Q: After installing OSX Lion, the built-in camera no longer works.  Solution?

EZJim's Website

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2090

my isight camera is not working-not recognized with photo booth or ichat

1. Click on Macintosh HD on the top right of your desktop (or whatever else you’ve called your Harddrive) 2. Click through System > Library > LaunchDaemons 3. Now look for the file com.apple.mio.VDCAssistant.plist  - and send it to trash.  http://www.appleware.co.uk/2008/12/03/isight-camera-fix.html

OK...so I followed the steps and found the com.apple.cmio.VDCAssistant.plist and trashed it and went back into Factime to check if anything had changed and still no camera connected?????

I go back into the System/Library/LaunchDaemons folder and the file is now missing???? Isn't it supposed to rebuild itself??

I am now even more confused.

I am on a 17" MacBook Pro and also updated to 10.7.1

Any other suggestions?

Thanks

NJV

Hi,

As a .plist it should be rebuilt, by the OS in this case, when the computer is restarted or by launching the Application that created it.

8:54 PM      Friday; September 9, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb( 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),

"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

I have precisely this problem on Mountain Lion and iMovie '08 (7.1.4), except I could never find 'com.apple.cmio.VDCAssistant.plist' at the path 'System/Library/LaunchDaemons' to trash it. It doesn't appear after a restart.

What are possible reasons why this file is missing? Does it indicate a deeper probem? If not, I can live with iSight not working directly in iMovie.

If so, and it's time to reinstall the OS, can I restore the system from a Time Machine backup, or will this just reintroduce the original problem?

Hi,

I have this file in Mountain Lion but I did upgrade from Lion.

Almost everything in that folder has the same "Modified Date"  suggestive of  an Install date.

The reasons why it might be missing is that any app that uses it has not been started.
For instance I am not sure iMovie '08 version 7.1.4 works in Mountain Lion.

My Version  is 9.0.8

Or something like using the Video preview in Messages > Preferences > Video section has not been used to trigger the recreation of the file.

Going to the Folder and then using Time Machine  to find an older version if that folder may not work with the Current OS level.

There is also a chance that if it is compatible that it comes from a  time when it is or has been corrupted.

8:41 PM      Wednesday; December 12, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

  iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Thanks for the input. I reinstalled the OS and the 'cmio' file is now there, though it doesn't rebuild if it's moved, I guess for the reason you suggest. I'm now happy that the system is in general as it should be.

However, iMovie still doesn't recognise the iSight camera even though my version (7.1.4.) is officially supported by Mountain Lion. Others in the forum have had success upgrading iMovie to 9.0.8 but I'm not keen on paying to upgrade when the old one should work, and largely does work. In any case I'll soon be getting a new Mac which will come with the latest version.

I'm still running iWeb and iDVD, from iLife '08 and I don't want to give them up!

Hi,

If this is an Internal Camera is it showing up in System Information/Profiler ?

GO to the Apple Menu and hold the ALT key down and select the top item.

Under USB the internal camera should be listed.

If it is not  try a PRAM reset.

Shut down the computer.

Restart it holding down Apple/CMD ( or ⌘)+ALT( ⌥)+P+R Keys until you have heard three Start Up Bongs.

9:00 PM      Thursday; December 13, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

  iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Yes, the camera appears in the 'USB' section and works fine in other applications. I am pretty sure the problem is caused by my having an older version of iMovie.

Hi,

In My version to see the Preview I have to cloick the icon in the horizontal bar at the left hand end.

This brings up  a second window.

This has two drop downs.

One is for selecting the Camera.   Is yours listed ?

The Second is for Pic Size.  My camera can do HD and 16:9 format and is set to this  but the drop down offers 4:3 and 640 X 480 pixels.

Is yours set to a size and format the camera cac achieve ?

10:08 PM      Thursday; December 13, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

  iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

I've heard that this second window should appear when you click that icon. But I just get one window and there's no option to select a camera, not even the built-in iSight.

All I can do is click cancel.

Hi,

This might seem daft but is the iMovie app in the Applications Folder itself ?

Not contained in any other sub folder ?

I came across someone hwo created an IM app Folder and placed iChat and Adium  and some others in this folder.

It stopped iChat from being updated.

It created issues for one or two of the others as they could not find certain parts of the app's support functions.

That is to say using iChat as an example that to do Video it uses a VideoConference.framework which is in Hard Drive/Library/PrivateFrameworks  (Up one level and across one then down two levels as it were)

Adding an extra  level to the "up" path causes some apps problems.

In fact iChat does this by name rather than the up across and down method and I would think other Apple Apps are the same  but it might be worth checking.

The other question I would have is do you still have that iLife install disk  and have you tried an iMovie reinstall ?

It is late where I am and it will be a while before I reply again.

10:31 PM      Thursday; December 13, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

  iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Hi, Thanks for the reply, I really appreciate your help with this.

Yes to both questions: iMovie is in the Applications folder, not in any subfolders. And I have reinstalled iMove from the original disc (before and after the OS reinstall) but can only get up to 7.1.4 without buying a later edition of iLife.

The camera definitely worked under Snow Leopard but not since I upgraded from SL to Mountain Lion.

Found the following on this forum:

If you have iLife '09 or older, there have been no iPhoto 8, iMovie 8 or

Garageband 5 (or older) updates relating to Lion or Mountain Lion. The

support and compatibility situations for those versions is unknown as

Apple hasn't said anything. We can only determine compatibility

anecdotally. If it turns out that there is a problem and Apple doesn't

release an update, your only recourse is to buy the latest version of

the application.

I reinstalled some other iLife apps as well. iDVD went missing after the ML reinstall. When I reinstalled it from the original disc, it wouldn't open and I had to download a manual update to get it working. iWeb previously stopped working after the upgrade to ML (all the menu options were greyed out) but when I reistalled it (together with iMove and iDVD) yesterday, it started working again.

All this seems to point to a compatibilty issue between iLife '08 and ML.

HI,

I had iWeb 2.x.x and had to update to version 3 to get it working in Mountain Lion.

I notice that EZ Jim who posts the most frequently in the iSight Community has not joined in, so presumably we have covered everything that he would think of as well.

On the compatibility front I found this site  http://roaringapps.com/apps:table/tags/_i/index_tags/_i

It claims iMovie 9.0.6 has issues itself in Mountain Lion but that iMovie HD (version 6) works.  (I am not even sure it is written for Intels).

I really don't have anything else.

8:28 PM      Friday; December 14, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

  iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously