Saturday, October 9, 2010

Lost your USB BlueTooth driver? Hack the bth.inf!!!

Note: This solution is meant for Windows XP...

I have a BlueSoleil USB Bluetooth thumb-drive which I use to transfer pictures from my cellphone to my laptop. Usually, when I plug it into a machine, it automatically fetches its drivers from the web. However, recently it became obsolete and the drivers were taken down...

If you have found yourself in a similar situation, do NOT throw away the USB device--if you are running Windows XP, hack the bth.inf file instead.

1. You need to find the manufacturer and product ID of your USB device. This is done by going to the device manager. Start--> Control panel--> Performance and Maintenance--> System--> Hardware tab--> Device Manager.
You will see an unknown device (your USB) with yellow exclaimation mark. Right click it, then click properties. In the details tab where you will see something like:

Device instance id
USB\VID_0A5C&PID_2101\5&45EA3A5&0&1
or
Hardware ids
USB\Vid_1caa&Pid_0001&Rev_1915
USB\Vid_1caa&Pid_0001

The part after the "VID, " (0A5C in my case) is the manufacturer and the numbers after "PID" (2101 for me) is the product ID. Write these both down. We will need them to edit the bth.inf file.

2. Search for a file in c:\windows\inf\ You may not see the file if you have not made hidden files visible. If you cannot find it, try going to Start-->Search and typing in inf.

3. Once inside the inf file, locate the bth.inf file. If you have not enabled file extension visibility, all you may see is a file named simply "bth." Open it with Notepad or some other editing program.

4)Find [Manufacturer] tag in the bth.inf file. The section of file should look something like this:

[Manufacturer]
%Microsoft%=Microsoft
ALPS=ALPS, NT.5.1
Belkin=Belkin, NT.5.1
Brain Boxes=BrainBoxes, NT.5.1
Broadcom=Broadcom, NT.5.1
Cambridge Silicon Radio Ltd.=Cambridge, NT.5.1
Dell=Dell, NT.5.1
FIC=FIC, NT.5.1
GVC=GVC, NT.5.1
HP=HP, NT.5.1
IBM=IBM, NT.5.1
Microsoft=Microsoft, NT.5.1
Motion Computing=MotionComputing, NT.5.1
Silicon Wave=SiliconWave, NT.5.1
Sony=Sony, NT.5.1
TDK=TDK, NT.5.1
TOSHIBA=Toshiba, NT.5.1
Wistron NeWeb=Wistron, NT.5.1
Zeevo=Zeevo, NT.5.1

;------------- Device section - Start -----------------------

Add the line "%Unknown%=Unknown, NT.5.1" before the "----Device section -Start---" line
I used unknown because my device had no name or manufacturer. If your device had a name, then rename "Unknown" with that.

5. After the " ;------------- Device section - Start ----------------------- " all the devices are listed. Before the end of the device section, i.e. the line ";------------- Device section - End -----------------------" add these lines:

[Unknown.NT.5.1]
USB Bluetooth Radio= BthUsb, USB\Vid_0A5C&Pid_2101

Replace "0A5C" and "2101" with your own manufacturer and product numbers. If your device name is known, replace the word "unknown" as well.

6. Save the file and plugin your bluetooth device. It should be detected and begin working.

1 comment:

  1. Is there a solution for Windows Vista? I have got for Device ID other things:
    BTHENUM\{0000110e-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb}_VID&0001003c_PID&000a
    BTHENUM\{0000110e-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb}_LOCALMFG&0039
    Thanks

    ReplyDelete