Vista 64 Bit Ethernet Signed Driver Trouble

[jimc52]

I am having a heck of a time. I have installed Windows Vista Home Premium 64 Bit and the ASUS P5QC mobo I have came with an unsigned 64 bit Atheros AR8121/AR8113/AR8114 PCI-E Ethernet Controller
driver.

I called ASUS tech support and talked to them and as of this time, they have only a beta version of the 64 bit signed driver. Vista is not accepting the driver and is considering it as unsigned, so I am left without a computer that can connect to the net.

I have searched hi and low all over the internet to see if I could buy a wired ethernet adapter which has a 64 bit signed driver, but all of the ethernet cards I have been able to find are only compatible with the 32 bit version of Vista or they only have unsigned drivers for their ethernet cards. This is really frustrating!

Does anyone know here WHO (what manufacturer, make, model) of a wired ethernet adapter card 10/100 or 10/1000/1000 (that does not cost a fortune - is retail version, not industrial or commercial)
I might be able to purchase that has the appropriate signed drivers - or

Does anyone here know HOW to disable the signed driver enforcement in Vista Home Premium 64 Bit with SP1? I understand it was possible to do it at one time, but since Microsoft HEXED us with two patches, that route has been disabled. So if there is a way to disable the mandatory signed driver requirement, I would like a step by step explanation of how to do it, in lieu of the need to purchase a new card (my ASIS mobo comes with an UNSIGNED version of the 64 bit driver - so I would like to use this if possible.

So any help would be greatfully appreciated

1 - Do you know who makes wired ethernet cards with 64 bit signed drivers compatible with Vista?

2 - In lieu of this, how do I disable the mandatory signed driver requirement in Vista 64 bit?

3 - If you are using Vista Home Premium or Ultimate 64 bit edition, what ethernet adapter do you have or are you using? Is a mobo adapter or a PCI card?

 

[lordbob75]

Try Updating your BIOS. I have the ASUS P5QC mobo, and the wired connection works great with Vista Ultimate x64. Perhaps you have a bad mobo?

~Lordbob

 

[lordbob75]

Aha. Ok, you should be able to press F8 during startup to disable the signed drivers feature.

Hope that helps.

~Lordbob

 

[jimc52]

Thanks - I will try that tonight when I get home. Will I always have to press F8 to boot, since I will then have unsigned drivers on the computer?

 

[lordbob75]

I am not sure, but I would guess at yes. Though it will Bly be temporary untill the signed driver comes out.

~Lordbob

 

[Hans23]

I too have a similar problem. I have ECS mobo A740-M with AMD Athlon x64. I have Vista x64 Ultimate installed on the primary HD and windows 7 x64 installed on the secondary HDD. They were both working fine until suddenly stopped working and wont boot. On trying to find the problem, I observed that the Atheros LAN driver is causing the OSes to boot in normal mode and can only boot in safe mode. I cant even restore the OSes to their older states as none of the restore points have been saved. I tried unistalling the LAN device and it would boot the OSes normally. Now when I try installing the driver again, the OSes hang and wont boot in normal mode again.
Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[lordbob75]

This sounds like the hardware could have gone bad. Obviously it used to work, and having it suddenly stop working means that it is probably bad. Can you leave it disabled? That may be the best solution short of getting a new mobo.

~Lordbob

 

[Techymike]

ASUS has had a few MB's with problems lately. If that is a new MB I would recommend getting an RMA from ASUS and getting another one. They are a good company and getting an RMA should be easy. add the ftp to .asus.com.tw/pub/ASUS/nb/A6R/

 

[Hans23]

Guys,
I too suspect the mobo to have gone bad. The mobo is ECS A740GM-M. I will have to try gettinng their support and get it replaced if possible. I could keep the Ethernet contriller disabled and it would boot without problems. I have a netgear network card but I do not have the Vista drivers for it.
Thanks for your responses.

 

[lordbob75]

This seems more like a hardware compatibility issue to me, though bad mobo could cause it. If you want to RMA the mobo, go ahead, hopefully that will fix it.

If the new mobo still encounters the same problems, then it is hardware compatibility.

~Lordbob

 

[Hans23]

Lordbob,
Thanks for the responses. My mobo did come with the driver CD that contains the Drivers for Vista. So I thought it might not be the Hardware compatibility. Also, there are a lot of people using the mobo with Vista and do not have any issues.

Hans

 

[lordbob75]

Well I meant that your particular hardware setup was causing an issue. But I don't know for sure.

~Lordbob

 

[Hans23]

Could be.
Here is the website for my mobo and the strange thing is it lists Atheros L1 gigabit and L2 Fast Tehrnet controllers with supporting OSes mentioned for L1 as Vista and for L2 as Vista 64bit. I do have Vista 64 bit installed.

Also, When I download and open the zip files for L1 and L2, L1 does have a folder for Visat64 too.

 

[FreMeN2077i]

try this "SetupReadyDriverPlus", found here -> h**p://www.easy-share.com/c/1700886782

it works for me
i'm using unsigned drivers for my webcam and it's work ok

 

[Hans23]

try this "SetupReadyDriverPlus", found here -> h**p://www.easy-share.com/c/1700886782

it works for me
i'm using unsigned drivers for my webcam and it's work ok

Thanks a lot for the link. I will try it.

 

[Hans23]

Seems like there is dome problem with the mobo. I tried to enable the onboard LAN and the OS wont boot at all. I disabled the on board LAN, booted into OS, installed the driver and re-enabled the Onboard LAN and again the OS wont boot.

 

[lordbob75]

Try RMAing the board. If the same problem with the new one occurs, then it is a different problem, like compatibility.

~Lordbob

 

[Hans23]

Try RMAing the board. If the same problem with the new one occurs, then it is a different problem, like compatibility.

~Lordbob

Lordbob,
I have opened an Issue complaint with the mobo manufacturer and they are yet to get back to me on the issue. If they suspect it could be the mobo, then I can RMA it.

 

[lordbob75]

Well let us know how it works out for you. Who made the mobo again? ASUS? I know they are pretty friendly.

If it is not the mobo, try pulling out any non-essential computer parts, and try to get it to work that way.

~Lordbob

 

[Hans23]

Lordbob,
The manufacturer of my mobo is ECS.
They havent yet gotten back to me. I opened the issue about three days ago.