Difficulties with Vista/Longhorn Driver Development

  • Thread starter Thread starter Robert Robinson
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Robert Robinson

Microsoft has again changed the driver design specifications. One would
hope that the reasons are to improve reliability, efficiency and ease of
writing the driver code. I haven't tried to write a Vista driver, but
I am increasingly concerned that this may be a difficult process. A case
in point is that we are still waiting for a LynxStudio L22 driver that
was to be released in January 2007, but is not yet available. The
company indicates that the delay is due in part to having to make
changes in the device's BIOS and to the necessity for driver
certification. One suspects that the latter requirement may be due in
part to DRM considerations.
Another example is nVidia. There are obviously making a real effort to
produce a good driver, but the latest release (101.41) is still beta.
One hopeful development is a description of a method for "self-signing"
drivers. This uses a Microsoft SDK as described by Richard Stallmann.
 
you seem to forget that people have had 5 years to begin and process development to a finished product.
almost all have been dragging their feet.with the excuse that why do a driver that has to be modified ever couple of months.

they have been doing that anyway for years.

from my opinion and observations they just want you to purchase new products instead of supporting the older stuff.
cased in point my lexmark and hp printers, was told drivers would be available when vista is\leased.
now their site says the printers are too old for support in vista.
but they both have managed to produce about a dozen new printers in the past year.

(e-mail address removed)@sport.rr.com

Microsoft has again changed the driver design specifications. One would
hope that the reasons are to improve reliability, efficiency and ease of
writing the driver code. I haven't tried to write a Vista driver, but
I am increasingly concerned that this may be a difficult process. A case
in point is that we are still waiting for a LynxStudio L22 driver that
was to be released in January 2007, but is not yet available. The
company indicates that the delay is due in part to having to make
changes in the device's BIOS and to the necessity for driver
certification. One suspects that the latter requirement may be due in
part to DRM considerations.
Another example is nVidia. There are obviously making a real effort to
produce a good driver, but the latest release (101.41) is still beta.
One hopeful development is a description of a method for "self-signing"
drivers. This uses a Microsoft SDK as described by Richard Stallmann.
 
mikeyhsd said:
you seem to forget that people have had 5 years to begin and process
development to a finished product.
almost all have been dragging their feet.with the excuse that why do a
driver that has to be modified ever couple of months.
Click to expand...

Microsoft has a habit of changing the operating system specifications as
the software is developed. This is understandable, but it makes life
difficult for a hardware vendor who is trying to write a driver. The
vendors are well aware about the changing specifications and are
typically unwilling to do driver development until an operating system
is reasonable close to its "final" form.
A second issue is that a hardware vendor, especially a small sized one,
usually doesn't want to invest in driver development until they have
some idea of the demand for running their product on a new operating system.
Vista/Longhorn is kind of an odd beast. It has been our experience that
some XP/Windows Server 2003 drivers work properly on Vista assuming that
you can get beyond the problem of an installer not wanting to recognize
what is an unknown operating system.
Sound converter drivers typically are not compatible. This is apparently
due to some major changes that Microsoft has made in the audio subsystems.
The driver incompatibilities and/or lack of availability are a major
problem for consumers especially regarding use of certain very
expensive, professional grade audio and video converters.

We will not be using Vista, but do have Longhorn running and like the
operating system. Real testing is still, unfortunately, still delayed by
lack of a L22 driver and the professional version of NaturallySpeaking
9.5. The good news is that the two involved vendors are actually working
on the required software and one can hope that usable versions may be
available in the near future.
 
epson, lexmark and hp are NOT small companies.
they have managed to produce numerous NEW printers that will be supported in vista.

(e-mail address removed)@sport.rr.com

Robert Robinson said:
you seem to forget that people have had 5 years to begin and process
development to a finished product.
almost all have been dragging their feet.with the excuse that why do a
driver that has to be modified ever couple of months.
Click to expand...

Microsoft has a habit of changing the operating system specifications as
the software is developed. This is understandable, but it makes life
difficult for a hardware vendor who is trying to write a driver. The
vendors are well aware about the changing specifications and are
typically unwilling to do driver development until an operating system
is reasonable close to its "final" form.
A second issue is that a hardware vendor, especially a small sized one,
usually doesn't want to invest in driver development until they have
some idea of the demand for running their product on a new operating system.
Vista/Longhorn is kind of an odd beast. It has been our experience that
some XP/Windows Server 2003 drivers work properly on Vista assuming that
you can get beyond the problem of an installer not wanting to recognize
what is an unknown operating system.
Sound converter drivers typically are not compatible. This is apparently
due to some major changes that Microsoft has made in the audio subsystems.
The driver incompatibilities and/or lack of availability are a major
problem for consumers especially regarding use of certain very
expensive, professional grade audio and video converters.

We will not be using Vista, but do have Longhorn running and like the
operating system. Real testing is still, unfortunately, still delayed by
lack of a L22 driver and the professional version of NaturallySpeaking
9.5. The good news is that the two involved vendors are actually working
on the required software and one can hope that usable versions may be
available in the near future.
 
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