# Possible DirectInput problem



## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Before I begin, I'm going to post some system specs if it will help.

Windows Vista Home Premium 32 bit Service Pack 1
Gateway Desktop Model GT5654 
AMD Athalon 64x2 Dual Core Processor 5000+ 2.6GHz
Radeon X1300/X1550 Series
DirectX 10 (because it comes with Vista)

Recently, I've started having a problem that I can only blame on DirectInput. I think the problem lies in detecting my keyboard drivers, but I could be wrong.

Whenever I restart my computer, I have to wait 1-3 hours for dxdiag to finish scanning for DirectInput. If I don't do this, a large majority of my games simply wont work.

Examples of this would be GTA 3, GTA Vice City, GTA San Andreas, DukeNukem3D, Gears of War, Doom/Doom 2/ZDoom, and recently I discovered this also prevents ShadowGrounds and ShadowGrounds: Survivor from working.

I know this because none of these games will work, and will freeze during start up of the game, when the drivers are being loaded. After the long, long wait for dxdiag to detect Direct Input drivers, all of these games will work perfectly. This is 100% re-creatable. A solution would be very, very nice, as I need DukeNukem3D to work for a TC I am working on.

*Edit: Trying other solutions*
The most obvious solution I've tried is plugging in my other keyboard, an Ideazon MERC Gaming Keyboard with a USB plug. However, this was the keyboard I was using in the first place, and my solution was fixed after I decided to plug in my PS/2 Keyboard that came with the computer. This solved it until the next reboot.

I also tried doing a registry scan to see if it was something in the registry that was preventing the device from being detected properly. Though even after repairing the registry, it seems I'm still stranded.

I may also note that sometimes when I use dxdiag when I want to play these games or I need to work on the Total Conversion for DukeNukem3D, no matter how long I wait, it will not finish detecting the Direct Input devices. Furthermore, if I try to toggle between checking for WHQL Signatures on the devices, dxdiag will crash. I'll post the last successful dxdiag.txt I have if it will help.


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

Reopening thread


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

After running DXDiag I am given the prompt "DxDiag has detected that there may have been a problem accessing DirectInput the last time this program was used. Would you like to bypass DirectInput this time?"
No will continue, getting stuck at the half-way point.
Yes will skip it, working for another 15-30 seconds and then finishing problem free, minus the Input tab functionality.
I have posted two DXDiag files, the first one being when this was not a problem after my first post and before it reoccurred. The second one (dxdiagbroken) is my current standpoint. Help is appreciated (and will be praised) because it is critical I fix this problem or at least find out why this is happening. And yes, I have updated all my devices and even re-downloaded standard mouse/keyboard/gamepad drivers, and updated to the latest version of Windows and DirectX 10.

*EDIT:*
Something wierd just started happening. Some programs (I.E. Skype, Steam) are now refusing to start unless I run DXDiag or keep it running in the background.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Today when I went to start up my computer... it didn't. That is to say, I've grabbed myself a version of HiJackThis and saved a log, and I've started an immediate full slow scan of my computer with AVG Antivirus. Along with this, I had to revert to a restoration point (thankfully it was only from a few days ago and I have lost no programs) and I will post the HiJackThis log. I've also started seeing a bunch of new processes that don't normally run when I start my computer, which bugs me. From what I can tell they are Microsoft programs, except for a suspicious dllhost.exe. This problem might be getting out of hand.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Bump.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Bumping again. If this keeps going I'm going to end up getting creative with words used for repeat combined with bump.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Hello? Anybody out there?


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

It has come to the point that I'm probobly going to just replace my computer under the warranty. Might be best, if I actually have enough problems that I would want to do that. DirectInput isn't the only problem I'm having with this computer, but it's bothering me the most. I ran dxdiag.exe again just to see if I could get it to work, but it's been running for over 12 hours and it still hasn't finished "detecting" the DirectInput devices. Same exact progress on the bar.

*Counting the Hours.*
Dxdiag has been running for 14 hours.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

I bet I'm going to have at least 10 more bumps before anyone gets to this friggen thread.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Bump.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Bump.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Bump


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## darkclyde456 (Dec 10, 2008)

well the first think i would do is get rid of avg, i used to have it and it messed with my games, now i have ca and havent had any problems with my games


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

I got rid of AVG awhile ago, though it has never really caused any problems except AVG Watchdog being annoying and taking up about 45% of my computer usage at random times. And thank you for responding to my thread, been hangin' out on a rope by myself for awhile. :up:


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## darkclyde456 (Dec 10, 2008)

ya i know what you mean i have had a few problems and someone just started talking to me. ya it would put up all types of errors for me in steam


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Weird, I seem to be like the only person I know who hasn't complained about STEAM or had problems with it in the slightest.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Bump, Again.

Also; I decided to run my computer in Safe Mode and try it then, but still to no avail. I believe the Direct X Component is overall failing, because now I'm having problems where plugging in a device will require me to restart my current program for it to work, and as for applications in general, detecting devices or going into some setup windows that automaticly detect software will cause the program in question to crash.


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## Moonfog (Jan 2, 2009)

_DxDiag has detected that there may have been a problem accessing DirectInput the last time this program was used._

AJSoroy
I have had this same problem for a few months and have finally had the time to solve it. I hope this helps you and others.

In the Device Manager I disabled Creative Game Port since I do not use my Sidewinder Controller anymore. If you have a creative sound card it would be listed under "Sound, video and game controllers".

Anyway, as soon as I disabled it and rebooted it has worked like a charm. If the problem returns I will post info.

Good Luck...


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Well, I don't have any Creative drivers or anything like that. Though I did notice that for some reason I have two mouse devices running, even though only one is plugged in. I'm gonna try uninstalling/disabling both of them and I'll see what happens.

EDIT:
Nope...


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

I'm pretty much through with dealing with this problem, so I'm going to bring this up with Microsoft (though I doubt I'll get anything better than trying a system restore point or reformatting.) However, if all does fail, I'll probobly reformat and save all my old stuff. Hope it doesn't come to that though.


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## Moonfog (Jan 2, 2009)

Does your sound card have a game port? If so you could try disabling it. You could also try using your usb to ps2 mouse adapter and plugging into the ps2 port if you have not done so. 

Also try another keyboard if you have not. A non usb keyboard would be good test as well.

If all those options still fail, I would uninstall the sound card drivers and pull the card.

I would try these before I reformatted my drive...

It seems Microsoft's DirectInput is a bit buggy.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

You know, I've actually been wondering about my speakers. I was origionally planning on yanking them and trying it then, because they plug into both a sound input port and a USB port. I'm going to try starting my computer with nothing but my keyboard and mouse, and my keyboard is already a PS/2 keyboard so I've gotten that out of the way. But I'll try my gaming keyboard again just to be sure. Wish me luck, and thanks for the help.


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## AJSoroy (Aug 24, 2008)

Well, I've finally resorted to posting my problem on the Microsoft answers Forum. That would be one of the most likely places to get answers, but I'd still like help here if anybody has their two cents to put in.


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## GameKyuubi (Jan 28, 2009)

Wow somebody with the same problem as me. I've got exactly the same problem; it started a few weeks ago. I don't think I did anything strange or even installed anything, but all of a sudden most of my games just flat stopped starting. They all started hanging while loading. I ran dxdiag and it won't complete the scan it does at the beginning. I go to the Input tab and the information collection stops halfway and never goes further. It'd be great if we could get some sort of solution here. I tried reinstalling directx through the downloadable end-user runtimes here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...56-C91A-4A8E-8BB8-9F20F1244A8E&displaylang=en
but it didn't help. :[


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