Acer Swift SF314-42 Fingerprint Scanner not compitable with windows hello

Hi,

I'm hoping someone can help me. I have an Acer Swift SF314-42-R5-3D.

Recently, out the blue my fingerprint sensor stopped working. When i went to the settings it says " we couldn't find a fingerprint sensor compatible with windows hello fingerprint". When i go to the device manager the Egis Tec Touch Fingerprint Sensor, under the Biometric Devices, says, "Currently, this hardware device is not connected to the computer. (Code 45) To fix this problem, reconnect this hardware device to the computer". I looked at the event logs and somehow the device was deleted, which I did not do. I have no idea how to get the "device" back as it wasn't an external piece of hardware.

So, i :

rolled back any updates - no help, updated the drivers - no help, deleted the drivers and reinstalled - no help, updated to windows 11 - no help, rolled back windows 11 - no help, used services.msc and ensured the service is allowed to interact with desktop - no help, checked group policy - no help, did a recovery of my laptop - no help as i couldn't choose the recovery point.

If anyone has any suggestions that may help that would be great, as i am at my wits end. I have used Rostoro as well to clean any registry keys issues, I have norton antivius (which I have had for years), The other weird thing was that my windows media player also mysteriously disappeared, that was easy to get back though.

Thanks in advance for anyone's help

cheers

[Edited the thread to add model name to the title]

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Balatekie

Hello!!

@Ezz00m,

You can try manually uninstalling and reinstalling your device driver

When the error message says your hardware device is not connected to the computer, chances are your device driver is missing or corrupted. In this case, manually uninstalling and reinstalling your device driver may help you out.

1) Press the Windows logo key and X at the same time, then select Device Manager.

2) In the Device Manager window, locate the device that’s giving you Code 45.

3) Right-click on that device entry and select Uninstall device.

4) Tick the checkbox for Delete the driver software for this device and click Uninstall (if you’re prompted for confirmation).

5) In Device Manager, click Action on the menu bar and select Scan for hardware changes. This should refresh the system, then reinstall the device and its corresponding driver.

6) Restart your computer, then open Device Manager to check if the Code 45 issue has been fixed.

Hope this helps!!

Regards,

Balatekie

billsey

The issue is usually not in the fingerprint scanner itself, but in the underlying USB connection. That connection is internal rather than an external USB port. If hardware it's typically caused by the cable coming loose, but more often it's just Windows not seeing good data on that port. Try reinstalling the USB host controllers and USB hubs in Device Manager to see if it's re-recognized.

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