Still can't capture with A1

[Brent Hamilton]

Hi Sam
I'm using a 4 pin to 6 pin cable and using the 1394 port on the motherboard.

I don't have any logo/text flashing ( do you mean on the camera viewfinder ?)

Also there is no AVC DV camera listed in device manager.

Note the Sony HC1 does show up as AV/C Tape Device using the same cable on the same port.

[Sam Johnston]

Yeah, I mean on the LCD/viewfinder (I'm pretty sure it's set to show all the time, but try looking through your display settings) HDV/DV IN should remain constantly on if things are ok, it will flash if the drivers are screwed on the computer side (depends really), and not show at all if nothing is going on.

XP is a bastard.
You may need to manually install the drivers.

You need to go through the add hardware guide, and add a device, click have disk and find a file in your C:/windows/system32/drivers directory called avc.sys (this is from memory, may be the wrong file, I had to fk around a fair bit to get it working); XP may start spitting out "file not found errors" (some XP installations don't have the proper drivers by default), in this case search your computer (all drives) for the necessary file or use google and download the file manually.

If all goes well you should have an AV/C compliant device listing in your device manager.

[Brenda Drennan]

I am having the same problem, maybe someone can help me. From my desktop, going into "my computer", I see all removable storage devices listed, but the A1 is listed under "Scanners and Cameras". When I open Vegas 8.0c, and see the devices listed on the left hand side (capture sources) it only shows the removable storage devices etc, no A1. Can anyone help here. I am able to capture from Pinnacle OK. It's my first time with Vegas, just downloaded it last night.

[Alastair Brown]

Add me to the list of people having problems getting their XH-A1 recognised by Vegas. Sometimes if I shut down and re-boot I get lucky, others I have to revert to my HV20.

[Jimmy Moss]

Originally Posted by Brent Hamilton

Hi Sam
I'm using a 4 pin to 6 pin cable and using the 1394 port on the motherboard.

Also there is no AVC DV camera listed in device manager.

Note the Sony HC1 does show up as AV/C Tape Device using the same cable on the same port.

I had a similar problem and after I thought I had tried everything it turned out my XH-A1 did not like my Digi 003(firewire) or the mabe the iLock (USB) that was plugged in with it. So all I did was unplug those devices, reboot, and then try the A1 without those devices and it worked. The problem had me scratching my head for awhile.

I've read a couple of your posts and am suprised its not fixed yet, so it could be the A1 but let me make some suggestions. I work for a major computer company and have probably taken 3000+ calls TS'ing computers and have probably fixed half of those (I'm not proud of it ;) , I'd rather be filming). Sorry if I reiterate some of the things you have already done, but it good to go step by step and it never hurts to do a step again even if you are SURE you tried it already.

So the facts are:

1. You cant capture with your A1 in any program you've tried.
2. Device manager is not seeing your A1, but it sees your Sony.
3. You have already osri'd (os reinstall).
4. You have replaced your firewire card. (?)
5. You have replaced the firewire cable.
6. You haven't tried another computer.

That would make me think its the A1 but to be sure you would want to try it on another system, that would tell you for sure. But lets say you do that and it works on the other system, then what? I will give you some other suggestions but let me ask a few questions first.

1. When was the last time it worked and what did you change/do/install on the computer or change to the camera right before it stopped working.

2. Was there any bad weather? Do you leave your A1 plugged in all the time to the wall or computer? Do you have carpet in the room where you keep these things? Are there any TV's, speakers, big magnets etc. near where you keep your stuff? (you would be suprised what static electricity will do to the PRAM/transistors on electronics).

3. What kind of motherboard do you have in your system and what is the BIOS version? You can check it while the computer boots up and hitting F2 to get to the BIOS (depends on the system which key you hit). Have you flashed (upgraded) your BIOS lately? What kind of chipset does your motherboard have? Does is fully support you firewire card? Check the manufactures websites to find out.

4. What kinds of other external devices do you have plugged into the system?

Here are some things I might suggest doing:

1. ***Try the camera with all devices unplugged. aka boot the system up with power cord and monitor only. Connect the keyboard when you get the startup screen. Plug in you camera, open veges with the keyboard (the tab key is your friend haha) and try that.

2. Boot to safe mode (f8 while booting up) and plug the camera in. Check device manager and see if its listed. Plug in a different device and see if its listed. (your firewire card drivers might not work in safe mode).

3. Unplug everything from the system and with the power cord unplugged hold down the power button for 30 sec. Boot up with keyboard/monitor and try again.

4. ****Reset the NVRAM on the motherboard (check the manufactures doc/website) Its usually a small jumper on the motherboard. Might be near the PSWD (password) jumper. Might be labeled CLCM (clear CMOS). Plug up with monitor/keyboard and try again.

5. Plug camera in and boot to the BIOS (f2) and see if there are any options or logs in there that give you a hint. (check the manufatures site).

6. What order did you install the drivers when you did a os reinstall? VERY VERY important to install system software (not same as programs) first (if you system requires) and then the chipset, generally followed by the video card, sound card, modem, and network card. (depends on the motherboard/manuf.).

7. Have you tried the firewire card in another slot on the motherboard? Then osri. Do you delete the partitions when you osri or just overwrite? (www.windowsreinstall.com). (make sure you delete partitions).

8. What wattage is your power supply? You said you had a NVIDIA Quatro. Those eat power. If your power supply is not good enough the video card will eating up all your power and the power supply might not supply the Buses with enough power to run the firewire ports. They are powered like USB so its really important.

9. Try a POWERED (uses an AC adapter) external firewire hub plugged into your firewire card. Then plug the camera into the firewire hub, see if it works. (That trick fixes printers and BSOD's like you would not believe).

10. Pull your sound card and any other expansion cards out and try the firewire card by itself. See what happens in normal and safe mode. Again all these cards use the same bus to comunicate with the CPU/Memory, would not be the first time a card has caused problems.

I think I gave you plenty to chew on. See if any of that works. The BIG one like people have said is try it on another system. Happy TS'ing.

Jimmy

[Jimmy Moss]

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[John B. Nelson]

I've been experiencing this problem since day 1 and started a thread on this awhile ago. I created a new thread to update what I have done to try to solve this frustrating problem. If you're interested here's the thread:

http://dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=110068

-John