Get Your Winfast Capture Card Working In Windows 7 x64
If like me you have been told of, or have had first hand experience of, the disappointment that flows over you when you realise your beloved Winfast capture card doesn’t work in the shiny new OS Windows 7 x64, then you’ll probably be searching furiously for an answer to resuscitate your loved one! Look no further here is my solution…
First, A Warning!
I have to stress that the following instructions are not guaranteed to work, I am not responsible if they cause any damage to your computer. However if followed correctly they should work fine.
Why Does It Happen?
Well Windows 7 blocks the main conexant capture driver that is used by some Winfast capture cards as, apparently, it is unstable & has been known to cause irreparable damage to your system (software, not hardware). It’s never happened to anyone I know though, but that is the official reason for it being blocked.
How Do I Unblock It?
Well I’ve collected a few different things I read around the web & which finally lead to me getting it working. First you will need to download a few things. Here is a list of the things you need:
- Modified Winfast Driver: http://tw1965.myweb.hinet.net/Leadtek.htm
- Driver Enforcement Disable Tool: http://www.ngohq.com/home.php?page=Files&go=cat&dwn_cat_id=34
Ok now you have those lets start.
- Extract the modified Winfast driver you downloaded for your capture card to somewhere like the Desktop.
- Press the windows button (Start Button), R-Click on Computer & press Manage. Then click Device Manager.
- Now find the Winfast driver with the yellow exclamation mark, R-Click & press Update Driver Software.
- Now click Browse My Computer, then Let Me Pick From A List, then Have Disk & pick the extracted driver from your Desktop.
- Click the driver and hit next. It will install the driver & when the install has finished it will say the driver can’t be used due to having no signature. We’ll sort that out next.
That is the first problem, which was the driver being blocked, sorted thanks to the modified driver. Now we have to get around the fact that the driver is unsigned, which in a 64-bit OS is a big problem.
- Open the program you downloaded from ngohq.com. Agree to the license & then pick Enable Test Mode.
- Now pick Sign A System File & type the file path to the modified winfast driver which is normally this:
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\wfavsvid.sys
- Finally if you don’t want a horrible “Windows Test Mode” watermark to be on your desktop pick Remove Watermark.
- This will take you to a website, download the file extract it & run the one that matches your OS then follow the instructions.
Restart your computer & all should be great. You should be able to run Windows Media Center & get access to your tuner, and if like me you have a DTV2000 H you’ll get a nice suprise when you realise you can use both analogue & DVB-T in Windows 7. You were restricted to DVB-T in Vista. Also for those that want to use it Winfast PVR2 seems to work fine.
I hope that helps someone. 🙂 I don’t know if this is a problem in the 32-bit version of Windows 7, if it is I think the instructions are the same except I’m not sure if the driver signature enforcement is a problem. Let me know if this is a problem in Windows 7 32-bit & if this fix works for that too.
Thanks: Thank you to http://tw1965.myweb.hinet.net & ngohq.com for making the driver, and the tool. Without them I would have gone mad trying to get my capture card working.
Update: It seems some people (well actually one person) don’t agree with installing non-WHQL drivers on their computers. That’s fine it is up to you whether having your cap card working, as it doesn’t seem like Leadtek are going to release a Win 7 driver, is more important that installing a non-WHQL driver. Remember the only thing that is different about the driver is that it has had it’s name changed to bypass Windows 7’s driver blocking. I’ve been running it for about 2 month now with no problems & my cap card works great. Remember it’s your choice.
17 Comments
Stuart Welsh
Actually you do not need to use watermark removal or sign your own drivers!
I have created a windows 7 64bit driver for the :eadtek DTV1000T here:
http://sw3d.vistapanel.net/files/DTV1000T%20WIN7%2064bit%20drivers.zip
This is whql signed and tested with Win7 64bit. All I did was to extract the setup.exe contents of the official vista 64bit driver, then do a find and replace on the .inf to rename the cxavsvid.sys and also rename the driver. It works!!
Paul Robinson
Great glad to see there is a better way to do this now. I created this post just after 7 was released and this was the only way to fix the problem.
I noticed you said DTV1000T though will it work with the DTV2000H too?
Stuart Welsh
Yes it will as it uses the same conexant driver. Although I don’t have that model it can’t hurt to try.
Paul Robinson
It’s a good point, lol. All this snow (which we don’t normally get here in the UK) has frozen my brain. 😆
Stuart Welsh
Uploaded it to rapidshare since it looks like my url above is not that good?
http://rapidshare.com/files/331771530/DTV1000T_WIN7_64bit_drivers.zip
Paul Robinson
Thanks. Looks like the URL you gave are doing maintainence or something so thanks for the link. 🙂
Dharmesh
Does anyone know how to get the Leadtek Winfast PVR2000 working on Windows 7 x64 bit, it doesn’t seem to have drivers on that page, but it’s similar to the 3000 and i don’t see why not.
Paul Robinson
Nope, sorry. Maybe someone else knows something?
Bazza
The links for the driver file download are both 404. Any chance somebody can repost them somewhere more reliable? Say MediaFire?
Paul Robinson
No sorry I don’t have the driver Stuart uploaded to Rapidshare. I have no idea why it’s been removed for terms violations. It’s not like it was a file they were making any money from, it’s a free driver file. Sometimes the idiocy of people/companies amazes me.
Visitor
This method don’t work for me since where is no wfavsvid.sys file after driver update in
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\wfavsvid.sys
but it’s listed as unsigned in drivers details.
I tried to search for this file and it’s found in some strange directory
c:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\wfavsvid.inf_amd64_neutral_167943455e5fe982\
Paul Robinson
To be honest I’ve kinda given up with my Winfast card. Leadtek don’t seem to be interested in creating a Windows 7 driver & I have heard that the method I wrote here no longer seems to work on new installs of Windows 7.
As soon as I’m able I’m going to buy a Win 7 compatible capture card, there are a few out there now. Sorry I haven’t been able to help any. 🙁
caguars
I have Winfast Tv 2000 tuner and I don’t find any drivers for Win 7 x64. Stuart Welsh do you have any compatible or modified drivers for my tv tuner, please ? Thanks in advance !
Pokerturniere
I just installed winfast pvr 2000 expert on windows7 64bit and when i turn tv on, its say “cannot find any video capture device” if you guys know the answer for that slagin problem. Send answer on gmail [email removed] and thank you very much,
take care all !
Paul Robinson
It probably means that you don’t have a driver installed or that the driver you are using is incompatible (and has been disabled by windows). It’s a known problem with Winfast capture cards in Windows 7.
My advice would be to get a Win 7 compatible capture card. I recently reinstalled & the hack above still works, but I can’t provide the modified driver for download as I’ve been forbidden to by Leadtek and could get in serious trouble for uploading it.
Are they being idiotic? Yes. Stupid? Yes. Do I want to get sued? Hell, no.
thedesignerzerone
I have a WinFast TV2000 XP RM (tv tuner). It worked fine when i had windows XP but now i installed windows 7×32 and i have no sound.
Please help! I installed it in compatibility mode and still no result and i have the latest drivers. My sound bord is Realteck with also the latest drivers and i have no problem with sounds otherwise.
Thanks!
Paul Robinson
Hi,
I don’t have a Winfast TV card anymore. I moved to a Hauppauge Nova-HD-S2 & so can’t help as much as normal.
I have found a few things though. Most suggestions are to make sure you have the latest Realtek sound drivers provided by your MoBo manufaturer rather than the latest Windows drivers. Also make sure your sound settings are correct. I found this page which someone said is should work for the TV2000 XP RM too.
Hope that helps.