Topic: Vantage Vue/WeatherLink USB - Windows 10 driver and software issue

[JMC708012]

I am trying to resolve a long standing issue I have had with my Davis Vantage Vue and WeatherLink.  Back in 2014 I purchased the WeatherLink package and after many attempts on a Windows 7 PC and email exchange with the Davis support team I gave up as I could not get the software and/or drivers, to work.  At the time, I was running a 64 bit version of Windows 7 and the software did not appear to be compatible with that and the support team, when asked specific and direct questions about compatibility also did not have a clue. 

Fast forward to now and I have a PC running 64 bit Windows 10 and I tried again to get data off my weather station via the WeatherLink USB.  I installed Silicon Labs VCP USB driver, but no luck.  I also read the various documents on-line, but they pretty much seemed to shrug and say we have given up on support and compatibility!

https://www.manula.com/manuals/pws/davis-kb/1/en/topic/windows-10-issues

I am at the point of considering buying a small Linux box to collect data instead.  Would this be any easy?  Does anyone have Windows 10 64 bit working with the WeatherLink who can advise me?

[Mattk]

Have never had any issues between WeatherLink and Windows 7 be it 32 or 64 bit, so not sure why there are issues in your case. Windows 8 and 8.1, don't have any issues either. Windows 10 I have no intention of going that direction any time soon so of no help with 10

[JMC708012]

Can you tell me more about your configuration?  Did it literally plug and play?  What did you manually configure?

[JMC708012]

Maybe my WeatherLink is simply faulty? 

[miraculon]

I am running Win10 64-bit with Winlink 6.0.3 with no problem. I am using the Silicon Labs CP210x USB to UART Bridge driver. If I recall correctly, if you install the "wrong" driver subsequent attempts will not work unless you run a utility that removes the incorrect driver. The utility is buried in the Weatherlink file structure, you may need to dig it out from the installation CD ROM.

See http://www.wxforum.net/index.php?topic=19586.0 This post was for the WDTU, but the same applies to Weatherlink. I have it under the "Support/Utilities" folder in Weatherlink.

Greg H.

[johnd]

@JMC708012: There are hundreds, possibly thousands, of users running WL under Win10 around the world, so there's not any fundamental incompatibility of WL with Win10. Any issue is likely to be with the separate USB driver, as per the comments above.

But you haven't spelled out what problems you're seeing:

1. Did WL appear to install fully with no errors reported during installation?

2. If [1] is OK then are any errors evident in the download.log file?

3. If you're using USB mode, have you tried switching to serial mode?

[JMC708012]

1. Did WL appear to install fully with no errors reported during installation?

On Win 7, I don't think I ever got WeatherLink to install and run correctly, but it was 4 years ago now.  On my Windows 10 machine, it reported an issue with (an old) .Net libraries, but they were downloaded installed correctly and the application now starts up.

2. If [1] is OK then are any errors evident in the download.log file?

Yes: "Computer gave up waiting for response from station.  Check port setting and connection".

3. If you're using USB mode, have you tried switching to serial mode?

USB mode does not find a weather station.  Serial, Auto Detect does not find a Com Port.

A driver issue, I would assume?  What do I check?

[johnd]

If you try and run the CP210x USB converter (in the WL section of the Windows start menu) then what does it say?

[JMC708012]

I am making some progress.  Running the converter, I get:
No Device Attached.  Communication Error.

However, if I unplug and plug the device, Windows now recognizes it (change of cable and reboot), but it is complaining about the driver.

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[miraculon]

You need to run the command line program: CP210X USB to Serial Converter.exe mentioned in the other posts/links.
This will remove the incorrect driver.
This is not done in the windows driver area, it is a stand-alone program issued by Davis.
After this program is run, then you can install the correct driver.

Greg H.

[JMC708012]

As above, I already tried that.  I don't think it is a utility that removes the driver (based on the name).

[johnd]

So what happens if you now try the Serial option in the WL Communications port dialogue?

[JMC708012]

It does not find anything.  When I plug in the weather station, Windows does a plug and play configuration and says the device is working correctly, but then when I open Device Manager it complains that the "Driver is unavailable" and WeatherLink cannot find anything. 

I have downloaded and tried to install the recommended driver (64 bit), but then when I plug in the device, it says it hasn't got it!  I have done several reboots too, but I wonder whether there is a magic combination of delete/install/reboot to get this to work?

[JMC708012]

Although I have tried every possible Windows 10 version from here I am getting an error when trying to install the driver
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[johnd]

I don't know whether you've got access to another Windows PC, but it might be worth installing WL on that and then ensuring that you can communicate with the logger in serial (VCP) mode, ie and not USB mode. If you can succeed with that then try back on the first PC, sticking with Serial mode.

[JMC708012]

Success!  I am still not quite sure what I did, but I have it running on a Windows Surface.  Thanks for your help, I will now see if I can get my main desktop working too.

[EA1EF]

Must block windows 10 driver automatic updates for your device. If update its done and datalogger does not work you must revert updates in device driver update application.

Only work the original driver that became in weaterlink from.

Belfryboy alternate datalogger works fine too...

Regards.