1

I am a entry level technician so please excuse the probably simplicity of my question.

I just reinstalled the OS on a homebuilt PC for a customer. I got drivers from the motherboard company’s website. I have installed all the windows updates to include Service Pack 3 and and all pertinent hardware and software updates not deemed critical.

Problem: There is an unknown device list in device manager. I cannot figure out what it is. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Specs

Via Technologies P4PB Ultra MoBo

Win XP Pro Vs. 2003 SP3

Intel Pentium 4 2.4Ghz

2G ram

AGP Aopen PA3000 Plus vid card

RealTek GQ698 audio card

2 Spice ups
2

Is this device using any IRQ’s?

Is there any other information you can supply that would assist in the identification of the unknown device?

3

Yeah, what’s NOT working?

4

If you goto Device Manager and double click the unknown device, goto the Details tab and look at the Hardware IDs property, or the Location property. This can sometimes tell you what the device is used for, if anything.

Also, just try rebooting the machine and if the ‘found new hardware wizard’ does not show up when windows starts you probably dont need it. back when I used to work at a computer repair shop, something like this would happen very rarely. It was usually some obscure serial device or bios setting for the mobo that seemed to have no effect on the functionality of the board.

Of course you can always go into the bios and start turning off built in peripherals, then see which one makes the unknown device not show up in Windows.

5

Strange as it sounds, everything works. I left out two expansion slots that are filled as well, not cards, their cables just plug into the motherboard, sorry not sure of their specific terminology. One is for digital audio Out, the other is a 4 port USB 2.0.

I initially thought the the 4 port was the issue, but I tested all 4 slots, and recognized recognized and loaded my jumpdrive software.

All other hardware and drives work:

cd drive x2

hd

smartcard reader

floppy

I unplugged the reader and floppy individually and rebooted to see if it would not show on device manager when rebooted, but the unknown devices were still there.

I have attached a screenshot of the device manager, and also of a software that identifies unknown devices apparently. I tried to get the drivers it identifies as corrupt but nothing changed.

Please let me know if any other screenshots would bring more clarity.

I am not sure about IRQ’s.

devmgr.jpg
devmgr.jpg700×596 49.5 KB
6

If you right click on it and bring up properties. Look at the Details tab and finally change the drop-down to Hardware Ids. You should be able to Google the ID and find it. This has worked for me in the past with PCI cards that I didn’t know what they were (laptop that wasn’t mine).

Dave

1 Spice up
7

Thanks Dave. That did the trick, it took googling the id number a few times but it turnout to be the media card reader under the floppy.

Thank you all, for your input and quick responses!