Windows 10: USB IrDA devices no longer work in W10

Couldn't get my USB IR adapter to work in W10 and found the answer in the link below.

http://borncity.com/win/2015/09/02/windows-10-infrared-irda-stack-is-removed/

:)

 

USB IrDa device

Apparently, Microsoft pulled IrDA support from Windows 10 with no explanation or reasoning and no official answer or any response whatsoever to the many users of IrDa devices (I use a ScubaPro dive computer $1000 which I can no longer connect after upgrading
to Windows 10).

This is not indicative of a customer-focused company that they claim to be. Windows 10 has been out for a while now with many people across many forums complaining about this issue and still no response. It's been months. I don't understand the silence.

Here's just a few examples:

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/scubapro/511628-irda-driver-windows-10-a.html

USB IrDA devices no longer work in W10 - Windows 10 Forums

IrDA support for Windows 10

Windows 10 Pro: USB IrDA adapter driver installation failed

Windows 10 IrDA: USB-IrDA adapter not working ?

Windows 10 and Infrared (IrDA) - Coolgear

This is ridiculous that Microsoft hasn't spoken about this issue. At least confirm the problem and give an explanation. Did you remove it because there's a serious security flaw? Did you remove it because you didn't want to support IrDa anymore? Microsoft
has a lot of customers that they screwed because they gave no warning about this and have kept completely silent.

 

IrDA Drivers not working in Windows 10

Can Microsoft please comment on why IrDA support was removed from Windows 10? And if it's coming back and if so, when? Many devices rely on IrDA such as sports watches, heart rate monitors and scuba dive computers. After upgrading from Windows 8.1 to
Windows 10, my ScubaPro Galileo Luna dive computer can no longer connect to my computer as the driver is not working correctly in Windows 10. The current mitigations that I could find are:

1. Revert back to Windows 8.1 (or earlier).

2. Use a Virtual computer that is using an earlier version of Windows, via VMWare or Hyper-V or similar.

3. Use a different computer that has an earlier version of Windows or Mac OSX.

These are all horrible solutions.

Looking at different discussion sites, it appears that the IrDA stack was removed from Windows 10 with no explanation. This is affecting a lot of customers. And apparently it is now up to the hardware manufacturers who depend on IrDA to come up with a
driver with the full IrDA stack when before they didn't need to do that. So perhaps some will come out with drivers that will work with Windows 10. But this still doesn't explain why Microsoft pulled support which caused a horrible customer experience for
many many customers. Please speak up about this.

Here's a few links that I found around this issue, but there's no official word yet from Microsoft. Why the silence?

Windows 10 and Infrared (IrDA) - Coolgear

IrDA support for Windows 10

Windows 10 IrDA: USB-IrDA adapter not working ?

Windows 10 Pro: USB IrDA adapter driver installation failed

| Polar Global

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/scubapro/511628-irda-driver-windows-10-a.html

Dive computer and sports watch owners with IrDA warned to not upgrade to Windows 10 - Myce.com

USB IrDA devices no longer work in W10 - Windows 10 Forums

 

I had put my email address on a list to get any info about this problem and received this response today.

************
Hi Everyone, Caleb from Coolgear here with an update regarding Windows 10 drivers for your infrared adapters.

Unfortunately the news isn't good. Our supplier is telling us that they are being stonewalled by Microsoft regarding the changes made in Windows 10 and how to update the driver package. I've also heard from Asix (formerly Moschip), the chip manufacture used in most adapters, that they are also getting similar lack of support from Microsoft regarding this issue.

All we can recommend at this time is that if using your infrared adapter is important to you, do not upgrade to Windows 10, or keep an older PC around to sync your equipment with. For the more technically inclined among you, a virtual machine using VMWare Player or Oracle VirtualBox is also a solution.

I would also recommend that you continue to make some noise on the official MicroSoft forums and elsewhere about the issue. Maybe with some pressure from the public Microsoft will at least acknowledge the problem and work towards resolving it.
************

 

Yes, VMWare supports using USB devices, so in worst case you install an earlier Windows version in a virtual machine and then transfer control of the IrDA device to the virtual. I use the same method to use my very old parallel port Iomega ZIP drive! I have installed Windows 98 in a virtual machine and when I need to access my ZIP disks, I connect the drive to my parallel port and transfer control to Windows 98. Not very convenient, but a good workaround.

 

I'm on a dual boot with W7 so I can still use that but the question is, why is MS being so uncooperative?

 

IrDA is an old technology and rarely used today, but surely this is not a reason to remove support for it!

 

Yes, IrDA is an old technology, but less than half the age of the hardware keyboard. Both have a rapidly diminishing user base, but the core user base of the hardware keyboard includes software engineers, and this is therefore safe for the foreseeable future. The core user base of the IrDA computer interface is not small, but is engaged in physical activities, particularly underwater activities and sports training, a sphere of activity which is largely closed to desk-bound Microsoft operating system engineers and salesmen, so folk who need to upload their dive computer or heart rate/bp logger data to a computer database may have to migrate to Apple when they update their computer systems, unless someone creates a third-party workaround, which has unfortunately proved to be a non-trivial undertaking. It may be that the new ultra-low power Bluetooth technologies may become practical to replace IrDA in these devices at some time in the future, but it would take another 5 - 10 years to phase out IrDA in dive computers.

 

I read up on the dive computers. Lots of pissed off people that have $1000+ hardware that doesn't work with W10 but did prior to the final release.

 

Just wondering, can't one just copy the relevant driver files (INF, DLLs) from a Windows 7 or 8.1 installation and try to manually install then through the Device Manager? For each unknown device relative to the IrDA controller, just browse to the folder that contains all the files and hopefully you will finally manage to make it work. I would install Windows 7 or 8.1 in another disk, or virtual machine and then find out (from device properties) which are the relevant files. I would simply copy them in a folder and try them in Windows 10. Nothing to lose.

 

I think that it's more than just files. Windows says that one has the latest drivers. I'm on a dual boot with W7 so I can use that. It's just strange that it worked supposedly up to the final release at which time, code was removed.

 

Maybe there are no drivers for it included in Windows 10, but you can connect it and then browse for drivers in Windows\Inf and Windows\System32 folders of your Windows 7 installation and it might install and work. I would try that.

I had done the same trick for my old parallel port Iomega ZIP-100 drive. Officially Iomega has dropped support for it in Windows Vista and later. But I have detected the relevant driver files in a Windows XP installation, copied them in a folder and managed to manually install it in Vista 32-bit and Windows 7 32-bit. Unfortunately Microsoft has changed the drivers of the parallel port in Windows 8 and 10, so it is not detected at all and I cannot install it manually any more. I could try to add it as a legacy device, but not sure if it will work or give a BSOD.


EDIT: Have you read the following line from the link in your original post?

"In the past, many vendors are using the IrDA stack, implemented in Windows. So USB infrared receivers don’t need their own drivers or IrDA stack. It simply works. Now Microsoft has removed the IrDA stack in Windows 10 RTM, so all USB infrared receivers/devices are bricked. Only, if a vender already has implemented its own IrDA stack and provides Windows 10 compatible software, the infrared receiver/devices may work."

So try the manual installation as I describe above and it might work for your device!

 

There is a driver in Windows/System32/Drivers/ dated 10/25/15 or the release date of W10 so any driver I try to point to manually it says that I already have the latest.

 

When I say manually, I mean to not allow Windows select a driver since it will tell you latest driver is already installed. From Device Manager right-click on the IrDA device and select Update drivers. Then select the LAST option in every screen, until you see the Have disk button. Click on Have disk and browse to the folder with the driver. Select the first result and proceed to install it. You may have to start your computer in test mode (ignore driver signing) to successfully install the device the first time.

 

One thing I didn't mention. The W10 driver is installed but the Device Manager states the device not working because it couldn't load the driver. It might be any driver won't load because something is missing within W10.

There are lots of different IRDa devices that don't work under W10 that it probably isn't something simple.