Hello forum

For some reason my PC (XP, SP2) is not detecting when I connect a camcorder to it via FireWire. This PC has been used for capturing and editing for years with no problem but suddenly it will no longer detect either of my camcorders. When I plug them in to any of the 3 firewire inputs, I get the "big bong" sound that suggests it knows something has connected, then the computer freezes for a few seconds, and then nothing. "My Computer" shows no hardware connection (it used to show an image of a camcorder), and Premiere Pro says the capture device is offline.

Going into Device Manager, under Hardware, it states that an AVC Device has been connected but no driver installed. When I try to install one I have no luck - I get a message saying "aborted because of a thread exit or application request" OR sometimes it states no new driver any better than current one.

Interestingly my ext harddrive and Ipod have no problems connecting thru the firewire ports.


Any suggestions most welcome!
Many thanks

James

Disconnect all other hardware from the Firewire ports while connecting the camcorder. And also check to make sure you are not running any software in the background such as screensavers, virus checkers etc as these can cause conflicts. Switch these off or just disable them to see if it makes a difference. When you plug the camcorder in again, if it asks you to reinstall a driver then do so, or if it says it can't find a more up to date version then go onto the company's website and see if there is one on there. It sounds to me like some sort of conflict where one or two pieces of hardware are trying to use the same resources (I think they are called memory addresses but don't quote me on that) and this is causing your computer to freeze.

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