Camera not showing in Measurement and Automation with Legacy 1394 drivers

[tstanley]

Hi,

I have a AVT Guppy Firewire camera, and am trying to get this camera to work on a new Windows 7 PC I have here.  The PC is running Windows 7 Professional 32-bit.  When I hook the camera up to the computer, it installs the NI-IMAQdx IIDC driver, the camera shows up in Measurement and Automation studio (version 4.6.2) under "NI-IMAQdx devices", and everything seems to work great.  However, I need to use the Legacy driver.  When I select the "Legacy IMAQ IEEE 1394 IIDC" driver, the camera disappears from Measurement and Automation Studio.  Rebooting the camera or disconnecting and reconnecting the camera does not help.  In Windows Device Manager, the camera shows as using the Legacy NI-IMAQ IEEE 1394 driver (date 10/11/2006, version 2.0.5.0), and windows reports it as working properly.  However, it still isn't showing in Measurement and Automation and my application cannot see the camera.

Here's what I have tried:

*Updated the NI Vision Acquisition software to version 2009.11. 

*Made sure the Legacy NI-IMAQ for 1394 Cameras 2.0.5 is installed

*Tried the same camera with the same software packages on an older PC running Windows XP and found everything works as expected there.

*Tried an IMAQ 1405 PCI card in the Windows 7 PC, which is working fine.

*Searched the forums.  I found several references to this document that refers to issues where camera dissappear from Measurement and Automation explorer:

http://digital.ni.com/public.nsf/allkb/22AD45D8A5B053AF86256EB5003B2811?OpenDocument

It looks as though it could apply to my situation, however, the link is dead for me.

Thanks for any help!

[oliver.guennel]

There are no known issues under Windows 7 with the Ni drivers and the Guppies so far.

Please make sure, that you have installed the latest version of the Vision software on the new OS and install the latest lMAQ1394 driver from. You can find the driver separate from the IMAQdx driver, under ni.com/info with the info code 'legacy1394'.

The IMAQdx driver would of course be more recommended, as it is actively supported and maintained by NI.

[tstanley]

Thanks for the reply.  Looks like I have the latest version of both drivers unless I am mistaken (2.0.5 for the Legacy 1394 and 2009.11 for Vision Acquisition Software).  I realize that it would be preferred to use the IMAQdx driver, but this application was developed several years ago and thus uses what's now called the Legacy drivers and I would like to avoid redoing it if at all possible.  

[Ben_Engelen · Accepted solution]

I would suggest installing the AVT 1394 bus driver on your PC.

This replaces the microsoft implementation of the 1394 protocol and is more suitable for vision activities.

You then still can choose IMAQdx or legacy drivers.

http://www.alliedvisiontec.com/emea/products/software/windows/avt-1394-busdriverpackage.html

however i'm not sure if it will work under windows 7

Ben Engelen

[pflores]

That KB that you linked was archived and merged with this one:

Troubleshooting FireWire (IEEE 1394) Camera Installation Problems

Check out the MAX section for some suggestions.

[tstanley]

Thanks for the replies.  Installing the AVT 1394 bus driver worked - it seems to install just fine on Windows 7, and now the Guppy camera is working with the both the NI-IMAQdx and the Legacy 1394 drivers.