USB driver on Windows Vista

First of all.. Sorry for my English.

We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows 2000.
It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.
I read this:

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlog...ign_perOS.mspx

It seems that on Vista-64 bits systems is not possible to load drivers
that are not signed.
We sell no more than 100 systems a year. I guess if this certification
is too expensive for us.

Is it correct?
Any link or suggestion?

Thanks in advance,
Giacomo

On May 10, 4:29 am, -Giacomo- <"[rimuovi]"@[rimuovi].[rimuovi]> wrote:

> We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows 2000.
> It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.

This issue is not going to go away, it is going to get worse.
Microsoft's end goal is to close the PC software and hardware
architecture and require all software on Windows to be licensed
through them, similar to XBox.

While there /are/ solutions to load unsigned drivers on 64-bit Vista,
they will likely break with every new service pack. I would strongly
consider moving your project to a different operating system.

-Giacomo- <"[rimuovi]"@[rimuovi].[rimuovi]> wrote:

> We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows 2000.
> It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.
> I read this:
> http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlog...ign_perOS.mspx
> It seems that on Vista-64 bits systems is not possible to load drivers
> that are not signed.

Unless your driver absolutely needs to be a kernel-mode driver, why not
rewrite it as a user-mode driver? UMDF drivers work on XP and Vista.

-a

> Unless your driver absolutely needs to be a kernel-mode driver, why not
> rewrite it as a user-mode driver? UMDF drivers work on XP and Vista.
>
> -a
>

Yes:

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/driver/wdf/UMDF.mspx

It seems a good idea. Thanks for the tips. I will work on it.


Giacomo

> We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows 2000.
> It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.
> I read this:
>
> http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlog...ign_perOS.mspx
>
> It seems that on Vista-64 bits systems is not possible to load drivers
> that are not signed.
> We sell no more than 100 systems a year. I guess if this certification
> is too expensive for us.
>
> Is it correct?

WHQL certification is 750 USD per attempt if I remember correctly. But
you can self-sign the drivers. Then all you need is a Authenticode
certificate which is 495 USD (or so) per year.

wrote:
> -Giacomo- <"[rimuovi]"@[rimuovi].[rimuovi]> wrote:
>
>> We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows
>> 2000. It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.
>> I read this:
>> http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlog...ign_perOS.mspx
>> It seems that on Vista-64 bits systems is not possible to load
>> drivers that are not signed.
>
> Unless your driver absolutely needs to be a kernel-mode driver,
> why not rewrite it as a user-mode driver? UMDF drivers work on
> XP and Vista.

Read the following URLs.

--
<http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt>
<http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/423>
<http://www.aaxnet.com/editor/edit043.html>
<http://kadaitcha.cx/vista/dogsbreakfast/index.html>
cbfalconer at maineline dot net



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Daniel Berglund ha scritto:
>> We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows 2000.
>> It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.
>> I read this:
>>
>> http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlog...ign_perOS.mspx
>>
>> It seems that on Vista-64 bits systems is not possible to load
>> drivers that are not signed.
>> We sell no more than 100 systems a year. I guess if this
>> certification is too expensive for us.
>>
>> Is it correct?
>
> WHQL certification is 750 USD per attempt if I remember correctly. But
> you can self-sign the drivers. Then all you need is a Authenticode
> certificate which is 495 USD (or so) per year.
>

Ohhhh. Not too much. We can afford this, but good money is for goods,
not for (e)paper ;-)
Thanks for reply.


Giacomo

-Giacomo- wrote:
> Daniel Berglund ha scritto:
>>> We wrote an USB driver for an embedded application on Windows 2000.
>>> It works fine, but now this OS in no more available.
>>> I read this:
>>>
>>> http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlog...ign_perOS.mspx
>>>
>>> It seems that on Vista-64 bits systems is not possible to load
>>> drivers that are not signed.
>>> We sell no more than 100 systems a year. I guess if this
>>> certification is too expensive for us.
>>>
>>> Is it correct?
>>
>> WHQL certification is 750 USD per attempt if I remember correctly. But
>> you can self-sign the drivers. Then all you need is a Authenticode
>> certificate which is 495 USD (or so) per year.
>>
>
> Ohhhh. Not too much. We can afford this, but good money is for goods,
> not for (e)paper ;-)

I can assure you will get a good, solid headache by figuring out how to
actually sign the driver using the tools Microsoft provdes. Value for
the money :-)