Lost USB Serial Communications

[Keyboy]

Greetings,

I am running a Dell Studio 1555 laptop with W7 Home Premium SP1. I also have been connecting an Arduino UNO board through the USB port using a Virtual USB Serial port for over a year with no problems.

Around 5/15/2015 I allowed W Update to install a number of updates. The next day, the Arduino software could not connect to the UNO board and gave me an error telling me to make sure that I had selected the correct Port from the drop down list. When I looked, the Port selection menu was grayed out. I also noted that when I plugged in the UNO USB cable I did not hear the familiar chime sound.

I went to Device Manager and didn't find any device with an error, in fact I didn't see any device that would enable communication via the USB port.

I downloaded the latest Arduino software and installed it. As part of the install it uninstalled the old software I had previously used. At the end of the install a message said everything installed OK. After installing the software and rebooting the computer I connected the UNO USB cable and started the Arduino software. The same issues were present. Device manager also didn't show any devices with errors or any thing that looked like a virtual COM port.

I did some searching on the Arduino Support forums and it looks like several posts indicate the same problem with W7 and some W8 users. So far they have not found a universal solution. I tried everything they suggested like: Installing the old drivers, reinstalling the new drivers, and booting the computer with the UNO USB cable plugged in. All of them didn't fix the issue.

If I posted this in the wrong section please move it.

I need your help to resolve this issue since it is far beyond my capability.

Thanks in advance for your help!

 

[rclarke250]

First off, do any other USB devices work when plugged into the port? And when you say old and new drivers, what drivers are you talking about? It sounds like a USB driver or hub issue to me, that is why I am asking about if the machine can see any other USB devices.

 

[Keyboy]

Hi rc,

Yes I am able to connect 4 thumb drives, 1 at a time since I only have one port, and each works fine. I tried read and write on each with no problems. The drivers I am talking about come with the Arduino software. From what I have read, the drivers provide a virtual COM port to communicate with the Arduino UNO board.

I appreciate you help and comments.

 

[Keyboy]

Greetings,

I booted the laptop and pressed F8 to get to the setup screen. I chose the option to disable the driver verification requirement. I then went to the Arduino software and used their stand alone driver installation. It said it completed. However, the UNO still couldn't communicate with the laptop.

I then went to Device Manager and couldn't find anything that was a virtual serial port, ardino, or device that had a error marking.

I then used regedit and searched for Arduino. Many occurrences showed up and several were in the driver section. Would it help if I uploaded them here?

I don't know why this driver and serial port is not showing up in Device Manager and is not working.

Thanks in advance for your help!

 

[Keyboy]

Greetings,

After many long hours of work, I traced it down to a bad USB cable.

Thanks for your help!