USB Gremlins!

[justinstyle]

Hello!
I've got an older (2-3 years old) Kodak DC3400 Digital Camera which I am very happy with. I know its far from the best camera available but it takes great pictures. Anyways my problem is, it has quit connecting to my PC (XP home, usb 2.0). The first thing I assumed was the problem was the cable, but I tried the camera on another XP machine and it worked perfectly several times. The only other thing I can think of is that it seemed to act up after my last XP update. Does anybody have any ideas about my "gremlins"?
:confused:

[Triton]

well id suggest trying www.usbman.com, someone suggested that to me after having problems with a USB mp3 player, a good read and a bit of info....i was also asked several times to provide IRQ information

[NDD]

Did you try to reinstall the USB drivers ?

[justinstyle]

I will check out usbman.com and no I have not tried to reinstall usb drivers because I have several usb devices and none of them have problems (scanner, printer, mouse, flash drive, etc.) I have also tried other cameras with no problems. One other thing I should mention is when I plug the camera in and turn it on I hear the "usb connection tones" but they are a lower key than when a succesfull connection is made, it also makes the "tones" when I shut the camera off. Wierd!

[BipolarBill]

Try another USB port. If you're using a hub, don't. Bypass it. Check the cable.

Finally, unplug the device and uninstall the software. Reboot and reinstall according to instructions.

I am the moderator at USBMAN.

[lptech]

justinstyle-

If you have too many USB devices installed, you have to make sure that the ones that draw the most power from its USB connection is closest to the port and the ones that draw the least power from the USB port are further away. That is if you've got them daisy-chained. Your camera might be to drawing more power from the connection than what the connection could provide and that is probably why you are hearing a lower audible tone than what you're used to! Good luck.:)

LPTECH

[NDD]

I was talking about the MOBO USB drivers ... :t :t

[$1500-P4 gamer]

Yep, I bet your low on USB port power. Id unhook everything and try it by itself in jack on mobo not hub like BPB said. Also if useing hub is it self powered (adds power to usb ports) or no power pack (drains usb power-they are junk and cheapo).:t

[BipolarBill]

...and give us feedback, dammit!

[justinstyle]

Sorry guys we had some very gnarly weather last night! I made it through 4 straight hours of Tornado warnings with out losing the power and after it seemed to be over I lost power till just about an hour ago. Anyways I tried plugging my camera into a different port and it immediately recognized the camera and then popped up a dialog box saying "a problem occured while installing your new hardware....." Now it does the same thing that the front port does. F.Y.I. I've got a newer Dell Dimension 8250 and it came with 8 usb 2.0 ports (2 in front + 6 in the rear). Also the only real usb item I use on a regular basis is the printer & mouse, the scanner is off when not in use and the other usb items I have I don't connect till I need them.

[BipolarBill]

Are you ignoring my suggestions?

[ukulele]

USB ports supply power to periphials. The say you can plug things in hot but I think it can cause damage to the ports from arcing. I never do it. Something to think about anyway.

[justinstyle]

I'm not ignoring your suggestions Bill, I'm unable to un-install the software because I never loaded it. I have used this camera on at least four different PCs all using XP and I have never used the software, and the camera has worked fine! The only difference I can tell is that none of the other PCs have ever updated XP. And as far as the hub is concerned I am assuming you consider the factory ports on my Dell are in essence a hub and I should bypass them and go directly to the mobo? I can verify the cable by having run the camera on the other PCs.

[BipolarBill]

Originally posted by justinstyle
I am assuming you consider the factory ports on my Dell are in essence a hub and I should bypass them and go directly to the mobo? No. They are ports.

What is the exact error in Device Manager?

[justinstyle]

I saw this and obviously I tried re-starting the PC. After re-boot and turning on the camera the same error arrives. When the camera is not plugged in there is not a single item anywhere in this machine that has anything to do with this camera, it simply dissapears.

"Windows cannot load the device driver for this hardware because a previous instance of the device driver is still in memory. (Code 38)"

[BipolarBill]

All you had to do is plug that into Google. The reslut is a bad driver.

http://www.kodak.com/global/en/service/software/dc3400/new/dc3400Software.jhtml#swWin

Get those. Do not plug the cam in while loading the. Restart and plug afterward.

[justinstyle]

I have searched google, and Kodaks downloads are useless they don't have any XP drivers from what I can see. The link you listed states; "This software installs the DC3400 software on a Windows (95, 98, 98SE, NT, 2000 or Me) system." I am going to try it anyways. I'll let you know if it works. I just think it is wierd that it worked before and now it does not, and it works on so many other machines without the software.

[BipolarBill]

It's a corrupt driver. It happens.

http://www.usbman.com/Guides/Cleanup%20Device%20Manager%20Safe%20Mode.htm

[justinstyle]

I installed the Kodak software to no avail. I will try to clean up my device manager later. Thanks for the help! I will let you know how it turns out. I have to take a "time out" for now.

[$1500-P4 gamer]

Originally posted by ukulele
USB ports supply power to periphials. The say you can plug things in hot but I think it can cause damage to the ports from arcing. I never do it. Something to think about anyway.

Volts (pressure of electrons wanting to flow to return path) is what causes arc. Think of lightning. Not amps. SO usb is +/-5v. 5v is not gonna corrode GOLD plated terminals from arcing and that is the ONLY thing it could do. Gold is used on my stereo connectors too-silver is better conductor BUT GOLD is super resistant to corrosion. So power is from, PSu to mobo then to device.. Your not getting any surges or spikes after all that cap filtering so overloading usb devices isnt a issue either. Been hot pluging all my devices since day one-not a single issue ever with USB.:t

[justinstyle]

Thank's for the info Bill! Your usbman.com link was very helpful. I uninstalled software, entered into safe mode, and removed usb from device manager. After reboot and reinstall, all is well with the camera again! I got to thinking about what gave me the problem in the first place and I remembered that I had shutdown and disconnected to dust (blow) out my system and it made me wonder if I should try to use the same usb port everytime I uninstall and re-install a device (i.e. my camera, scanner, printer, etc.) to avoid conflict/corruption? or is this a random incident?

P.S. Thanks again Bill! :t

[justinstyle]

Now that the camera works again I can show you guys the storm that screwed me up the other night!

[BipolarBill]

:eek:

[eigenvector]

I found this forum because I was getting the same problems with my DC3400. I did a google search on the error message.

I figured out what my problem was. I thought i'd post here in case someone else comes by looking for answers.

In my case, the problem was that XP seems to use the same driver for the DC3400 and my scanner. So, when I tried to plug in the camera, it would fail to connect. If I went in to the device manager and looked at the properties for the camera, it would say something along the lines of "Can't initialize driver. A copy of this driver is already loaded in memory"

The solution was to unplug my scanners USB cable before plugging the camera's USB cable in.

It's sad; it seems the people at Microsoft didn't ever expect to have a camera and a scanner plugged in to the same machine.

[mireland]

Originally posted by BipolarBill
:eek:


:eek: and double :eek: