vpcs13v9e webcam not found ?

[Tzwigz]

Hello .

Like one month ago i bought a sony vaio pgc-51113m from ebay.

At first sight it was looking alright , but after like on hour i found 2 slight problems. 

One is that the webcam is not working . Its not being found at all . And i found a 'unknown device' in device manager under USB  controllers . 

Where can i find drivers for webcam ? i did installed ArcSoft Companion 4 with no luck .

Also , the speakers are very low , and i did tooked it to a phone and electronics repair center and they just looked a lil' bit at it and told me that the speakers are done and needs replacing . Might be something else ? how should i test ?

gladly waiting for some replyes .

[rich912]

Hi Tzwigz,

For the camera problem try the advice in the following thread:

https://community.sony.co.uk/t5/pcs-accessories/where-to-download-camera-driver-for-vaio/m-p/647914/...

For the speakers have you tried installing the audio drivers from the Sony Support site?

https://www.sony.co.uk/support/en/content/cnt-dwnl/VPCS13V9E/list#os1

Rich

[Tzwigz]

Hello

Thanks for the reply , problem is half solved now .

i can see the device in device manager , it's now called Sony Visual comunication , but i still can't use it .

if i want to call someone on facebook they can only see a black picture and if i try to open it with arcsoft , it says it's either used by other app either it's not installed . 

any advice ?

[rich912]

Under Windows 7 this should be listed as USB2.0 Camera. What drivers are installed?

Rich

[Tzwigz]

hello

to be honest , i dont know , because i have a hard time with it from like one month and i keep installing other and other drivers , even from other sony laptops , and probably now it doesnt has the right ones . 

how can i check ?

[rich912]

I did suspect as much. My guess is that you have installed a Sony Vista driver from an earlier model. To check right click the device in Device Manager and select Properties. Have a look on the Driver tab. It should show a Microsoft driver which is inbuilt in the OS.

If it is showing a Sony driver then use the uninstall option on the same tab and then reboot. Hopefully Windows will then install the correct driver - if not you may need to repeat the process as detailed in the link I provided.

Rich

[Tzwigz]

Hello again.

it just gets me out of my mind .

it was showing that its a microsoft driver , so i got mad and reinstalled w7 . 

first thing after this was to install  arcsoft and check webcam . It was doing the same thing (unrecognised device ) and i did the battery out and hold power for 30 sec thing . After this , it was working alright . Then i installed all the drivers and stuff ..and suddenly , when i rechecked if its working , it wasnt working again .

now i'm gonna install ubuntu for a while and check it out , really dunno what to say but it gets me out of my mind . 

will repost soon .

[rich912]

From what source are you downloading and installing Arcsoft? As far as I am aware this is not available as a download from Sony support. Also, at the point that the camera was working do you know whether it was reported correctly in Device Manager as a USB2.0 Camera?

What other drivers are you installing and from what source?

Rich

[Tzwigz]

Hello

It looks like the laptop has some hardware problems in my opinion. 

After I installed Ubuntu it still wasn't working. Leaved it like that, in sleep mode, for like 2 days and when I tried it again it was working.  It might be something related with battery. Cause after that I was keep trying, plugged in or on battery and it finally worked again a little bit and now it's again not working at all.

Did you ever experienced something like that?

As far as I remember it wasn't USB 2.0

Cheers 

[rich912 · Accepted solution]

I have come across intermittent hardware problems before but not the camera. As in being connected with the battery I doubt this - if anything it is more likely to be connected with opening and closing the lid (just a guess). Either way it will probably be an expensive repair and an external USB camera will be a far cheaper option although not as convenient if you transport this notebook on a regular basis.

Rich