Bridging USB device driver

[Jason72]

Maybe I missed this somewhere and maybe this should be posted on Windows Guests section, but is there a way to bridge a USB port to a Windows VM?

Let me explain.

I have a Windows 7 machine running a Windows XP VM. I want to bridge one of the USB ports from Windows 7 to the Windows XP VM and let the Windows XP VM have the installed drivers. So, what would essentially happen is that Windows 7 becomes a pass-through to the device.

The reason I'm even asking is because the device I have does not have any drivers greater than Windows XP, but I'd rather not keep a Windows XP computer around if I don't have to. If I can have Windows 7 kick off a Windows XP VM and the VM can access the hardware then I can access the hardware when I need to and scrape the XP computer.

Is this even possible?!?

[mpack]

This sounds like a perfectly ordinary use of USB as discussed a gazillion times before. Have you looked in the user manual?

FYI, USB is just a network. And like a network the host OS needs drivers to talk to basic infrastructure: network cards and the like. But, the network itself consists of a host of application layer protocols built at higher levels. All USB devices passed to a VM require that the guest OS have device application layer drivers installed, whether the host also has them installed is not relevant, all the host needs is the basic NIC level drivers.

p.s. You don't "bridge a USB port": USB ports are not addressable, only the devices are. So, you talk about a device being connected to, mounted in, or passed through to the guest.

[Jason72]

Well, talking to the manufacturer, the solution was to buy their new product which costs $2000. I'd like to avoid that. Hardware is a PhoneTree system for my church.

I didn't know it was discussed so much because I don't pay attention to all the posts on the forums. I wasn't sure what terminology to use when addressing the USB issue.

I don't have a basic level NIC driver so I guess I'm SOL.

[mpack]

I don't have a basic level NIC driver so I guess I'm SOL.

Sure you do. The "NIC" in the case of the USB network is the USB host controller in your PC. Your host definitely has drivers for that if USB is working at all. Now all you need are device specific drivers for XP.

Do bear in mind that XP has no native USB3 support, though drivers can be installed if this is needed.

Final point: the idea to use a virtual machine to control physical hardware often doesn't end well. OTOH XP era drivers should work just fine on Win7 (and probably Win8 and Win10 too). The main thing is to install the 32bit version of the host OS, because Microsoft made a decision that 64bit Windows would not have a backwards compatibility layer for 32bit drivers, only for user level apps. If it was me then I'd get some churchgoer to donate an older PC, install Win7-32bit on it, and see how well your USB device works on that. I expect it would work fine, and you can tell that company (politely of course) where to stick their $2000 bill.

[Jason72]

Let me take a look at that when I get a chance. The NIC I thought you were referring to was on the main machine and not VM. I guess I got it mixed up. Maybe I overlooked how everything was setup.

As fyi, the driver didn't work last time I tried with Windows 7, but maybe I was using 64-bit and didn't pay attention. Anyway, something went very wrong with their implementation of the driver INF install and I just couldn't get the driver working. I tried patching the INF but I was not knowledgeable enough though I have patched a video driver INF before. I'll try Windows 7 again and make sure it's 32-bit.

Anyway, I'll try both paths and see what I get when I have time.

Thanks!