SA44B – "Device not found" error, another possible solution

Hi.
I just want to share my recent experience with “Device not found” error in Spike software.

After some time I got back to a computer with 32-bit Win7 that I was using a few months ago together with SA44B with no problems at all. But at this time the Spike SW started reporting “device not found.” I reinstalled and updated Spike and FTDI drivers several times with no success. Finally I explored the list of devices that actually installed when SA44B was detected. On a functional system, only devices called “USB Serial Converter A” and “USB Serial Converter A” appeared in the “USB controllers” folder. On the system reporting “device not found” there also appeared two virtual serial ports (COM8 and COM9 in my case) in the “Ports” folder.

I tried to uncheck “Load VCP” in “USB Serial Converter A” and “USB Serial Converter B” -> properties -> advanced and everyhing started working 🙂

Martin

Martin,
Thank you for the pointer. This is a great thing to check when you are having problems, as we use FTDI’s D2XX driver rather than the VCP driver. Usually, the driver installs without a problem, but when there is a problem it can be a real headache.
I’ll add this to the list of things I have customers check.

Justin, all,

I recently purchased an SA124B (and belonging TG124A), but havent been able to install properly,still stuck with the message ‘ device not found’, on various PC’s with win7/win10, similar on OSX/ESX/Win7 and OSX/ESX/Win10 (clean installs).
Must be doing something consistently wrong, but what?
(have unchecked the ‘load VCP’ as indicated above, thanks Martin)
Is it possible to share a checklist?

Thank you in advance,
Krgds,
Han

Hello Han,

As a preliminary check, have you installed the USB driver from the http://www.signalhound.com/Spike page? When you install it, it will require you to run as administrator (Right click -> Run as Administrator)

You have the necessary y-cable for power? You should connect both PC side connections first before the SA124 side. You should see a green solid LED if the device is properly powered.

Typically connecting a device to the PC for the first time will cause the PC to “load” the driver. You should see some activity in the task bar noting this. It should notify you when done. This can take anywhere from 10 seconds to 1 minute. If you try to launch Spike before this completes, you will get the Device not found error message.

Most customers experience issues with our products on Apple computers, whether in a virtual machine or natively through bootcamp. I would try getting it to run successfully on the PCs first before the Macs.

Sometimes, anti-virus software conflicts with our devices and needs to be disabled/reduced.

I look forward to your response.

Regards,
A.J.

Hello Andrew,

Thank you for your suggestions!
Apologize for only being able to try and respond now; I haven’t been able to spend time on RF for the last months, until now (holiday time); and have put this equipment aside for a while.
Bought a new laptop with Win10 and gave it a try. At first I got the same ‘device not found’ with the TG124A. Then tried the SA124B with no success either, and left it connected to the pc for a few hours. Afterwards the SA124B did respond, now working.
Tried again the TG124A and seems to work as well.
I do not quite understand why it is working now, have yet to try with some other PC’s (and again a Win10 VM on OSX; want to understand what went wrong in numerous previous attempts with other Win7/10 pc’s).
At least its moving forward here now.
So thank you once again, I’ll let you know when I’ve tried some other pc’s
Best regards,
Han

Hi,
I use the SA44B with 3 different PCs. Spike is still working with one and W7/64. On another one it worked before (also W7/64), but stopped now. Load VCP is not checked, no additional Com ports, but “Device not found”. I checked “Load VCP” now and I got two additional Com ports. Still “Device not found”. Unchecking VCP, the Coms disappeared, but no succes. On a laptop under Windows XP I never got Spike to work. The old SW works, but the preamp does not work all the time. It works with Spike on the first PC.

What shall I do?

Occasionally we get sticky USB problems when something goes wrong during a device’s initial configuration. To remedy this, you sometimes have to remove the instance of the USB device. This tool: http://www.ftdichip.com/Support/Utilities/CDMUninstaller_v1.4.zip
can be used to remove all memory of previously connected Signal Hounds.
Launch the GUI version, leave teh VID at 0403, change the PID to 6010, click “Add”, and then click “remove devices”. Then re-install the USB driver, connect your device, wait for the “searching for updated driver” to finish (1-2 minutes sometimes), and then launch Spike.

Hi,
it worked, thanks a lot!

Alfred

Hi again,

as stated before it is working with my second PC W7/64.
I tried the same with my laptop with W XP/64. I deinstalled the old SW, cleaned with CDMUn.. and installed Spike and the driver.
But still “No device found”. I used CDMUn again, reinstalled the driver but no luck.
Is Spike working with XP at all? I saw the new Spike 3.12 is only for W7 and higher.

est regards
Alfred

Oh, sorry, I missed the bit about Windows XP. No, Spike (all versions) is only compatible with Windows 7 / 8 / 10. Our legacy software will work on XP.

Hi,

Spike could not find the device on my second PC now. CDMUn does not help. You should find the real root cause pretty soon!!!! My SA44B is useless in the moment.

Regards
Alfred

Alfred,

Contact us directly at justin (at) signalhound (dot) com. We will be able to more quickly assist you via email.

Let us know the CPU make/model and any troubleshooting steps you have taken up to this point.

Regards,
A.J.

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