Nick Whittome - The Naked MVP

Microsoft MVP, Superhero, Crocodile Wrestler. Owner of NTES and G7eleven

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"Failed to uninstall the device. The device may be required to boot up the computer"

This happened to me today on an Acronis restored Small Business Server box (to different hardware using universal restore).

The issue is that the HP server that the image came from had HP drivers that ended up blocking the broadcom drivers on the Dell server I was moving to.   The way to fix the issue is as follows:

1.  Go into a command prompt.
2.  type “set devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices=1”
3.  Hit return.
4.  Type “devmgmt.msc”
5.  Hit return.

Once device manager has loaded, go to View, Show Hidden Devices.

You will then see “greyed out” old devices and network cards that you can remove.

 Once you reboot all should be well.

Posted: Wed, Dec 5 2007 14:26 by NickWhittome | with 26 comment(s)
Filed under: ,

Comments

Tim Barrett said:

Nice tip Nick, thank!

-Tim

# December 5, 2007 11:10 PM

Tony said:

I received the same message and this fix worked for me. Thanks

# December 22, 2007 7:03 PM

Martin said:

Hello i tried this and it did not work, i cant or don't see any greyed out one at all. is there anything else i can try to fix this?

# January 16, 2008 10:45 PM

Chameleon said:

Works for me! THX !

# March 6, 2008 2:07 PM

Steven said:

Ok, this solution works wonders if you have a driver conflict or race condition.  However if the device you are trying to remove, is the only device, even with the environment variable set, This is about as useless as saying throw the PC out the window.  On my system there is no hidden device, Just the device, and in safe mode, with the environment var set, with show hidden devices, I STILL CAN'T REMOVE THE NIC

# April 7, 2008 5:25 PM

Andrew said:

nice tip. I'm fighting with power management on a Dell latitude that won't turn E-net back on for anything. This is a step toward the fix.

# April 16, 2008 6:34 PM

Zak said:

Remove bindings from the network cards you are trying to delete and also remove QoS - it shouldn't be needed and you can always reinstall it when the unnecessary devices are deleted...

# April 29, 2008 11:33 AM

shah said:

TQ. finally i can solve my problem..

# May 19, 2008 11:08 PM

Salik said:

I am facing same kind of problem with my gprs modem but this tip doesn't work for it. I just can't remove it from the system. First time windows installed its own driver for it now when i try to install manufacturer driver it just does do it. and also don't remove the device. Any one can help me out?

Salik

# May 31, 2008 1:57 AM

Salik said:

Try this link, it will surely solve your problem.

fastest963windows.blogspot.com/.../windows-driver-uninstall-failed-to.html

Salik

# May 31, 2008 2:48 AM

Keith said:

This link worked for me at first......but then the devices came back into the device managers list.  I am also working from a Acronis Universal Restore and having issues with some hardware.

# June 6, 2008 10:41 AM

vinay HN said:

Thanks Friend ... . . . It saved my lots of time..........Thank you so much

# July 18, 2008 3:09 AM

Dave said:

Thanks mate saved me blowing my top over this stupid issue :)

# July 19, 2008 5:46 AM

sam said:

THANK YOU! that stupid nintendo wifi adapter was doing this to a customer and the drivers wouldn't delete, your trick worked where others didn't, THANKS!

# September 12, 2008 1:38 PM

Tom said:

I have the same issue with my Realtek audio card. I did what you said and saw the old devices on the list. But I don't know which ones I should delete. Could you give me some more tips please? Thanks a lot.

# October 4, 2008 11:05 AM

Sandeep said:

Thanks Man, It worked like a Charm !!!!!!!!

# November 4, 2008 12:13 PM

Anon said:

Absolutely top fix.

# December 17, 2008 9:31 AM

Angela said:

Thanks for this. I was able to uninstall a rogue Dlink device that was interferring with my laptop's internal network card, which works great now.

# February 9, 2009 5:57 AM

Rob said:

Updated Link.

This worked great for me after I changed rights on the registry.

# February 16, 2009 5:56 PM

Asko said:

Didn't succeed to uninstall a NIC in safe mode, but your trick did the job. Thanks!

# February 17, 2009 5:02 AM

Giedrius said:

Thanks! Help a lot!

# February 23, 2009 5:17 PM

umtp said:

it doesnt work on my laptop. the name of the stubborn device is High Definition Audio Driver.any idea?from my taskbar i can only see speaker icon which are belongs to bluetooth audio...weird..

# July 8, 2009 12:32 PM

Ryan said:

Oh you're good, you're very good!

Thanks mate!!!

# September 18, 2009 6:36 AM

Maaz said:

Superb mate!!!

This worked wonders for me...THANKS!!!

Tried it in safe mode, didn't work, restarted and went in normal Windows it worked like a charm.

# September 23, 2009 1:52 PM

mortal said:

wow... you rock !!!

thanks a lot !!!

# June 2, 2010 7:59 AM

Angel said:

it ways work on my dell notebook which causing my IP hardcoded on the packet scheduler mini port #2 and i can't apply new IP address.

# November 25, 2010 9:32 PM