Win7 64 driver support

So, I've read the threads about getting USB drivers working (or not working) under 64 bit Vista but I found nothing so far on Windows 7 64 bit. I assumed they would be similar if not the same but that might not be the case. Here's what I've tried so far:

1. Plugged in MC board (with firmware on it) via USB, got device not recognized, manually added drivers but it said the INF had an issue. Nothing showed up in MCHelper.

2. Erased the board and tried again. This time Windows 7 identified it as a GPS Camera and installed drivers for that. Weird! Obviously that did't work and nothing appeared in MCHelper.

3. Manually replaced the incorrect GPS Camera drivers with the MakingThings Controller drivers. They installed and both .sys files appear in System32. I go into MCHelper and finally there's an entry for the board shown as "COM5"

4. Tried to inspect the board in MCHelper but all the fields are blank. (The board is currently erased.)

5. The download firmware option is grayed out and cannot be selected. 

So currently, I am unable to download firmware to the board. Anyone have an idea of what I can do? It seems like the drivers are working. Maybe its an issue with MCHelper. Is it a permissions problem?

I'd also be interested to hear what shows up in Device Manager - is it recognized as a Make Controller there?  I don't have access to a Windows 7 machine, so it's a little tough for me to test...

If you plug in a controller with no firmware on it, Windows 7 (64 bit) identifies it as a GPS Camera. If you force the MakingThings controller drivers, they do install properly and it shows up as a com port using the MakingThings drivers. MCHelper recognizes the controller but doesn't seem able to talk to it. I can send you some screen shots tomorrow if you want. And as I mentioned before, the drivers puke with an INF problem when you install them if there is firmware on the controller.

This is how the controller looks in device manager: http://www.ianwood.com/images/dev-mgr-win7-x64.jpg

And this is the MCHelper app: http://www.ianwood.com/images/mchelper-win7-x64-2.jpg

From all appearances, the drivers installed correctly but there doesn't appear to be any communication with the controller other than finding it. I can't flash it or communicate with it.

Does anyone have a 64 bit windows (either Vista or Win7) installation that works with MCHelper? If so, how did you do it? My old laptop died so I am dead in the water until I figure this out. Theoretically, it should be the same between Vista x64 and Win7 x64. Happy to be a beta tester if need be.

Ugh - sorry to hear that.  Just FYI even in the best case, we don't have a solution for uploading new firmware on Vista64 at the moment.  But when I had a Vista64 test machine I was able to install it no problem for a board already running an application - connect the board, point the installer at the .inf and that was that.  There may be something different between different processors, etc.  I'll try to get that machine back to confirm which kind it had.

I only use MCHelper to upload firmware. Any time frame for a solution for 64 bit Windows? In the meantime, do I have any other options short of coaxing my old half-broken laptop back to life whenever I need to upgrade firmware?

I only use MCHelper to upload firmware. Any time frame for a solution for 64 bit Windows? In the meantime, do I have any other options short of coaxing my old half-broken laptop back to life whenever I need to upgrade firmware?

Ian,

As far as I can tell (hours and hours of trial and error) there is no working pipeline for getting an erased board up and running on Vista 64.  If you have access to a 32 bit machine, you can connect your erased board and upload your firmware then.  Then when you connect to you 64 bit machine, MCHelper should recognize it and work as expected.

Thanks Patrick. Liam, when can we expect a 64bit driver for Windows? Vista's been around for a while but you can expect with Win 7 coming out next month there will be a much larger number of 64 bit Windows machines in the wild.

For uploading, there's unfortunately not a clear timeframe - this is dependent on Atmel, the vendor of the Make Controller processor.  Uploading relies on a proprietary driver of theirs that does not support Vista64, and they've acknowledged this but not provided a timeframe for a solution.  Maybe it'd help if more people complained about this

As for support when the board is up and running, I need to get access to another Vista64 machine.  It's not clear to me why it works on some machines (the one I tested with) but not on others.

For what it's worth, I was able to get the MC working fine in Windows 7 64bit.  The problem is that the CDC driver (usbser.sys) is not in the directory on my Win7 machine that it is on my Windows XP machine.  On my Win7 64 bit machine, the usbser.sys file was located in some obscure directory that I only found by doing a full search.  It was located in "C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\mdmcpq.inf_amd64_neutral_f370a2fdc13ebfea" on my machine.  By copying that usbser.sys file to the Windows/System32 and the Windows/System32/Drivers folder, the controller works fine.   I assume an update to the install .inf file could probably correct the problem (or maybe include the usbser.sys file with the controller).  

Hope that helps!

I figure there's definitely scope for Windows 7 not being covered by the existing INF - I haven't tested that at all. I'm more confused by the variation between Vista installations. 

And I still can barely believe that Windows doesn't just automatically load the right driver for a device based on its self-description as a USB serial device.  Sheesh!

Thanks Deke. I'll give it a shot. I had usbser.sys in windows/system32/drivers but not in windows/system32. It was also in the driverstore dir you mentioned as well. Is your copy of atm6124.sys in SysWOW64/drivers (mine is) or is it in the same locations as usbser.sys?

Yes, atm6124.sys is in the SysWOW64/drivers directory on my machine. For the record, I'm using the Release Candidate version 7100 of Win 7.

I am on the final RTM version but I don't think that's going to make a difference. I have made some progress but still not there. Currently, when I plug in the controller via USB, MCHelper sees it properly (instead of just showing up as COM5 it says Make Controller COM5) but then the controller keeps resetting every couple of seconds. Runs fine when plugged into my XP laptop but my XP laptop is precariously close to never turning on again. Hopefully, it lives long enough to see me through this!

I don't use the Maker stuff currently but as I was trying to get the CDC driver working I found this forum on Google. I thought I'd share my final results here with a trimmed down, all-purpose CDC INF that should work on 64-bit and 32-bit windows from XP up to Windows 7. I'd love to have feedback about whether this really does work on all of these platforms. I have tested it on 64-bit Win7 and it works great with an Atmel development board that I have on hand.

<a href="http://blogs.6bit.com/josh/2009/10/usb-communications-device-class-on-64-bit-windows/">USB Communications Device Class on 64-bit Windows</a>

Awesome - thanks for sharing!  I think the only small (trivial?) modification we'll need to make is to add support for serenum.sys as well so we can use SetupAPI on the Windows side for device enumeration.  I look forward to testing once I get to a 64-bit Windows machine again.

Today I hooked up my Make Controller v1.1 and my Windows 7 x64 Ultimate downloaded the drivers from windows update service and it all worked good. Currently having fun with mchelper

Previously Jeremy Smith wrote:

Today I hooked up my Make Controller v1.1 and my Windows 7 x64 Ultimate downloaded the drivers from windows update service and it all worked good. Currently having fun with mchelper

Jeremy, Does this mean you are able to upload firmware to the Make Controller now? 

Has there been any progress with uploading firmware in Windows 7(64bit)? I have the v2.0 Make Controller and I've run into all the same problems and tried all the soulutions. I can get my system to interact with the controller if Heavy is loaded but no luck erasing or uploading from either of my 64bit machines.

So I'm sure I know the answer, but I'll ask anyway - any progress from Atmel on releasing a 64bit driver?  I've been patiently sitting on my MCv2.0 since the fall of 2009!