Installing the Sample Drivers on XP and Vista

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A question was raised today on how to run the WPD sample drivers on Windows XP.    WPD drivers and applications can run downlevel on Windows XP as long as the WPD and UMDF runtimes are both installed.

 

Compiling a WPD Driver for your OS

For the driver to run on Windows XP, it has to be built using a Windows XP x86 build environment provided by the Windows Driver Kit (v6000 or later).   Similarly, for running on Windows Vista, use one of the Windows Vista build environments.

If the runtime OS does not match the build environment, you may get a "Code 10 - This Device Cannot Start" in error message in Device Manager after installing the driver.

 

Installing WPD on the XP machine

Either one of these supply the WPD runtime components for Windows XP:

1. Install Windows Media Player 11, or

2. Install the Windows Media Format SDK 11 redistributable: WMFDist11-WindowsXP-X86-ENU.exe package, typically under c:\WMSDK\WMFSDK11\Redist folder from a Windows Media Format 11 SDK install.

 

Obtaining the WUDF Co-Installer

The UMDF runtime is distributed and installed by referencing its co-installer in the driver INF.   For Windows Vista and XP, the recommended co-installer to use is the version that is distributed in the Windows Driver Kits: under the \WinDDK\6001.xxxxx\redist\wdf\ folder.   Copy this to the same location as your updated driver INF before installing your driver.

 

Modifying the Sample Driver INF

The following example shows the INF changes to enable the WpdHelloWorldDriver to install in Windows XP using the v1.7 UMDF co-installer.   The actual version number would depend on what was provided in the WDK.  The modified/added entries are highlighted in red, and the same updates would apply to both WPD driver samples.

The changes involve adding a CopyFiles directive that references WUDFUpdate_01007.dll, and updating the AddReg entries to use UMDF v1.7.

[SourceDisksFiles]
WpdHelloWorldDriver.dll=1
WUDFUpdate_01007.dll=1
...

[Basic_Install.CoInstallers]
AddReg=Basic_Install.CoInstallers_AddReg
CopyFiles=CoInstallers_CopyFiles
...

; Add the co-installer DLL to the CopyFiles list
[CoInstallers_CopyFiles]
WUDFUpdate_01007.dll

...

; Update the registration to use the correct binary
[Basic_Install.CoInstallers_AddReg]
HKR,,CoInstallers32,0x00010000,"WUDFUpdate_01007.dll"

...

; Update the UMDF version to 1.7.0
[WpdHelloWorldDriver_Install]
UmdfLibraryVersion=1.7.0

...

; Set the Co-Installer CopyFiles destination to system32
[DestinationDirs]
System32Copy=12,UMDF ; copy to system32\drivers\umdf
Basic_Install.CoInstallers_CopyFiles=11
...

 

The same updated INF will also work on Windows Vista, as long as the UMDF co-installer DLL is provided with your driver files during install AND you've compiled the driver DLL with the correct WDK build environment (see the first section of this post).  

On Windows Vista, installing the WPD runtime components is not required because WPD is available inbox for most SKUs.

 

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.