acer aspire m5 481pt webcam not detected

bjnewton

You can tell which model I have through my subject line. I cannot for the life of me find the webcam. I am trying to use skype and well that doesnt work either. I initially thought it was a webcam issue, maybe the program didnt recognize my webcam. When I looked in the control panel I could find no listing anywhere. There is obviously a cam here, how do I initialize it?

you'll have to dumb it down for me too. I am not very tech saavy. Took me two days to figure out that the computer was not detecting my camera to figure out why skype wasnt working. Although i think skype is messed as well.

 

any help is appreciated!

 

thanks!

finlux

Hi bjnewton

 

According to the spec sheet here, your model does indeed have a webcam. You can tell for sure by looking at the top centre of the screen (on the plastic bezel).

 

If you press the Windows key & R - this will bring up the Run box. Type: devmgmt.msc & press enter. This will bring up your device manager. Under "Human Interface Devices" (or possibly its own description) will be your webcam driver. Make sure there is not an exclamation by the side of it or even a red cross.

 

If the webcam is not listed at all, Windows cannot "see" the webcam, then it is not working and will need to be sent back for repair. If there IS an exclamation by the side of the webcam, then try the following:

 

1. Right click & choose "Uninstall"

2. Restart the laptop when it has finished uninstalling

 

Windows should now re-install the webcam, and it should now work. If it doesn't then I'd suggest that it has failed - or perhaps a cable has worked loose - and will need attention. Contact Acer support for your region to arrange a repair.