ATI TV Wonder USB 2.0 works, power supply issue

[jwillis84]

I'm an idiot.

I figured out why Live view wasn't working.

MMC 8.9 had this new default of TV On Demand or something.. very poorly implemented. It really should not have been released like this.

You [press] the pause button and Live video appears.

Its really not intuitive what they were doing..a quick google turns up a lot of upset people when they released 8.9 since it changed the defaults.

This software has a lot (alot) of hidden undocumented hotspots all over the interface, and behaviors that just mess with you.

So it seems to work in a virtual machine, stably.. but MMC is a trickster.. I can see why people looked to winvcr or some other standalone tool that had a well defined behavior pattern.. learning MMC could take a while.

Audio also seems to come and go.. it is there and it is captured.. but these hot spots in the UI seem to flip switches or something. I almost want to take it apart to see what its doing.

[jwillis84]

MMC is a bear, getting it installed, learning what to press and not to press, and how to recover.

Virtual Dub Capture is a 'breeze' by comparison.

The 1.9.11 version even auto-tracks the sound source when switching the video input.. video tuner or video composite or video s-video.

Its not exactly a vcr or vlc but its a lot easier and more stable.

MMC has Video Soap, for "scrubbing" the signal I guess.. though I am not sure its in the hardware or software side of the MMC. If it is in the hardware, I would think that based on all the other DirectShow filters, there would be one for Video Soap.. which leads me to suspect its in the MMC software itself.

One of the nice things about Virtual Dub is it "shares" its Graphs in GraphEdit.. you can connect to them and "see" how its snapping all the building blocks together and using the ATI hardware real-time. Not everyone does this, it takes extra effort.

I know you can "hook" a Graph from a third party and "steal" the GraphEdit view real-time, I used to do this.. but its been a while. It would be interesting to see how ATI built their application graphs for running the hardware.

Really I pursued the cdrom installs and then explored the many versions of MMC and CIM available because of Video Soap. But I'm winding down to think Virtual Dub is a far better archival tool.. and its not that hard to use.

I've read with interest about AVISynth and think perhaps it could replace Video Soap in a workflow.

MMC on the surface is attractive because it looks simple and quick to use, but maybe its not.

[lordsmurf]

For your own sanity, ignore VideoSoap for now. It was really useful 15 years ago. Now, not really. It's just like the tuner.

You need to be aware of a problem. ATI MMC 9.1x removed the dropped frame counter. For that reason alone, it's garbage. If you cannot verify a capture, it should not be used. ATI MMC 7.x, 8.x and 9.0x all had the feature. No idea why it was removed, but as you're learning, ATI did some stupid thing in later years.

If it's not removed, it's hidden, and I've never seen it. I wouldn't put merely hiding something past them.

My biggest issue right now is that my second capture system forgot how to capture with overlay in VirtualDub 1.8.x to 1.10.x, all versions. It was working great with a driver installed for the PCIe card, which I later used to build another system (that I sold off), and kept the PCI card for myself. It also had ATI MMC 9.1x, and refused to uninstall. So I removed everything ATI, and that's when the troubles started. ATI MMC works, VirtualDub does not. And the system drops frames now. The card works fine in VirtualDub, not MMC. Now it's opposite. So everything does work.

These are amazing cards with one of the worst installs I've ever seen, But realize most video cards are like this. Ugh!

[jwillis84]

Oh.. I love a challenge.

I'm not giving up.. I tend to make great progress.. learn things.. and then get tired and wonder around for a bit.

Thanks!

Really, for alerting me to things like the feature lists.. and pros and cons about one version versus the other.

That really saves me time and helps me focus, it would take a long time to acquire that experience.

The installs can be fixed.. I know that for sure.. I was just questioning if it was worth the effort.. as in "should I stop now, is this pure insanity?"

So 7.x, 8.x and 9.0x are of most use.. interesting.

For the ATI USB 2.0 the versions below 8.9 do not recognize it, so that's a lower limit. I'm not sure about the upper limit but its less than 9.16 .. I suspect the setup.inx problem (fix) is the same for all of them since the error message during install is the same. I don't know about the 7.x versions. All three development programs appeared to have been in parallel and overlapped in time.. so a product may be supported across all three development programs depending on when they occurred.

I now have on hand:

ATI All in Wonder VE (T200 PCI),
ATI TV Wonder Elite (T550 PCI),
ATI TV Wonder HD750 (T750 PCI)

amazingly they all came shrink wrapped.

So I plan to deep dive into those when I get the chance.. this setup.inx problem is what gives me pause.

The VE will have problems on XP
The Elite should be ok with XP
The HD should be good on XP and 7x64

I am targeting XP since backward app support was good on Win7x32... and feature wise Win7 was the best bargain for users in 30 years. Win10 is becoming more and more like Chrome and feature dwindling... can't believe I'm saying it.. but I miss the old microsoft.

[lordsmurf]

Just to add:

ATI MMC 7.x is not something you want to mess with. Huge leaps at 7.5, then 7.7.
More leaps at 8.0, and again at 8.7.
At this time, don't even mess with anything below 8.7. Focus on 8.7, 8.8, 8.9, 9.0x

8.7 was probably the most compatible, working even on 128 Pro Theatre-chip cards (with a hack, documented on this site, one of the earlier posts here from 2004 when the forum opened)

8.8 was only found on some installed CDs that I recall, not online upgrades. A few AGP cards used it.
8.9 and 9.0x are not much different.

9.1x removed some features, and added a really crappy MPEG-4/XviD capture mode. Barf. Sadly, only 9.1x will work on the PCIe cards, which is why I avoid them for any build where MMC (thus MPEG-2, probably 15mbps) is required.

VideoSoap was useful for MPEG capturing direct to DVD MPEG. That mostly overlapped with the DVD recorder era (04-08). It has no real use now. Either capture AVI and denoise with better/newer Avisynth/VirtualDub, or up the bitrate to BD/low-broadcast 15mbps levels. In the old days, so high bitrate didn't play well on CPUs, and often the payware MPEG decoders didn't support high bitrates.

There is a rare version of ATI MMC 9.15 that supposedly works with the ATI 600 USB card on CD. I've yet to find that. I have a 9.15 version from online upgrades center that does NOT work, so the disc probably had a specially modified version.

If you're serious about trying to make ATI AIW/MMC cards (not just USB, but PCI, maybe PCIe) work on Windows 7, or at least with overlay in XP reliably, or in VMs, maybe even x64, possibly Vista as a fall-back (7 vs Vista did behave different in my tests), then I have about 25gb in archived ATI drivers, MMCs version, and other hacks/info that you may find helpful. Some of shared on this site, but not all, because of the same issues you're seeing*.

* It never fails, you post something, put a warning "THIS MAY NOT WORK! (and possibly screw up your system so bad that a reformat is required!!!)", and somebody would reply "It isn't working for me, help!" or "It messed up my system, and is all your fault!!!" Well duh. So in those unusual cases, I chose to just not share.

Also note that 15mbps MPEG-2 capture will not work well, at all, one single-core CPUs. So you need a beefy dual-core to not drop frames. There were some native AGP/SATA boards from Asrock, but slower 1.5 SATA-I. That's our best option for AGP cards. It's why I've focused most on PCI, and now that USB (which I'm still leery of, seeing how it barfed on my HO portable studio).

I've not had an advanced ATI conversation, at my level, in probably 10 years. This is nice.

[jwillis84]

wild night..

this isn't functional yet.

summary (don't try this at home - you could wreck your system!!! - but it works)

you can take any of the distribution .exe files and use 7zip to extract the internal setup.exe (that's the InstallShield ISScript launcher and ATI MMC .msi package bound together with the IS script).

these commands basically "lie" to the msiexec process and tell it to ignore the ISScript engine.. so it doesn't crash it.. my working theory is the script engine is "crashing" the msiexec by sending it a bad reference to a command line object that overflows the msiexec input buffer.. doing this directly tells the msi do its thing and ignore the other command from the script engine (I think any way )

Extract the Setup.exe from the distribution file with 7zip

then..

Extract the ATI Multimedia Center msi package (be patient it will ask you where to put the files)
C:\Users\...\Desktop\9_06>Setup.exe /V" /a ISSETUPDRIVEN=1"

Install
C:\Users\...\Desktop\9_06>msiexec /i "ATI Multimedia Center.msi" ISSETUPDRIVEN=1

Uninstall
C:\Users\...\Desktop\9_06>msiexec /x "ATI Multimedia Center.msi" ISSETUPDRIVEN=1

You can install the software on virtually anything.. I ran it against Win7x64 and it put them in place.

But..

IS2016 recognized the extracted IS script (sort of) enough to see they are performing logic to customize the registry and shortcuts based on OS detected and Hardware detected (DVD, CDROM, PCI, AGP, AIW, TW, Rage Theater.. ect..). It also installs a critical service and deploys the language support.

I think the InstallShield script is not failing but when it finishes and starts up msiexec it feeds it a commandline that crashes msiexec.. that's my theory. The best thing would be to figure out why, next best would be to "hook" or intercept the function call to msiexec, sanitize or reformat the command.. and reinsert it. (But) i could be wrong.

When msiexec crashes, it leaves a dialog box hanging on the screen, that acts like a debugger break point and holds the window "open". Process Hacker could then grab the command line fed to the crash-"ing" msiexec and it said something like -embedding {GUID} C which I think is a pass by reference (maybe) to a COM or Registry object, or both. (I don't know for sure).. its also another clue.. if it is a COM or Registry object.. security permissions may be blocking access.. and that might show up as a "0x800405 : String Out of Bounds"

[jwillis84]

Oh yeah.. curiously.. the "by-pass" method seems to install Start Menu items for "three" different versions of the TV app, at least they have unique icons and shortcuts.

I'm not so wild about trying to make the by-pass method work.. I'd rather get this [intended] method working.

BTW I do appreciate the chatter about what's relevant and what's not.

I am reading it.

Perhaps.. after the software is working as [intended] we could explore [re-scripting] it in something like InnoSetup or Makemsi or Wix.. those are much more current and less effort.

A mix and match might be a matter of Trial & Error, enabling component installs with hardware it wasn't even intended to work with.. I dunno.. that seems a ways off from now.

[jwillis84]

keep making leaps in understanding,

the failing msiexec call from the ISScript is passing a "packed" {GUID} to the cmdline of the msiexec, that should refer to a .tmp file on the file system created by the script (somehow.. I'm not sure how) .. it should be the result of a portion of the ISScript called a "custom action" or (CA) in microsoft windows installer terms. The ISScript does its steps in detecting and preparing the system then hands off the job of final package install to the ati mmc .msi -- this is called a combo or hybrid InstallShield ISScript driven / MSI database install package. Either XP is blocking this handoff which is causing the Unhandeled Exception String out of bounds error.. (or) something in the hand off command is causing the msiexec to crash. I don't know which. The msiexec -Embedding cmdline option isn't well documented that I can find, and I don't know if the .tmp file with the Custom Action information is available or readable. .. (it feels) like I am getting close to figuring the problem out.. but I've been here before.. it could still be a long ways off.

I'm pushing this information out, in case someone with greater experience and understanding can swoop in and solve the problem for the benefit of everyone interested in this 14 year old software.

[jwillis84]

Success (of a sort)

I was reading the InstallShield InstallScript for the ATI MMC versions that would not install

And produced an annoying error before terminating.

I started noticing that not only were they checking OS and Software Preqrequistes and Preinstalled keys.. ect.. they were actually querying the capabilities of the hardware itself !!

They were looking beyond DirectX support, and into the CPU using WMI.

Here's the Super Beyond Belief thing.

If they saw something that didn't qualify.. they did not catch it and provide a "Helpful" technical notice before shutting down. They simply let it fail and bubble up to the OS to handle.. which of course [Unhandled Exceptioned] it.

I'll put that on the table and just walk away.. let's just say.. not smart.

Customers are left scratching their heads without a clue.

Sooo.. I've been testing mostly in a VMware virtual machine 5.0.2 and when the ATI MMC installs (8.9, 9.15, 9.16) it kind of works.. sort of.. not great.. not bug free.. but hey it works.

Putting these clues together I wondered.. what if I could find hardware that fully satisfied this Install Script?

Guess what.. I have a 2009 HP 5101 Mini (a low power netbook) with a generic OEM install of Windows XP and Service Pack 3.

Also..

I have also been toying with WinSTALL LE, a "re-packager" that came free with Windows Server 2000.. which examined a machine before a software setup was installed, then after and produced a Corporate network compatible standalone "Installer Package".

WinSTALL LE has changed hands over the years, but most recently the new owners updated it for Windows 7 and continued to make a "free" version available. They have since stopped offering it to the public but it had a good reputation as the go to software for over two decades. I happen to have a copy of that.. and took a "snapshot" of the 5101 netbook both before and after and generated a package.

Back to the netbook.

The cdrom version of the software that came with the ATI TV Wonder USB2.0n installed "flawlessly" and performs exactly like you would expect it to perform.

This confirmed the "idea" that the ATI MMC installers are "looking" for unpublished prerequisites, in the hardware that is discovered using WMI. Weird Installer failures can (now) be chocked up to failing a test in the install script.. not necessarily "buggy" installers.. simply.. dumb installers.. which don't tell you why they are quiting.

I think or I am almost sure from reading the scripts its looking for specific MMX or SSE instruction capabilities in a CPU and possibly more. Virtual machines tend to not virtualize a complete set of advanced native instructions.. and code that detects missing instructions often have a backup plan to "emulate" the missing capabilies.. but a coder can decide to just "fail" or "Terminate" their code rather than build in a backup plan.

Also AMD Cyrix NEC or other cheap CPU manufacturers can take a detour and offer competing advanced instruction sets.. like x64 for example.. which may or may not take the place or offer options a coder will accept.. so the ATI MMC software seems to be very picky about at least CPU hardware, memory hardware and dma access.. a slurry of undocumented "dependencies".

Its very satisfying to know why the Installers are not working everywhere on every hardware platform that can minimally run WinXP SP2. I never considered there could be other very sensible reasons.

[Sooo] why does the "re-packager" re-package matter?

Simple.. [ it has no script ] ..

it simply lays down the files and registry entries and shortcuts and copies the files it needs to wherever they need to go.

[Why] is that of any interest at all?

Well.. most of those advanced instruction sets were about "speed" and "ram" which back then were in short supply.. today our machines are horendously fast, gigantic in memory capacity, and titantic in storage space.

Even if the coders didn't code a path around missing advanced instructions, the compilers they used.. often automatically did.. and so the software will often still run on hobbled machines with CPU's the size of a planet.

So.. I'm saying there's a chance.. that a simple.. dumb and dummber.. re-packaged package installer may be more stable and not crash while your installing, and easier to debug.

The compressed first attempt .msi installer came out:

180-V01100-200.msi - 82.4 MB (86,482,944 bytes) - installs ATI MMC 9.08

That was created using the "Express" settings and just letting it run.

So it installed "everything" that was on the cdrom.. except the DVD player software. The DVD player requires a decoder license and key or something which I think has to be installed apriori.. if it doesn't see its already there.. it just declines to install the DVD player.

Individual component installs would probably be a lot smaller.

-- it does include "uninstall" information as well

As they say.. Wax on.. Wax off

The Install Script did serve a purpose.. it tailored and customized the install for several different operating systems and situations.. 95, 98, NT, 2k or DVD or noDVD, FM radio or no FM radio, PCI, AGP or USB tuner hardware.. so this much simpler install may not be appropriate for all situtations.

But it is interesting.

[jwillis84]

Thinking about Win7 x32

The Install script does look for 95, 98, NT, 2K and in some sections XP

But it will fail to detect Win7 (or Vista or 8 or 10) at all

So that means even if run under compatibility mode it could be checking things outside the norm when it comes to just the reported OS version.. it may do very dumb things based on its own independent probing of the machine. It may not recognize certain pieces of hardware, ect.. (what's a SATA drive, or SSD.. for example)

Since the ATI installer is "going off road" it wouldn't be surprising to see some odd behavior

Treating an application already installed as a WinXP app and setting "run this app as an XP app" would be easier, especially if the normal Install Script isn't getting in the way and misbehaving badly.

Its only a personal thought.

MMC may just be misunderstood.. and need a little therapy.

[lordsmurf]

I've said this for a quite a while now: ATI AIW hardware doesn't seem to understand dual-core or quad-core, though it seems to takes advantage of it anyway (by not dropping frames on 15mbps captures). Many, many audio cards also fail its pointless MMC cash test, even though the card is fine.

So ATI is somewhat slow, dimwitted, outdated. But before you jump on any ATI hate bandwagon, ATI and Canopus aren't any better. Most video capture workflows were created with a specific setup in mind, not any future one (even when claimed they do).

You jostled a memory for me. I vaguely remember using 7zip to extract part of an archive, and use the installer inside of it, back in 2012 when I was doing the WinVista/7 ATI AIW/MMC thing. Hmmm... No repeatable successes at the time, but it may be because I forgot to repeat that step when I tried it again 2 years later.

How much of the ATI installers can be repaired, ignored, or even lied to?

[jwillis84]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lordsmurf

How much of the ATI installers can be repaired, ignored, or even lied to?

I'm not sure.

Virtual machines excel in lie'ing to software to get them to work.

The InstallScripts however seem to be using WMI as the mechanism for probing the equipment before deciding what to setup, or how, or not.

I would guess you would want to [audit] what the processes were tickling in the WMI database, then intercept or write something to respond otherwise.

The scripts seems to be traversing /root/cimv2 which is about as general as you could get. I don't know Wbem well but suspect you can override the answers there fairly easily.. maybe a MDL or MOF "fake" provider? SNMP used to have something like that where you could substitute scripts that were elaborate, or just echo'ed back plain text when queried.

The hard part is "guessing" the right answers without a successful install, this HP 5101 mini netbook is a success.. so auditing the responses from it should provide a good template.

I suspect it would go like this:

Step 1, before install, apply an (overlay) .mof or .mdl file to a system
Step 2, run the installer

other variations might be to see what the scripts do if they are denied access to the /root/cimv2 branch, would they default to sanity values, refuse to install, report "Access Denied"?

What I've learned from this is that "certain combinations" of CPU, GPU and hardware probably work, and changes made by switching out cards or hardware during the course of a machines life, probably changed the installed software behavior.. the proper course of action would have been to "Warn" the end-user to remove the ATI software (before) making a hardware change, make the hardware change and (then) reinstall the ATI software.. it would probe again and setup in accordance with the new restrictions.

But inverting that by changing hardware (first) and then attempting to (fix) the now broken ATI software would be crippled by the plug and play system. PnP disables and removes drivers and branches of the CIM when hardware changes.. so old code paths would not work, basically (uninstall) of the ATI software would fail or at least be (incomplete).

That should (always) be standard practice.

Its a catch-22 situtation that has plagued Windows for a long long time.. the default behavior only works if you never update hardware, and alway use microsoft supplied drivers. The Apple model avoids this by denying uninstall processes really exist, everything is top down, or forwards.. only way back is reinstall.. or buy a whole new system.

[jwillis84]

I noticed another difference.

The 5105 netbook had XP (Home) edition not XP (Professional).

I doubt this is significant.. but the home TV and PVR markets they were targeting were more towards Home and MCE types of installation.

I normally use Professional edition for the domain join features I use at work.. and its just more familar to me than Home edition

Truth is though, Home editions had feature (trade offs) that Professional did not have, or had instead to balance the sales value proposition.

ATI was probably developed and tested expecting a Home edition.. not a Pro or Ultimate or whatever.. that could make a difference in installer behavior too.

.. its grasping at straws.. but its a real variable

Gamers were also a target demographic, and they also were Home users, not Professional users.. for that they often got extra games or gamer support software installed with Home editions that Pro users did not have.

Win7 when that came along had a built-in (in place upgrade) which could carry you through four or more potential "edition flavors" and I doubt the ATI software was tested across Home premium through Home Ultimate Premium editions

[jwillis84]

I tested with XP Home vs XP Professional.. no difference.

In the virtual machine using Virtual Box 4.1, I did not get an error and was able to install MMC from the original cdrom which included ATI MMC 9.08 - I could not do this is the VMware Player 5 virtual machine because I got the 0x80040705 error message.

Virtual Box 4.1 still would not run the TV application, the USB port would lock up.

But the take away is that the 0x80040507 error seems to be a symptom of the VMware Player 5 machines emulation of the hardware the MMC software needs in order to install. It is still the Installshield Install Script which is failing the install on this virtual machine but discovering additional details is always interesting.

MMC 8.9 and MMC 9.15, 9.16 do install in VMware Player 5 and can play TV over the USB without locking up.

I have not tried an XP Virtual Mode or Windows Hyper-V virtual machines.

And VMware Player and Virtual Box are much more mature these days, I was running an old copy of each due to work on a project with Coldfusion 5 on Linux from long long ago. I will probably update and see if it will work on those newer platforms.

[jwillis84]

Trojan horse method

Virtualbox has terrible USB 2.0 support, runs at USB 1.1 speeds.. which the TV player program won't tolerate.

But you can Export a Virtualbox VM from [File|Export] to a .OVA open virtual architecture machine

Then [Open] that machine in VMware, it complains, but try again at lower settings and it succeeds.

The virtual machine keyboard works, the mouse does not, until you inject/install VMware Tools from the File menu and manually confirm with the keyboard and reboot.

After that the VM boots and has MMC 9.08 already installed, courtesy of Virtualbox.

I haven't upgraded VMware or Virtualbox to see if later releases work without this trick.. but its one way to get around the Installshield Install script failing with Error 0x8004075.

I have to wait a bit before I can test the USB communications with the ATU USB2.0 but have a feeling it will work, since the VMware USB support is much better.. closer to normal speeds.

A convoluted way of installing.. but sneaky

[jwillis84]

While the Trojan method works.. I could never get the MMC 9.08 to work, even after bringing it into VMware

And upgrading VMWare and VirtualBox never brought a success.

MMC 9.08 just does not want to work on Virtual hardware.

MMC 8.9 (does) work on virtual hardware, and it does install on XP.

Lesson learned was if you use the cdrom software that comes with the ATI TV Wonder USB2.0n

Then you have to use [real] hardware, the MMC that comes on the two different cdroms had 9.03 and 9.08 and those just would (not) work, even if you could get them installed on VMware or Virtualbox, on any version from 5 to 14 for VMware or 4 to the latest 5 for Virtualbox.

I really wanted to find a virtual machine solution, but the effort is looking harder than finding an older laptop with real hardware that the software does work with.

So I'm branching.

If you use the ATI TV Wonder USB2.0n drivers from the cdrom and then install the UCI and the MMC8.9 in a virtual machine like VMware 5 or above.. that will work.. but its unusual.. and the default of TV On Demand being (on) will leave you a black screen with audio coming in. You have to manually turn (off) TV OnDemand and the picture will appear. < That is a lot of hard won information.. and its reproducable.

Somewhat harder, but similar, the same combo of drivers + UCI + MMC 8.9 on Windows 2000 in VMware 5 also works.. but TV OnDemand still causes problems.

The VMware virtual experience is always competing for real hardware resources and is suboptimal.. I don't think you can tweak it out.

The HP 5101 mini experience even under XP Home edition was much nicer.. and even for a netbook, its specification dwarf the [normal] hardware specifications of "most" computers from 2004 when the ATI TV Wonder USB2.0n came out. (forwarning: There was a USB 1.1 compressed version of the ATI TV Wonder USB, but it was dramatic red in color and did not work well.. it is not the same thing.. stay away from it.. its too low bandwidth, the drivers are available.. but its just really from the Windows 98 era when USB 1.1 was available if not dominate)

The HP 5101 mini came out in the year 2009 and ended production around 2010 or 2012, it still has support drivers available from HP for Vista and Windows 7x32 (how convenient?)

I have not tested a Win7x32 install .. but I'm eager to try it.

I'm busy this weekend so this trial will have to occur later.

Longer term I've a new interest in Installshield DevStudio 9 because that is what the ATI software was packaged with.. but I can't get a copy.. or find a way of buying a copy.. its just not available anywhere.. so I'm studying old Installshield books on the subject.. hoping to gleen some information.

p.s. My test scenario was VMware and Virtual Box on Windows 7 x64 running 32 bit installs, and installing ATI 9.03 and 9.08 into that. Crossing the 32 to 64 bit barrier.. could be introducing more difficulty for the software than would happen in a straight 32 to 32 crossing. For one thing there is the WoW64 subsystem which makes 32 bit apps run on 64 bit versions of Windows. Mis-named WoW64 is Windows on Windows for 64, which creates the C:\Programs and File (x86) bifrucation and branches in the registry. ATI had no way of knowing about those differences, and App compatibility may not catch every misaligned pass thru from VMware or Virtualbox.. its a thought.. but a slim possibility things would be better with a VM on Win7x32. your mileage may vary

For my part.. dispelling the "instability" of the installs means I feel encouraged that the "right" versions of MMC will work under Windows 7 x32 without the need for a VM possibly using the feature AppCompatibility.

I'm not so encouraged AppCompatibility would work under Windows 8 or Windows 10 because they revamped and jettisoned so much useful support subsystems. And totally trashed the Windows Classic user interface subsystem as a way of "burning the bridges" for previous windows programers after Windows 8.. they were basically retiring a large segment of the population and wanted a demarc.

Windows 7 is still an important achievement that hasn't been eclipsed by anything since.. Windows Chromebook editions are just not its equal. Its very possible Win10 will go down the road of becoming a special Android edition as most of the office apps move over to that platform.. so supporting Windows 10 just doesn't make sense at the moment.

On the other hand, an Android App that supports ATI USB, PCI might make some real sense.. but I'm not going there yet.

[jwillis84]

New development

Researching Installshield and the newsest Installshield products, IS and AdminStudio.. they have a "repackager" product in the AdminStudio.. which basically competed with WinSTALL but took it a step further.

AdminStudio can "detect" an older "Legacy" InstallShield install during discovery and use "Professional Logging" which supposedly gets more details from the logs in the context of being an InstallShield install and will "re-package it".

They have a 21 day eval.. which I'm not sure how functional that is.. its still very expensive.. but I'm thinking [maybe] it can examine the Legacy Installshield DevStudio 9 installs and come up with something "better" or more consistent than the old Installshield 9 installer alone. I can't imagine it capturing the logic to support Window 95, 98, NT, or Win2000 specifically, especially since those are no longer supported, but XP and Win7 might get better support.

I "believe" the "logic" in the Installer Script embedded within the old Legacy packaging could be the cause of unstable installations.. its trying to adapt the one installer to five or more hardware platforms.. capturing or repackaging for just the one "supported" hardware platform should produce a saner installation without all the extra logic.

And as I said I now have discovered that the HP mini 5101 netbook apparently makes a perfect install of the cdrom provided software with the ATI TV Wonder USB 2.0 version "n" capture "dongle?"

Before having a good hardware platform.. I couldn't be sure any capture was "good" now I can.

What remains is whether it will also install "perfectly" on Windows 7 x32, and deciding whether re-packaging only the XP or that and the Windows 7 x32 (inclusive) should be done.. and if the eval copy will do that. I know that WinSTALL will do it.. I've done that.. but it didn't have "Professional logging".. I also learned "Prof Logging" seems to create relocatable or templated installs that allow re-tagetting the install directory.. [hints] that it might be possible to re-target for x64.. but only "hints" nothing for sure.

[jwillis84]

Well.. gosh.

Yesterday tried intalling Win7x32 on HP 5101, so I could try the OEM cdrom software from ATI for the USB2.0 capture device.

I'm learning a lot about old hardware.

For example, if your Flash stick is (too) large the older hardware will fail to boot off of it.

Luckily I had a small microSD card of 8 GB and tossed it into a USB carrier to turn it into a Flash drive.

I used the Microsoft - "Windows 7 USB DVD download Tool" to create a bootable Flash drive froma Win7x32 install disk.. I had to do it this way because I did not have a USB DVD drive, and back in those days USB CD was much more common anyway.. I wasn't even sure a bootable USB DVD drive wouold even work.. and they are getting hard to find... ones that work with really old hardware.. and ones that even work with Win10.. silly world.

This after trying a standard USB 16 GB and 32 GB flash drives.. those would never boot.. it was like the BIOS locked up trying to scan them and just went blinking forever.

The 8 GB USB microSD card was a late night last effort.. and amazingly it worked.. booted right up!

I've thought about it, and BIOS was 16 Bit, not 32 Bit.. so it could be anything over 8 GB is outside the range of its tiny imagination and just permenantly boggles its mind.

Windows 7 x32 was a complete joy to install and revived my utter contempt for Windows 8 and Windows 10.

Windows 7 was an absolute "premium" desktop operating system that worked right out of the box and came fully loaded.

So then I plugged in the ATI cdrom and ATI USB device and immediately ran into the UAC and Compatibility issues, but I got both the drivers and software installed after a bit of work.. not much, but no errors.

I did not "prepare" this install for receiving an older software package meant for XP.. so I deserved the trouble I got.

After a reboot the ATI Launcher appeared, but the TV app could not find or initialize the video

Windows Media encoder had no trouble finding and using the USB device

Device Manager presented all the devices and drivers as you would expect

It was not as smooth an install of the ATI software as using XP Home SP3, but everything except the TV app seems to work.

Win7 comes with DirectX11, so I did not install DirectX9, I'm not even sure it would install.. but there are obviously a lot of variations that can be tried.

This was after the long struggle to find a bootable USB Flash drive.

XP on the HP 5101 is still looking like the most "trouble free" way of finding a complete hardware platform that accepts and installs the ATI USB provided software and works with the ATI USB 2.0 device

But I haven't completely given up on Win7 x32 yet.

[jwillis84]

Ok.. finally a little Success !

The ATI TV Wonder USB 2.0n

And the cdrom 9.08 MMC installs on Vista 32 bit and is fully functional.

It seems the DirectX interfaces changed between Vista and Win7, where Vista included more backwards support for DirectX 9 and Windows XP. DXVA1, DXVA2 et. al.

When a newer DirectX is already installed (as it is on Vista and Win7) you cannot install DirectX 9.. so backwards support is very important.

I still had to make sure that all "applications" on the cdrom were tagged as running only in XP SP2 compatibility mode.

If I did not an unpacked version in %TEMP% would block any attempts at reinstall until manually cleaned out.. so make sure the first install goes correct.

If it doesn't go correct, open a file explorer window and type %TEMP% and delete the half installed packages.

The [Very familar] Error messages would say "Access Denied" they are referring to an attempt to "unpack" in the directories the half installed %Temp% packages are occupying.. remove them.. and your clear to try and install again.

[lordsmurf]

What I also found is this:

On the AGP (maybe PCI, not PCIe) cards, you could install in XP, sometimes Vista, and then upgrade to Win7. The upgrade left the earlier settings intact. But it wasn't a repeatable process, and wildly varies from system to system (due to other hardware), meaning it worked perfectly, partially, or not at all.

I was looking at my old ATI AIW/MMC Win7 research earlier tonight, trying to see if I missed anything.

We can each get it to work, sort of. I was close, and you are now too.

Win7 with ATI AIW PCI, VirtualDub overlay, and MMC, would be ideal. x64 obviously ideal, but x86 is honestly fine. The big deal about x64 is more than 4gb RAM, but a capture box needs no more than 2gb-4gb. One of the main draw to getting Win7 is to use SSD and newer hardware, and that can be done on x86.

So I'm rooting for you.

You keep posting, and I keep reading. You're not talking to yourself.

FYI: Generally, we merge posts on the forum. But this thread is special, not doing that here. The updating makes for good reads.