Vista 64 Bit Ultimate
i7 920 CPU / 12 GB RAM
ASUS P6T Motherboard

Canon XL-2 camcorder is not recognized by Vista when plugging into the firewire port. Premiere CS3 does not see the device either.

No issues with XP2 32bit... recognized and captured fine.

Searching the net reveals firewire connectivity on Vista (in general) is problematic, if non-existent.

Should have done my homework before building the box. 64 bit allows for access to more RAM and than means faster render times. Not being able to capture via firewire is a definite "show stopper".



I had been happy with 64 bit up to this point (all bells and whistles turned off of course). Another "EPIC FAIL" for Microsoft.

Anyone have any ideas .... at all ... on how to get this working?

Go it .... after a ton of digging.

Windows Vista does not enumerate an IEEE 1394a device that you connect to the computer

A registry hack puts back the 32 bit enumeration ... and ... "bob's your uncle!".

After adding it, the firewire connection IMMEDIATELY recognized the camcorder and installed the drivers. Nice....

Below is the Microsoft KB answer...

"When you connect an IEEE 1394a device to a computer that is running Windows Vista, Windows Vista does not enumerate the device. However, if you connect the same device to a computer that is running Microsoft Windows XP, Windows XP enumerates the device successfully."

Note An IEEE 1394a device may also be referred to as a FireWire device.

"Windows Vista only enumerates a device that sets its link status to request enumeration. If an IEEE 1394a device does not report the correct status of its link, the IEEE 1394 stack in Windows Vista does not enumerate the device."

Donsom,

I'm glad the fix worked for you but it only helped my situation. First off, we have the same hardware in the PC but I am running VHP64 not the Ultimate version. Before I did the Enumerate hack my PC totally ignored any firewire device. After the hack the sound card will play it's "ding" sound but no "your device is ready to use" window pops up.

My Sony Vaio works perfectly with my firewire devices. It uses VHP32 OS.

The good news is that I can at least transfer the files to the i7 PC via the Sony. The i7 kicks butt rendering video. I'm using Vegas Pro.

ive seen this alot , i have 64 bit Vista , and an old camcorder , i bought a pci firewire card installed it and had no issues , i know this doesnt help lol its just odd so many have issues with firewire , are you sure its your connection and not your camcorder?

in device manager does it show your firewire (IEEE 1394) as being installed correctly?

Hi Archie,

I know it is not the camcorder because I have three of them and they work with my Sony Viao running VHP32 but not my i7 PC running VHP64.