• Registered: 2020-04-04
  • Posts: 4

Topic: WDM Driver Presentation Name, how to completely uninstall

How does one completely remove the RME UCX drivers including EVERYTHING in the registry?

We have over 30 UCX devices that move between workstations. (Annual Calibration, Lab use on laptops etc.)
When a new RME UCX is introduced to the system the WDM driver presentation adds a number front of the driver name.
First device: RME UCX FireFace, Second device: 2-RME UCX Fireface, 3-RME...and so on.
Obviously this is necessary for multi device setups.  However it is a major problem for users who must frequently introduce a new serial number to the system, since the driver name will change our measurement systems have to be reconfigured to use the "new" device. Even though there is ONLY ONE connected ever to any system at the time. We now have systems with no less than 15 devices to choose inputs from despite the fact, there is ONLY one ever attached. Very confusing to say the least.

An easy way to deal with this issue would be if the driver and ALL REGISTRY Settings could be removed by the uninstall program.
However this is not the case.

I have tried.
Uninstall RME App from Add Remove programs, Uninstall RME Driver from Add Remove programs. Reboot
Show hidden items in Devices and removed all RME references under AudioInputs and outputs and Sound...controllers.
After all this the registry still has hundreds of references and sure enough when a UCX is plugged in depending on the serial number it will present the driver as RME...2-3-4 etc...

Please provide one of the following.
1,. A script that removes all references from the registry.
2,. An uninstaller that completely uninstalls the drivers and all its configuration, including the registry
3,. A setting in the UCX control panel, to use the Same driver name as previous when a new device is introduced and stop creating new driver names on a new device introduction if there is ONLY one Device is plugged in at the time. "Single Device Mode".

Thank you.

2,.

2 Reply by MC

  • MC
  • MC
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  • From: Germany/Thailand
  • Registered: 2007-04-06
  • Posts: 25,576

Re: WDM Driver Presentation Name, how to completely uninstall

This has nothing to do with RME or the UCX. It is the way Plug & Play works and has been implemented in Windows and its registry. With hardware installations there are several entries that can not be removed completely.

Regarding the issue that you experience, which would be zero problem with ASIO and basically is not an issue but a useful feature: The numbering comes from the amount of registered units. These units are still there as 'currently non present devices' (USB Plug & Play). They can be made visible in the Device Manager and deleted there as well (see Google how to do that).

Much easier is a tool from Uwe Sieber called 'Device Cleanup'. It shows all non present devices. You can sort them after 'Class' and immediately see your 15 UCX entries (Media). You can select all of them and remove them in one step. Thanks to P&P as soon as you attach a UCX it will work again, and have no number in the WDM name. Now if you change to a different UCX simply delete the one entry found before attaching it. Then it will again have no number.

Mr. Sieber has written a command line tool to automate this process with a single mouse click, DeviceCleanupCMD. You can easily adapt it to meet your personal application and requirements.

Link:
https://www.uwe-sieber.de/misc_tools_e.html

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

  • Registered: 2020-04-04
  • Posts: 4

Re: WDM Driver Presentation Name, how to completely uninstall

Well sadly this is a half hazard solution did not work.  Download the third party tool (why REM does not have this?), found the offending entries, Access Denied not just for the orphan descriptors but for pretty much everything. I have local admin rights on the machine in question. Find it kind of mind boggling that we are being sent to use a third party tool by some nice gentleman to remove some of your drivers, but none the less we just need a solution. Again ASIO is NOT an option in this case. It is antiquated and if anything we are more interested in WASAPI other than WDM. And I am sorry but asking me to google how to do this and  that is a bit condescending. To say the least. Please provide 1, an uninstaller that works, 2 option not to reuse driver presentation name with new device class introduced.

4 Reply by MC

  • MC
  • MC
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  • From: Germany/Thailand
  • Registered: 2007-04-06
  • Posts: 25,576

Re: WDM Driver Presentation Name, how to completely uninstall

I have never experienced any access issues with Device Cleanup Tool 0.7.1. Nor have thousand others. And there is no imaginable reason why it should fail, as these entries are simple, don't require higher rights, and can be deleted with many different tools.

As an alternative you might try USB Oblivion, it will delete all non-present devices at once:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/usboblivion/

> Find it kind of mind boggling that we are being sent to use a third party tool by some nice gentleman to remove some of your drivers

I explained that above. Not the driver is removed, just a simple registry entry that is part of the installation routines for Plug & Play devices in Windows, which we can't change. The driver can not prevent Windows from reading the USB hardware serial number and register that specific hardware in the registry, as these routines are Windows ones. Even without any driver this will happen.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

  • Registered: 2020-04-04
  • Posts: 4

Re: WDM Driver Presentation Name, how to completely uninstall

Thanks MC, this did the trick https://sourceforge.net/projects/usboblivion/