.

-Phil

SSteve

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) said...
Anyway, download and unzip the drivers from ftdichip.com; then when you plug in the device and Windows gives you the option of locating the driver, point it to the .inf file in the unzipped directory.

I'm trying that. I downloaded and unzipped "CDM 2.00.00.zip." When I reinstall the driver and select either FTDIBUS.INF or FTDIPORT.INF I get three options: "USB Serial Converter", "USB Serial Converter A", and "USB Serial Converter B". When I select any one of them, I get the message "Installing this device driver is not recommended because Windows cannot verify that it is compatible with your hardware. If the driver is not compatible, your hardware will not work correctly and your computer might become unstable or stop working completely. Do you want to continue installing this driver?" I go ahead and select it and restart and it still doesn't work.

In Device Manager on your machine, what's the name of the FTDI driver under "Universal Serial Bus controllers"? Double click it and go to the Driver tab and click "Driver Details..." What files are listed?

I really appreciate everyone's help. This is driving me nuts. I can't think of anything I changed since the last time I successfully used the Propeller Tool with a USB device. I ran the SX-Key Editor a couple days ago. I might have installed a new version of StampPlot. I don't use the Windows computer for anything but Parallax stuff. It's not connected to the Internet or even to my LAN. Phil, if it wasn't for your PropSTICK, I wouldn't have any Propeller at all.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Here's the data you wanted...

SSteve

Thanks, Phil. That looks the same as what I've got here. Well, actually, when I first plug them in Windows installs the generic USB Device. I then tell it to use USB Serial Converter and it tells me it's the wrong driver. After the computer restarts, the USB Serial Converter device status is "This device cannot start. (Code 10)"

I can't imagine all three devices stopped working at the same time (unless someone hit my house with an EMP that only affects FTDI chips). I guess my Windows is gummed up. It looks like another round of wipe and reinstall. God, I love Windows.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

G

Try the following attachement "R2176.zip". This is an Win2000-XP driver package of FTDI released at December 2005.

G

SSteve

Thanks for the file. I ran FTClean right-clicked on ftdibus.inf in the zip you sent and selected Install. I connected the Propeller Clip and it still installed as a generic USB Device. I went into device manager, double-clicked the generic USB Device and selected Reinstall Driver. I selected ftdibus.inf from the zip you sent and got the warning about it being the incorrect driver. I clicked Continue and got a blue screen with the message KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED and the machine rebooted. I tried it all again and got the blue screen again.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

bambino

Steve,
What did you get when you let V1 of the propeller tool install your driver?

SSteve

It installs 2.00.00. I just gave that a try: I ran FTClean then re-installed Propeller Tool 1.0. It ran the USB driver installation and told me it installed 2.00.00. I then plugged in the Propeller Clip and opened Device Manager. Windows assigned it the generic USB Device driver with the yellow exclamation. The device status was 28. I clicked Reinstall Driver and selected the USB Serial Converter device. I got the message that it is the wrong driver for the device and said continue. I restarted Windows and now Device Manager shows USB Serial Converter with a yellow exclamation. Its device status is 10.

I'll try calling Parallax tech support tomorrow to see if they can come up with something I haven't tried yet. After that I give up.

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store

dandreae

The issue has been solved by a visit to Parallax.

Dave

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Dave Andreae

Parallax Tech Support·

SSteve

Muchas gracias to Dave who was kind enough to let me bring all my stuff down to Parallax and helped me troubleshoot the issue. I'm almost too embarrassed to say this, but the problem was a bad cable. The extendo-cable that came with my new Propeller Clip was faulty. I'm astonished that I never tried another cable. If anyone asked, I probably would have sworn that I had. After all, who doesn't try another cable when nothing works on two different computers? Just a weird mind-block, I guess. Can I blame this cold I came down with on the 31st?

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OS-X: because making Unix user-friendly was easier than debugging Windows

links:
My band's website
Our album on the iTunes Music Store