Problem with a Vivitar camera

Hi

I'm sort of new here and I need help trying to help my sister-in-law.

She just bought a computer with Vista on it and I helped her setting it up. At the same time, she got a Vivitar 3815 camera.

After setting up the computer, I hooked the camera to the PC with a USB cable and everything went fine. Then, I unhooked the camera and hooked a brand new USB thumb drive to the PC and again, everything was fine.

The problem started when I then tried hooking the camera back to the PC.

As soon as I power up the camera, I now get a message in the tray stating I can safely remove the USB device. When I doubleclick on the message, it even states that the device is a Vivitar 3815 camera but Vista just will not recognize the camera as a removable drive anymore.

I have hooked the camera to another Vista PC and it works fine and Vista had no problem identifying it (as it was the case initially with my sister-in-law's PC).

It's as if the PC didn't like having a camera hooked up , then a USB drive hooked up and finally the camera being hooked back.

It doesn't make any sense to me.

If anyone can offer a solution, it would certainly be welcomed.


thanks

PS: I have tried hooking up the camera in other USB ports, with the same results.

 

Have you tried installing the software that came with the camera , then restart the camera and then try plugging the camera up ?

 

Yes I have and I forgot to mention that I also installed the latest drivers from the Vivitar website.

 

when you have the camera hooked up via the USB cable, and then click on " my computer ", does it show the camera and then by double clicking are you able to view the pictures ?

 

Not at all.

 

when you plug in the camera and then click on " my computer ", what do you see ? You should see something either in the Hard Disk drivers or something under Scanners and Cameras.

Go to my computer and then plug in the camera with the usb cable and then turn the camera on.....then you should see something.

 

The first time I saw the camera and the photos that were on it. Now, I don't see anything.

 

I understand that and was trying to help you solve this problem....but you are putting the cart before the horse.

 

Thanks for trying to help me.

Sorry for my poor English but I don't understand what you mean.

 

What I am basically showing you is another way of finding the pictures. Why the camera worked the first time and now the computer doesnt see it, that I cant explain.

If you go through the steps I explained on how to find the pictures and once you open one up, right click it and select Windows Picture Fax Viewer to open the picture ( can check the box at the bottom, so that it will always use this program ) and then try the camera and usb cable again and see what happens.

 

Nope, whatever I do, however I try, I can NEVER see the pictures that are in the camera.

 

go to "my computer" and type everything that you see, close that out and then plug in the camera with the usb cable and turn the camera on and then go back to "my computer" and write down what you see this time.

 

OK, I'll do that in a few days, the next time I visit my sister-in-law.

thanks

 

Went so my sister-in-law's place today and once again, the camera is not recognized.

I did check out carefully in "my computer" and the damn thing just does not show up.

I did notice though that even if the camera is not hooked to the computer, every time Vista boots, the "You can safely remove the device" message, appears in the tray, even though no device is hooked. When I right click on the message, I get another dialog box that says "safe to remove the device, now". After clicking "OK" then, the whole thing disappears.