Trouble installing device drivers August 2015

[vpicco]

I am having problem installing the latest NI Device Drivers.

I have downloaded the 3 parts from the NI website. I ran each self-extracting executable, without chaning any default option. As the instructions say, after the third part is done extracting, the DVD autorun starts. I select to Install the drivers and I keep all the default options. The installation works fine until 95%, then it stops and it gives me this mesage:

"Please insert the media labeled ni Device Drivers August 2015 part 2"

I cannot get past it. I tried to manually point it to the directory where all the files have been extracted but nothing. I have re-downloaded part 2 (it automatically deletes it after extracting it) and I have changed the default extraction folder so that it is separate. I pointed the installer to that folder and nothing. Eventually I had to click on Cancel, which aborted the whole device drivers installation.

What am I doing wrong?

PS: this is OT, but seriously, why do I have to download almost 4GB of stuff, extract it (and it takes forever on my very powerful work laptop), just so that I can talk to one instrument via GPIB? I understand the simplicty of having one package that works for everybody no matter how simple or complex their system is, but with every new release this is becoming more and more ridiculous...

[Dennis_Knutson]

You obviously don't have to install the entire device drivers. That is your choice. You can just download the NI-GPIB and NI-VISA drivers. A powerful computer is still going to be hindered by a slow internet connection.

[Bob_Schor]

I can't "prove" this, but what I think is going on is that there is a small glitch in the distribution of LabVIEW (multiple DVDs) and the Device Driver DVDs.  Both were distributed as separate DVDs (or DVD Images), with the first DVD of the set having knowledge of all of the installation choices, whether the code was on that DVD or a subsequent one.

Once the installation process started, requested elements were installed provided they were on the current DVD.  When a request came to install from another DVD, you were instructed to insert the appropriate DVD.

In going to a "single image" installation, what NI appears to have done is to combine the files in the Products and Distribution folders into a "super-folder", saving you the trouble of swapping disks (because you've got a single "super-disk".  If the 3-part Device Driver kit that you download made a DVD Image (such as a .ISO file) that you could burn to a DVD, you'd be all set -- insert DVD 1, follow the directions, and when it asks for DVD 2, insert that.  But they skipped that step and created the files and folders on your hard drive directly.  But now, when you need "DVD 2", it's not there!

I don't know what happens if you download the DVD 2 file and try to run it -- I'm guessing that it will expand and unpack (somewhere) the files/folders that belong on the DVD 2 physical DVD.  I further suspect that if you copy the folders "on top of" the similar-named folders from the DVD-1 expansion (I'd do it without overwriting duplicates), you'll be creating the "super-disk" you need to install Drivers without needing to do a disk-swap, since it will all be together.  [Note -- you may need to download a third Driver DVD image -- I don't recall how many there are in 2015].

The Good News is that once you have everything downloaded (which does take a long time, but imagine how painful it would be if you had to download 50-60 tiny little pieces to get the combination you needed for your particular hardware), you now at least don't need to download again, but can save the Installer Files and install to your heart's content.

Bob (so glad I got a single 32GB Flash Drive) Schor

[crossrulz]

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vpicco wrote:

PS: this is OT, but seriously, why do I have to download almost 4GB of stuff, extract it (and it takes forever on my very powerful work laptop), just so that I can talk to one instrument via GPIB? I understand the simplicty of having one package that works for everybody no matter how simple or complex their system is, but with every new release this is becoming more and more ridiculous...

---

You don't.  As Dennis said, just download and install NI VISA and NI GPIB (assuming you are using an NI GPIB controller).  If you need to also talk to an NI DAQ, DMM, etc., then you will want the full driver suite.

[vpicco]

Thanks all for the useful answers. In the past I had trouble when installing only NI-VISA and NI-GPIB. Maybe I was doing it incorrectly. After some Google research the consensus seemed to be "just install the NI Device Drivers". I have done that ever since.

Just a clarification regarding the speed issue. My download speed is just fine, it is actually really fast. What is slow is what comes next. I double click on the self extracting file and for a good minute (I timed it) I just see the mouse with the little wheel spinning. Then the prompt for the extraction folder shows up. Then the extraction starts and it takes a good 5 minutes or more to complete. Everything repeated 3 times. Then the actual installation finally starts, which takes just as long. In order to speed up things yesterday I tried to start the extractions of more than 1 file at a time. That was a mistake, because the little wheel never stopped spinning and after a while I just rebooted to regain control of the computer.

It's not a very big deal, I understand it's a large piece of software and there is a lot fo hardware to be supported, but I really think that a huge company like NI can do better, particularly because this is the software that people use really frequently. Lastly, I am not the only one to complain about these issues, this goes as far as 2008:

http://forums.ni.com/t5/Multifunction-DAQ/Why-are-the-NI-DAQmx-driver-packages-so-Huge/td-p/828316

[vpicco]

Bob,

As per NI official instructions, you are supposed to download all 3 packages separately, and extract them in order. Without changing any of the default folders, the first part is extracted to DCD-Aug15-1, the second part to DCD-Aug15-1\Products and the third part to DCD-Aug15-1 again. When the third extraction is done, the DVD autorun is launched automatically. I did not try to download just part 2 and run it.

References:

drivers download page: https://www.ni.com/nisearch/app/main/p/bot/no/ap/tech/lang/en/pg/1/sn/catnav:du,n8:4.9547.9548,ssnav...

installation instructions: found on the link for part 1

Note: The NI Device Drivers is separated into three downloads. This page contains the download for Part 1. The download for Part 2 is located at page, and the download for Part 3 is located at page

1. Download the Part 1 (DCD-Aug15-1_downloader.exe), Part 2 (DCD-Aug15-2_downloader.exe), and Part 3 (DCD-Aug15-3_downloader.exe). These are smaller helper files that manage the download of the larger driver. 
2. When prompted, save these files to a temporary location.
3. Launch the three files to download the driver. If you receive a security warning, click Run to continue.
4. When prompted, save the driver software installer files to a temporary folder. The download of the driver software should now start through the National Instruments Downloader.
5. After downloading completes, open DCD_Aug15_1.exe to launch the first self-extracting executable. You must open DCD_Aug15_1.exe first.
6. Select the file path to which you want to extract the driver files and click OK. . The default location is C:\National Instruments Downloads\NI Device Drivers\Aug15.
   The self-extracting exe will automatically be deleted from your hard drive upon completion.
7. Repeat steps 5-6 for DCD_Aug15_2.exe and DCD_Aug15_3.exe. The NI Device Drivers installer will run after you run DCD_Aug15_3.exe.
   After installation, you may delete the driver installation files to recover space on your hard drive. 

[Bob_Schor]

Are you, in fact, extracting all three downloaded files to exactly the same folder?  If so, I'd expect that it would be doing the "combining of folders" that I talked about.  It looks, to me, like the Drivers are found in sub-folders of the Distribution Folder, with Folder names of the form "NI-xxxx", such as NI-DAQmx, NI-Motion, or NI-TimeSync.

If you are still having problems, check the file(s) that are created by extracting the three downloaded folders.  In my Distribution Kit, I see 14 folders from NI-488.2 to NI-XNET.  However, there are other files (like PXI_PS, PXI Platform Services) that are also part of the Driver set, so my earlier enumeration "rule" is definitely not complete.

Bob Schor 

[Hooovahh · Accepted solution]

I recently posted a thread where I found an issue and describe how to fix it.  Basically the installer thinks there are two volumes and some installers are on the second volume.  By editing or replacing a few text files you can convince the installer that all subinstallers are on the same volume.

http://forums.ni.com/t5/LabVIEW/Device-Drivers-August-2015-Issue-Fixed/td-p/3206936

[vpicco]

Thank you Hooovahh, you understood my question to perfection and provided a relevant solution. I will try but from the link I can see it describes exactly my issue. Thanks again