workaround for unsigned drivers? for win 7 x64

[evident]

I have a Wireless USB dongle - Hawking HWU54G Rev Z2 that doesn't get picked up natively by windows 7.

hawking provides vista 32 drivers and when i put them on the machine it gets installed, however since they are unsigned they won't work. I tried selecting ignore if drivers are unsigned, but they still won't work. does this mean i am SOL?

i am in the process of upgrading my parent's pc from xp to windows 7 (see thread http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=323758 )
but there are some old peripherals (logitech quickcam 4000 and lexmark z52 printer ) that seem like they are out of support

 

[JackMDS]

Some old stuff does not work any more with newer OS' and it is beyond a driver issue. The basic hardware of this devices does not have the gamut/capacity to deal with new needed instructions.

 

[Nothinman]

You can't use 32-bit drivers with a 64-bit OS regardless of whether they're signed or not.

 

[TheJTrain]

Same issue here with my old Creative SB Live 5.1 sound card. It's the second-to-last remaining original piece of hardware from my very first homebuilt back in 2001 (the other is the DVD drive), but moving from WinXP-32 to Win7-64 (first time in Win7 for me) last night couldn't get any set of drivers to work, even the 64-bit Vista drivers I found. Pretty unsatisfied with Win7 if it actually does REQUIRE signed drivers and won't let you override that requirement. If it just won't work, that's one thing, and I can understand that, but if it's an arbitrary "Windows won't even let you try" kind of thing, that's something else.

 

[JackMDS]

There probably situations with providers that do not want to provide new drivers in order to force you to buy new devices.

However there is No official way to know.

Otherwise, the issue is Not so simple.

Some drivers might create Hooks into the system to resources that changed or not existing any more and might harm the integrity of the OS.

Other consists on many Files including DLL and Sys files. Those can create even more problems since they can end up replacing existing files ,or and, create hooks thta go No where, or effect other resources.

 

[Nothinman]

Same issue here with my old Creative SB Live 5.1 sound card. It's the second-to-last remaining original piece of hardware from my very first homebuilt back in 2001 (the other is the DVD drive), but moving from WinXP-32 to Win7-64 (first time in Win7 for me) last night couldn't get any set of drivers to work, even the 64-bit Vista drivers I found. Pretty unsatisfied with Win7 if it actually does REQUIRE signed drivers and won't let you override that requirement. If it just won't work, that's one thing, and I can understand that, but if it's an arbitrary "Windows won't even let you try" kind of thing, that's something else.

I can see what you're saying and I mostly agree that there should be some way to use unsigned drivers. Hell driver developers don't want to have to sign all of their test builds. But I can understand why MS would want to make it very hard to use them because it forces driver developers to go through the WHQL process and make sure they pass.

 

[RebateMonger]

There seem to be some Vista x64 drivers for the ZyDAS chipset here:

http://www.junyuantek.com/download.htm

 

[Modelworks]

Driver signing doesn't help anything at all. WHQL and driver signing are two different things. Anyone with about $500 to spend can sign a driver. You pay the fee to a partner like Verisign (MS conveniently is an investor) and now you can sign drivers, software , etc .
http://www.verisign.com/code-signing/content-signing-certificates/microsoft-authenticode/index.html

I researched it because I was going to write some USB drivers for x64 . About the only insurance it brings is that they can track back to the owner of the license that signed the driver.

WHQL is totally different . The reason you see WHQL on video and sound drivers isn't all about stability, it is about MS making sure you haven't circumvented the media path protecting DRM content .


You can use unsigned drivers but you will have to load windows in test mode. Details on how to make it work.
http://www.minasi.com/newsletters/nws0903.htm

 

[sathyan]

I found for three of my USB devices (Epson 1250 Scanner, Intel Webcam, M-Audio Midiman) there were no Vista/7 64-bit drivers so they would not install in my Windows 7 64-bit installation. I was about to retire the devices. However, all three of them do work in XP Mode using Windows XP 32-bit drivers. Win7 installs a "USB stub" which allows one to "attach" the device in XP Mode. You may to give it a try for the webcam and printer.

 

[evident]

I found for three of my USB devices (Epson 1250 Scanner, Intel Webcam, M-Audio Midiman) there were no Vista/7 64-bit drivers so they would not install in my Windows 7 64-bit installation. I was about to retire the devices. However, all three of them do work in XP Mode using Windows XP 32-bit drivers. Win7 installs a "USB stub" which allows one to "attach" the device in XP Mode. You may to give it a try for the webcam and printer.

while i have no doubt that your workaround will get usage out of your old peripherals, this solution is out of the question, as it's WAY too complicated for my parents.

 

[RebateMonger]

There's maybe four things you can do in cases like this:

1) Stick with the older OS (XP, in this case)
2) Stick with the 32-bit version of the new OS. There are still more 32-bit drivers than there are 64-bit drivers.
3) Remember who provided updated drivers for their hardware and who didn't. Next time you buy something, don't buy from companies that don't update their drivers.
4) Buy new peripherals.