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FTDI Driver Breaks Hardware Again (eevblog.com)
janoc writes: It seems that the infamous FTDI driver that got famous by intentionally bricking counterfeit chips [NOTE: that driver was later removed] has got a new update that injects garbage data ('NON GENUINE DEVICE FOUND!') into the serial data. This was apparently going on for a while, but only now is the driver being pushed as an automatic update through Windows Update, thus many more people stand to be affected by this.
Let's hope that nobody dies in an industrial accident when a tech connects their cheap USB-to-serial cable to a piece of machinery and the controller misinterprets the garbage data.
Let's hope that nobody dies in an industrial accident when a tech connects their cheap USB-to-serial cable to a piece of machinery and the controller misinterprets the garbage data.
...
Thanks to the reality of supply chains, companies intending to buy the real deal can accidentally buy the knockoffs. Anyone willing to do this(or their previous actions, like bricking devices) is someone I intend to never purchase from, real deal or not.
There are now plenty of competitors to FTDI. Don't buy FTDI- even if you think you're buying the real deal, reality can intervene.
Yep, Microsoft should revoke WHQL on future driver versions and refuse to certify FTDI drivers in the future.
This is a blatant violation of trust; end users have no way to know if the FTDI chips in their devices are genuine.
Son of a.... I spent, literally, 4 hours yesterday trying to troubleshoot a 3d Printer (Tinyboy 3D), with it not working. MProg from FTDI said the chip was fine (right vendor and product ID), but it just wouldn't work. I tried every driver I could find. Finally, I uninstalled the driver, disabled wifi, plugged it in, waited for Windows 7 to install the version it knew (2.4 something), used Mprog 3.5 to reprogram the chip as legit (as per: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...), unplugged, replugged (at which point windows reinstalled it again, with 2.4), and suddenly it started working! I can confirm this "Non Genuine" serial data, since I opened up the Arduino IDE and saw that on the serial console. You know, I sympathize with FTDI. They're having their tech ripped off. But, it's inappropriate to punish end users who don't have any say. Sure, we could not buy stuff that uses counterfeit chips, but many sellers aren't even going to know. FTDI should be pursuing the counterfeiters in China, and using what legal system China has to stop it. Either that, or create a version of the chip that has such a low price point, they put the cloners out of business by providing legit-working-alternatives for a price point. So annoying that I've lost time because FTDI does this crap, and apparently Microsoft is okay with it (I don't see how this should have passed WHQL).
I would imagine Windows Hardware Quality Labs tests the drivers against the hardware they are made to support. Requiring anyone to test real drivers against fake hardware would be a Gordian knot as new knockoff distributors appear and then fade away when someone starts trying to find them. I'm sure the same factory would produce the same knockoff and a "new" distributor would get it into the supply chains.
All that being said, I learned long ago not to let Windows update my hardware drivers, any hardware drivers. I just fixed one the other day where suddenly a favorite resolution on an LCD TV was missing. It took a bit to figure out the latest graphics driver (Intel via Windows update) installed a management program limiting display resolutions. Removed that program (and hid the update) and everything was back to normal.
Of course, in this case it would not matter where you got the update, if your device is counterfeit it gets tagged.
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
Yep, Microsoft should revoke WHQL on future driver versions and refuse to certify FTDI drivers in the future.
This is a blatant violation of trust; end users have no way to know if the FTDI chips in their devices are genuine.
This would be how I'd handle it.
1) After you login you see a message from windows. Automatic update of FTDI serial driver has failed. FTDI serial driver reports non genuine hardware. Warning the use of counterfeit hardware may cause system instability or other undesirable behaviour. Wouuld you like to disable the previous driver, or continue using it and mark it as non upgradeable? A non upgradeable driver may have bugs and other issues that could, in time, expose your system to threats. Long term use is not recommended.
So, your problem may well be that you have a counterfeit "Prolific" chip that Prolific's driver no longer plays nice with.
No, that's not the problem at all. You can read yourself from Prolific's website:
http://www.prolific.com.tw/US/...
Note on that page how they no longer support "EOL chipsets" even though they work fine in windows 8 and 10 if you simply use an older driver that doesn't care about what OS version you have. If you use a newer one though, the driver throws a code 10 error so it won't work, unless of course, it detects a non-EOL chipset.
FTDI is malware.
Use Linux.
use MCP2221.
aaaaaaa