The Acer Guy

UPDATE: I will shortly be closing the comments to this thread as 190 answers is more than enough and it’s hard for anyone to find what they’re looking for, even if it is written in the first twenty lines of this post. There is a 99% probability that you will find the answer to your OrbiCam problem in this post. Read through it carefully and follow all the instructions BEFORE downloading anything unnecessary. Try the “My Pictures” trick first and then if that doesn’t work, try the Device Manager procedure. If after that you’re still not getting anywhere, the only solution is to get in touch with Acer. If you have the details I show you how to get from Device Manager, Acer support staff can also e-mail you the correct drivers.

In a previous post I proudly declared to the world that Acer had released a fix for the OrbiCam issue that arises when users upgrade to Vista or with early pre-installed versions of the same software.

Since then hundreds of users have passed through this blog and have clicked on the “fix link”, only to be disappointed with the result. Many posted their frustrations here and I apologize to all of you who were misled.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon with some amazingly-friendly Acer support staff who took me through the problem and explained the possible solutions.

The symptoms
The symptoms arise when a user double clicks on Acer Orbicam (Desktop icon), and Vista displays the following message: “Acer Orbicam application has stopped working” and needs to be shut down.

First of all, your webcam is still working, the device does not have problems. You can check this quite easily by opening Messenger -> Tools -> Webcam Settings.

Another way is to check the folder:
C:\windows\BisonCam\

There you will find the application “LiveCam.exe”. Run this to check that the webcam device is working fine.

If you don’t have the “BisonCam” folder, this means that your webcam is a different model; I don’t yet have a complete list of all the devices and their relative folders but all notebooks and webcams have some folder so if you look hard enough you’ll find yours.

The problem
There appear to be two factors that can create this problem:

1] The Orbicam application needs the correct orbicam driver to work correctly;
Windows Vista has its own internal driver to install the device, naming it “Acer Orbicam” (great Windows!!) but in this way the application cannot find the correct driver, so Vista returns the error message.

2] If some pictures are present inside “My Pictures” folders, the Orbicam application will fail to start. It seems to be a Vista issue and still needs to be fully clarified.

The problem seems to have been caused by the Vista Upgrade software, which causes the OrbiCam application on certain models to malfunction. However, as explained above, the OrbiCam camera works fine, the software just can’t control it correctly after the upgrade.

Another issue that has added to the confusion here is that there are “more than ten” different types of OrbiCams installed on Acer notebooks. Again as mentioned above Windows Vista has its own internal driver to install the device, and simply calls it “Acer Orbicam” which makes distinguishing the correct driver from wrong one an almost impossible task. If you replace your driver with the wrong one, the application cannot find the correct driver and you get the now famous error message.

Lastly, the problem is restricted to Vista-ready notebooks and NOT native Vista notebooks. By that I mean the problem does not exist with the new Gemstone and TravelMate ProFile models as these were designed specifically to run under Vista.

I know this is no consolation to users with this problem but I just wanted to reassure readers that this issue is not endemic to all Acer notebooks.

Solutions
Currently only 2 notebooks have complete solutions available online. This is because - so far - they are the only “problems” Acer support technicians in Taiwan have been able to fully replicate, analyse and repair.

These “fixes” are not general solutions and ARE NOT OK FOR ALL NOTEBOOKS. This explains why some readers have been getting error messages with the new drivers/applications. The new drivers and applications can be found at the following addresses:

Aspire 9300 at the following link:
http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers/notebook/as_9300.html

Aspire 5570 at the following link:
http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers/notebook/as_5570.html

If your notebook is not one of the two above, read on:

For all notebooks with Acer Orbicam the repair procedure is the same:

1] identify the specific webcam device you have inside your notebook
2] get the hardware description (hardware id) of your notebook’s webcam
3] get the full serial number of your notebook (long alphanumeric code in the bottom side)
4] send this information to your local support centre who can then walk you through the procedure for your specific notebook.

All steps are important because only with the above information can Acer correctly identify the right driver and application for your notebook. Simply sending “Acer Orbicam” as the description, does not help because all the different webcams Acer installed are called “Acer Orbicam” (again, thanks Windows)…

So how do you identify the right one ?

How to get the webcam device information:
Go to “Control Panel”, switch to “Classic View” (the support team still find this way easier and better to work with than the default one) and double click on the “System” icon; to the right you will find Tasks list and below “Device Manager”, click on this.

Now you have the full list of devices of your notebook, look for “Imaging Devices” and double click on this. Here you will find the Acer Orbicam.

Double click on “Acer Orbicam” and the Acer Orbicam Properties window appears. There are three tabs : General, Driver, Details

Click on “Driver” tab, the important information listed here is:
“Driver Provider” and “Driver Version”

Copy this info onto a word / txt file or take a screenshot of this window. Just make sure you write down this information. Then click on “Details” tab

Under “Property” you have a scrolling list, click on it and open the drop down menu.

On the drop down menu look for “Hardware Ids”. Click on this.

In the Value box, you should find something similar to:
USB\VID_5986&PID_0102&REV_0100&MI_00
USB\VID_5986&PID_0102&MI_00

As before, copy these two lines or make a “screenshot” of the window

At the end of all this you will have:

Your Notebook’s Serial Number
The OrbiCam Driver Provider
The OrbiCam Driver Version
The OrbiCam Hardware IDs

Send all of this information to Acer with your support request/telephone call. This should cut down the time it takes them to get you back up and running.

Rate this:

2.9 (4 people)

295 Comments »

UPDATE 3: I have closed comments on this thread as the argument has moved on. The solution can be found by reading through the (long) thread below.

UPDATE 2: I have had an explanation of this problem from the tech support guys at Acer and the solution below is only OK for the Aspire 9300 and Aspire 5570 models for which the correct drivers and applications are available from the relative support page. Please have a look at this page for a correct fix BEFORE YOU POST HERE as the conversation has moved on.

UPDATE: This solution doesn’t work for everyone. Please read the comments to see why and what others are doing about it.

I have received an answer from Acer to the Orbicam problem.

There are two software entities involved – the camera Drivers and the OrbiCam application itself – and BOTH need replacing/updating to fix this problem.

The new driver and a new version of webcam application (below) seem to fix the issue.

The correct files to download are:

Acer Orbicam driver (Bison)
Acer Orbicam Bison utility 1.0.0.13

These can be found here under the MS Windows Vista drop down menu:

http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers/notebook/as_9300.html

In order to fix the problem, you must download and install them both to make the Orbicam work correctly.

FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS BELOW IN THE SAME ORDER:

1. remove the installed OrbiCam application and reboot if required;
2. install the new driver (preferably with the “driver update” wizard from Device Manager)
3. update the Orbicam application 1.0.0.13

After this, the webcam should function properly, even if the original Orbicam icon disappears.

To check everything is working OK run LiveCa07.exe or BisonM07.exe that are located in the c:\windows\bisonxxx\ folder or simply run Messenger.

And please, let me know if this works.

Rate this:

2.2 (1 person)

122 Comments »

Here’s an interesting fact: Nearly half of the visitors to The Acer Guy are using Windows Vista.

I am assuming these Vista visits have a lot to do with the surge in interest over the Orbicam problems under this same operating system. And, as these Orbicams “stopped working”, I’m assuming all these people upgraded from XP.

Well, if you are in the 48.28% of visitors, can you let me know how the upgrade went? Were you brave enough to do it on your own or did you use Acer’s Express Upgrade?

Just for fun, here’s the OS split:

Windows Vista - 48.28 %
Windows XP - 47.52 %
Windows 2000 - 1.72 %
Mac OS - 0.95 %
Unknown - 0.57 %
Windows 2003 - 0.57 %
Windows 98 - 0.19 %
Windows CE - 0.19 %

Rate this:

2.5

2 Comments »

More Vista worries here.

I have noticed a HUGE demand for “Acer OrbiCam driver” in my swicki. We’re talking a LOT of people: 759 searches (number 1 spot) compared to 130 for the second-placed “customer support” request.

I have found this link to DriverZone.com for the Acer OrbiCam driver. According to this page, the supported systems are:

Operating Systems: Win 98, Win 98SE, Win ME, Win 2K, Win XP, Win Server 2K3, Win Vista

Hope this helps if you’re in trouble.

UPDATE 1 (request): For all of you reading this article I need to know if the solution at DriverZone.com actually works. Can you leave a reply and let me know?

UPDATE 2 (request): Same thing applies to the Device Manager solution.

UPDATE 3: Scroll down for what might be a solution you didn’t know you had… (thanks Richard) or save yourself the time and click here.

UPDATE 4: I have closed comments to this post as the argument has moved on. Please read this post for a solution. Thanks.

Rate this:

2.5

57 Comments »

It has been mentioned more than a few times that 80% of the components of competing PCs are all the same.

Think about it: LCD screens, processors, hard disks, graphics cards (and dare I say it, batteries)… they’re all shipped in from one manufacturer or another and assembled in various combinations to offer optimum solutions at specific price points.

So what’s the difference?

The difference lies in the remaining 20%. That’s the part that contains all the added-value of one brand over the next. Sure, this part contains things like warranties and after-sales support, but even there companies compete on more or less the same level.

The one thing I have always liked about Acer is, quite simply, what you don’t see. If you take a closer look at the spec sheets, the number of “AcerXYZ technologies” is really quite something. You’ve got Acer SignalUp technology that conceals an extra-sensitive PIFA antenna on top of the LCD screens where they enjoy maximum signal strength as well as Acer InviLink™ Nplify™ wireless technology as featured on the latest Ferrari notebooks. That’ll explain why all the Acer notebooks I’ve owned always seemed to suck a wireless signal out of nowhere.

Then, on some notebooks, you’ve got the massive Acer Video Conference package that includes a 1.3 Megapixel Acer Orbicam™ that in turn features Acer VisageON™ technology (a face tracking feature that keeps your face in the centre of the screen), and Acer PrimaLite™ technology that automatically adjusts the colour and definition for clearer pictures the really clever Acer Bluetooth® VoIP Phone that pops out of a slot and saves you yelling into the daft little built-in microphone.

What about the screen? They’re all the same aren’t they? Well. No. First Acer came up with Acer CrystalBrite™ technology that took screen clarity to another level and then they introduced something called Acer GridVista™ which resizes the application windows and slots them into dual, triple or quadruple grid configurations so everything you have open is right there in front of you where you can see it (tip: if you really want to get the most out of this feature, hook up a second external monitor (which you’ll probably do through the Acer PCI Express® ezDock) and then tell me if having up to eight organized windows doesn’t speed you up a little bit).

How about protection? Well for starters there’s Acer Gravisense that protects the hard disk by automatically retracting the disk heads if the notebook takes a fall and there’s even Acer Anti-Theft technology that sets off an alarm if the notebook is snatched away.

Then there’s the mother of all add-on applications: Empowering Technology. I’ve only ever come across a couple of other blogs that talk about this software whose sole purpose is to make changing something “important” on your PC, notebook or whatever, simple. Apart from the one on The Acer Blog, which in turn links to a pretty cool explanation here, I also found a quick review of it on Tracy and Matt’s blog.

Empowering Technology shouldn’t be underestimated. I have seen it used in real situations and it makes as much difference as all the other trademarked technologies listed above put together. It’ll be interesting to see how it evolves with the Vista platform.

But that’s another argument. The fact is Acer has bundled almost its entire product range with a series of added-value technologies each designed to help you get more out of your product. Notebooks, Desktops, projectors and even their TVs have been given the Empowering treatment. If you don’t believe me, then read this.

Acer doesn’t shout too loud about this added value, and I really think it should as I believe this particular take on Pareto’s 80:20 principle says a lot more about a PC vendors approach to its customers than any performance benchmark ever could.

Rate this:

2.5

2 Comments »