NOW A NEW WRINKLE... (formerly "MiniPac loses programming - when turned off")

[pmilnes]

I appreciate the help...

I have a Mini-Pac USB that has always lost programming when the PC is turned off.  I have to re-program it every time I boot.   

Any thoughts?

Thanks!

[Hoopz]

From the Ultimarc sit:

Problem: (USB Only) Board appears not to work until WinIPAC is run every time following reboot. Yellow exclamation marks in Control Panel, Device Manager.
This is a rare Windows XP problem (fixed in Vista), and is caused by a registry error. It is suspected that this problem occurs if the board is regularly swapped from one USB port to another, or different board versions used on the same PC.
Ensure you are using the latest version of WinIPAC (March 2007) which has a permanent workaround for this problem. Installing the latest version should cure the problem with no further action needed.

[pmilnes]

Okay, so I did that... and now it doesn't do ANYTHING.

I removed the old program, installed the new version, and then loaded my previous keyboard layout - and programmed the minipac and NOTHING.

Any ideas?

Help!

[AndyWarne]

Assisting via email...
But, it worth mentioning that problems like this are very unlikely to be the board having lost programming. This can be confirmed by moving the board to another PC, it will almost certainly be fine and still have programming.

Running WinIPAC works-around the Windows XP composite device registry bug ( a problem in XP well-known to USB device developers!) and makes the device work again but thats not because it has re-programmed lost data.

In Vista, Microsoft has fixed this problem, all USB devices are re-scanned at boot rather than relying on possibly incorrect registry data.

Andy