Installing an XP driver on a x64 8.1 machine

Inimigor · March 4, 2016

Hello everyone, I'm working at the jurisdic forum of my city, and recently we have received new machines, but not new authenticator printers, we have Bematech MP20 printers here at the moment, but the driver it uses should be the Generic Text, but due to some unknown reason, they use a different driver specifically for the system used here (it looks for it specifically, and I can't change printers settings in the system), and they haven't updated it to any version above windows XP.

The driver apparently is for Windows 95/98 originally and selecting it manually as the driver works for XP, but when I try to do the same in windows x64 I can't install it because it doesn't have x64 information.

I've tried a few things, disabled driver signature requirement, added a dword value 1 for DisableDecoratedModelsRequirement at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup and still can't install it, when I try to select the driver it is not accepted because it's not for x64 systems.

What I'm thinking as a solution is finding a way to make Windows accept the 32-bit driver and hope it works well, or find a way to make the generic printer driver be recognized as the 32bit driver by the system.

I can provide the files if needed (but upload here at work is slow AF, so I will upload at home)

The support from the IT center for the forum (the center is in another city) said we should keep the XP, because they don't plan on adding support for 8.1. But out of 180 computers there would be just two running on XP, versus all the 178 others running Windows 8.1 x64. But I know they are pretty ~~lazy~~ slow, (There's a bug where it generates forms in letter when it is not generated by the head of the sectors, where they just need to change the sizing of the page for A4 and it's been two weeks and still nothing, it's an issue that affects the entire state.)

swordsman247 · March 4, 2016

This is from microsoft:

Can I run 32-bit programs on a 64-bit computer?

Most programs designed for the 32-bit version of Windows will work on the 64-bit version of Windows. Notable exceptions are many antivirus programs.

Device drivers designed for the 32-bit version of Windows don't work on computers running a 64-bit version of Windows. If you're trying to install a printer or other device that only has 32-bit drivers available, it won't work correctly on a 64-bit version of Windows. To learn how to check for drivers, see Update a driver for hardware that isn't working properly or go to the device manufacturer's website. You can also get information about drivers by going to the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisorwebpage.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/32-bit-and-64-bit-windows#1TC=windows-7

Inimigor · March 7, 2016

It's not a program, it's just a driver, it has no .exe file. just a .inf file and a few .dll files.

Inimigor · March 7, 2016

Actually I'm wrong, it has a .exe file, but it didn't work with XP and basically what it does is to copy the files to the folders so that windows would recognize it along with default drivers.

I'm uploading a .zip with the drivers.

The printer is a bematech MP20, using a parallel port to print. With Generic Text Only driver it works fine.

Bematech.zip

Inimigor · March 7, 2016

Ok, I've gotten the XP PC here for testing it too, I'll try to find the folder where the drivers and its files are located, so that I can maybe rename the driver files in 8.1 and maybe the system shall recognize it.

Inimigor · March 22, 2016

Made it work, the system used here looks for the name of the driver, I made shortcuts with the name of the drivers linking to the proper drivers, and awesomely enough it work.