No way to activate camera

[ihatethislaptop]

I just got a Vaio SVE1712z1eb,  in short a new laptop with windows 8 and it has a buit in Camera . The Camera does not seem to have any driver software installed and I cannot make the laptop aknowledge the cameras existance. I have looked onine for a camera driver but its pretty hard to do considering I have no idea who manufactures it. The Vaio camera utility does not seem to be on my laptop and I have no idea what to do other than throw my new laptop out of the window and use my acer that cost approximately £700 less and yet they mange to supply a working installed camera.

[rich912]

Hi ihatethislaptop,

The camera will almost certainly use native windows drivers and will not therefore require downloading.

Is the camera present in Device Manager under Imaging Devices and how are you trying to use the camera – Skype?

Do you have ArcSoft software listed under Start > All Programs – I’m not sure what Sony are currently using for web cam capture these days...

Rich

[ihatethislaptop]

The device manager does not have any imaging devices listed other than a USB camera driver that it says is not connected. No arcsoft apart fro the one I downloaded to see if I could get the camera to work and that sis not work.

cheers

shaun

[rich912]

Hi Shaun,

The USB camera listed will be the webcam. It would seem that newer models (Win 😎 are not supplied with capture software but the camera should still work with applications such as Skype – I take it that Skye doesn’t recognise the camera?

You could try some basic troubleshooting such as deleting the camera in Device Manager and then rebooting. If this fails to resolve the issue then open Device Manager > expand Universal Serial Bus Controllers > right click each item listed in the tree and select uninstall. Then shut down, remove power adaptor and battery and then hold down the power button for 30 seconds. Re-attach battery and power adaptor and reboot. Windows will reinstall the USB controller drivers – however as the camera is recognised in Device Manager I am unsure whether this will make any difference.

Ultimately if the above fails to work then you will need to contact support for further advice or a repair.

Rich