Canon Scangear missing from TWAIN list in Irfanview + Paint.net but not MS Imaging?

[merfield]

Hi

I’ve been tearing my hair out on this one!

Baseline stuff. Win7 64 bit, fully patched, running on a Tosh Satellite A500. I’ve got a couple of Canon Scanners, one a Lide 600F and the other in a multi function Pixma MG5350 - though this is probably a read herring. I’ve been using Irfanview, and Paint.net and MS Office Imaging as TWAIN ‘controllers’.

Canon make (IMHO) a really great scanner / TWAIN interface, called “Scangear” (see https://www.google.com/search?q=Scan...HqWWiQfOkLDUCA) that is way better than the WIA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Image_Acquisition interface. I (nearly) can’t live without Scangear.

When a scanner is installed, there are often TWO versions listed in the TWAIN source list - the native version, and the WIA version.

My problem is that Irfanview and Paint.net (mostly) cannot see the native version of my scanners, only the WIA version which means I can’t get at my beloved Scangear scanner interface only the paltry WIA one. The infuriating bit is that sometimes, Irfanview and Paint.net CAN see the native TWAIN source meaning I can access Scangear. The odd thing is that MS Office Imaging is always able to see the native (non-WIA) version of the scanner and the WIA one.

I’ve done all the usual stuff:

- Uninstalled and installed the scanner drivers and associated programs (Canon Toolbox).

- I’ve uninstalled and reinstalled Irfanview and also rolled it back the first 4.x version and then through each version to the current versions 4.33.

- I’ve looked for the exe for Scangear to run it directly, but it don't exist, the Scangear program lives as some DLL kind of ghost in the c:windows/twain_32 folder (I think as I can’t find its source as even Sysinternals process monitor says it is the TWAIN controllers process is the source of Scangear e.g., Irfanview or Paint.net etc.

- I’ve tried plugging the scanner into different USB ports to no effect (though it makes windows scurry off for the driver each time I try a new port which is pretty odd)

The problem with MS Doc imaging is that it wants to save everything in TIFF’s and I’m after the flexibility of Irfanview and Paint.net to save files in other formats.

Does anyone have any idea why MS Doc imaging always sees the non WIA version of my scanners and why Irfanview and paint.net only see it once in a blue moon (no its not the moon causing the problem ;-)

Cheers

Merf

[j7n]

I am a happy CanoScan user, and have done all of my scanning in IrfanView, and then loaded the pictures in other programs for further processing. However, I have never used it on a modern operating system. My ScanGear does "live" in DLL files.

1) Maybe the problem has something to do with "permissions", and IrfanView is forbidden to load an essential ScanGear component. Just a wild idea, maybe you can "convince" Windows that IV is a system program by copying into a subdirectory of Program Files. But this is not likely to yield a result.

2) Google suggested me this thread. It mentions a ScanGear executable file, and directs to put into Windows XP compatibility mode. Maybe it is worth trying to put th calling program, i.e. Irfan in the compatibility mode.

3) Maybe the problem lies in the fact that you're running a 32-bit program under a 64-bit OS. And the Microsoft program might actually be 64-bit. Although this does not explain why Scangear is sometimes accessible.

Some have suggested to run the scanner software inside a Microsoft Virtual PC with a regular 32-bit WinXP OS to avoid Vista/Win7 limitations. But this might be way too much a hassle.

Of course MS WIA is a half-cooked product, like their Sound Recorder, Paint, etc. It wouldn't be the first time that they "hid" or disabled a well know older interface.

Sorry for the verbosity. Too much coffee.

[Mij]

In Irfanview my Lide60 scanner in Windows 7 32bit offers only the Scangear CS interface.



For information; Irfanview appears to be running the file C:\Windows\twain_32\CNQSG\SGST.exe when showing this interface.

[merfield]

Thanks for the posts :-)

OK, I think I have a (kind of) solution

I tried disabling WIA, but that did nothing in IV but it stuffed up Paint.Net and the Office imaging system (no surprise with the latter as its MS prog talking to MS prog, and the former requires MS .NET so…)

I then tried running Irfanview (IV) as an administrator, and, there was the non-WIA version of the scanner. However, getting Scangear to run has still been a mission…

there has been a huge amount of HDD churn while IV was trying to load Scangear, and various other problems - I ended up killing various processes in task manager, completely uninstalling the scanner software, doing a registry clean (Ccleaner and JV16 power tools), rebooting, reinstalling yada yada yada. Things do at least now appear to of settled down.

However, when I now run IV as a ‘normal’ user - only the WIA version of the scanner appears. When I run as admin, voila, both versions of the scanner are there.

Funnily (not the ha-ha kind) Paint.Net still can’t see the non-WIA version even as an admin.

And, there is the ugly old UAC prompt now every time I want to run IV.

So it appears that deep in the windows TWAIN and WIA systems live a lot of bugs. Who would of guessed?

Hope that helps someone else

Cheers

Merf

[Mij]

It could be that IV needs the 32 bit version of the Twain driver. I expect that 64-bit Win 7 installs a 64 bit version by default.

[minimalist]

...

2) Google suggested me this thread. It mentions a ScanGear executable file, and directs to put into Windows XP compatibility mode. Maybe it is worth trying to put th calling program, i.e. Irfan in the compatibility mode.

...

This worked for me in somewhat similar circumstances: Windows 7 64-bit, Canon LiDE110, Irfanview 4.32.

My symptoms were Irfanview crashing when trying to acquire scanning image, but putting Irfanview into XP compatibility mode solved the problem.

The Canon drivers were directly installed on this build, so maybe Canon doesn't provide a 64-bit version as it does seem to be installed in C:\Windows\twain_32.

[TomSkan]

Solution for CanoScan Twain ScanGear for all programs (Windows 10 64-bit)

Hi

I’ve been tearing my hair out on this one!
(...)
When a scanner is installed, there are often TWO versions listed in the TWAIN source list - the native version, and the WIA version.

My problem is that Irfanview and Paint.net (mostly) cannot see the native version of my scanners, only the WIA version which means I can’t get at my beloved Scangear scanner interface only the paltry WIA one. The infuriating bit is that sometimes, Irfanview and Paint.net CAN see the native TWAIN source meaning I can access Scangear. The odd thing is that MS Office Imaging is always able to see the native (non-WIA) version of the scanner and the WIA one.
(...)
Cheers

Merf

Old thread, but still valid. I was digging whole Google and not found any good solution.
Hope, not all hairs are out...

I have the same problem - after installing CanoScan (9000F driver) - at beginning I could use Twain ScanGear with different programs, and after new computer start - no more. Only simplified WIA. Yes - at beginning it was possible to scan with Cannon Twain. MP Navigator could do the job all the time, but this is not what we call convenient tool I have not done anything special with installs till that moment (after that of course re-installing and so on). So what is the problem? I came to the conclusion, that other programs could not find what MP Navigator EX 3.1 can.
This seems to be missing registry entry. (Regedit will help - but be careful - if you are not an expert - make an restoration point before any action and be sure what are you doing).
Quick scan with ProcMon and I have found a missing entry:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Classes\VirtualStore\MA CHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Canon\ScanGear

I found with ProcMon, that the Navigator finds something similar here:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Canon\Scan Gear
(I see some spaces in this reply preview - of course there are no spaces in the above registry branches entries)

So I simply copied the whole branch (additionally also cnmbj, but I am not sure if needed). [copy was - exporting the branch from the second entry to reg file, editing it and changing the name of the branch in every line needed, saving the new file and registering this self-made .reg file by clicking on it]

That's it. Now I can choose Cannon 9000f (my scanner) as device to scan in other programs. Works flawlessly. Hope this can help somebody else.
No re-installation of drivers needed!

Somebody from Canon stuff out there? Can you incorporate this registry entry into the driver for all your users in the future, please?

[John_Ha]

See also File > Select Scan / TWAIN Source does not see Canon CanoScan LiDE Scanner where it is shown that the problem does not depend on XP Compatibility mode. In fact the problem is resolved by running IV 4.44 32 bit in "Run as administrator" mode when it sees the missing TWAIN driver.

It is also shown that IV 4.44 64 bit sees the CanoScan 64 TWAIN driver.

TomSkan

I tried to follow your instructions above but, as Pooh often says, "I am a bear of little brain" and I couldn't work out exactly what you had done. As this thread has been viewed many thousands of times could you possibly describe it in more detail bearing in mind I don't have Procmon, and basing it on what you did with regedit.exe. It would be great if you could post the a) actual registry lines where you captured the information from, and b) the modified lines and where you inserted them.

[TomSkan]

TomSkan
I tried to follow your instructions above but, as Pooh often says, "I am a bear of little brain" and I couldn't work out exactly what you had done. As this thread has been viewed many thousands of times could you possibly describe it in more detail bearing in mind I don't have Procmon, and basing it on what you did with regedit.exe. It would be great if you could post the a) actual registry lines where you captured the information from, and b) the modified lines and where you inserted them.

Open regedit. Go to the branch From:
You have to copy one branch of the registry to another place.
Branch to copy is Devices and sub branch of it is (in my case) CNQ9602

From:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Canon\Scan Gear
To:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\VirtualStore\MA CHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Canon\ScanGear

(No spaces above - if any - delete them. Do not mismatch this (underline) '_' for space - do not delete it). I see spaces (which should not be there) between: 'Scan Gear' (From) and 'MA CHINE' (To). This spaces should be deleted to properly look for the branch and replace the line in the .reg file.

To copy this you should export with RegEdit menu - first branch ('From:') as .reg file (for example ScanGear.reg) and change with text editor in the file all lines 'From:' (see above under 'From:') to 'To:' (see above under 'To:')
Then you save it and you have to register it (just double click on the .reg file (file has name given before - in our example: ScanGear.reg) - and system will ask you if you would like to register - confirm).

Do not make any mistake in preparing the new .reg file. That's it.

[Jean-Yves Meuric]

Very interesting topic !!!
I also had this problem some years ago, then it dissapeared and came again some days ago.:
- when I launched Irfanview in normal mode, I did not see the correct Canon MP495 driver
- when I launched it in administrator mode, everything was OK
- I made the described change with regedit and it worked !

This morning I tried on my second windows installation on the same PC :
-both are running windows 10 and up to date.
- both are running Irfanview 4.52

All is OK on this second install and there is nothing in the current_user registry which looks like the suggested patch !

Jean-Yves