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It appears that Canon do not offer native 64-bit drivers for any of their range of digital cameras; Is there any way to work around this?

EDIT Would I be better upgrading to Windows 7 x64, or no better off?

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For the record, here's the compatibility chart for your camera; note that only EOS Utility is unsupported on 64-bit Vista: canoncanada.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/6161 – esm Jul 15 at 19:47

3 Answers

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For image transfers, it should work in PTP mode (or you could use a card reader); you won't be able to remote-control the camera, unfortunately.

To answer your edit, the problem is 64-bit support from Canon for older models, not necessarily the OS itself. However, on Windows 7 Professional, you could possibly run the 32-bit versions of everything in "XP Mode".

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up vote 2 down vote

My preference has been to use a card reader. I realize this is not really answering the question, but this is what I've done since the day I got my 20D.

My experience is that transfer speeds are better. I never have compatibility issues. Programs just see the files are being in a normal folder somewhere. Using the Canon software just caused trouble.

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AFAIK, all Canon DSLR's present themselves to the computer as a USB drive. The drivers for that are built into Windows. It should work fine with Windows XP, Vista, & 7 in both 32bit & 64bit flavors.

If you're talking about the Canon software that comes bundled with your camera, you can probably download an update from the Canon website.

I installed the Canon software, that came with my 7D, on my x64 Windows 7 system and had no problems at all (although I don't use the software on a regular basis, I know it works).

EDIT 1: If you upgrade to Win7 x64, you might be able to use XP mode. Alternatively, you could install a virtual machine product. I recommend Sun's VirtualBox because it has the ability to route USB connections to the VM's.

EDIT 2: Regardless of how the camera is presented to the computer from a technical perspective ... all the Canon digital cameras I own or have owned have worked fine with all versions of Windows. Just plug it into the USB and it worked. Does the 20D require drivers to work on any other version of Windows?

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Canon won't support older cameras on 64-bit platforms, which is why your 7D doesn't have a problem, but his 20D does. – esm Jul 15 at 19:58
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@david The 20D does not present itself as mass-storage; in PTP mode it can be used for pulling pictures off, but not for features like remote tethering. There also doesn't appear to be any 64-bit support for viewing RAW files in Explorer (like I'd been doing on 32 bit operating systems on my old laptop before it died) – Rowland Shaw♦ Jul 15 at 20:12
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None of the Canon DSLRs present themselves as a USB drive. They are, at best, MTP or PTP devices that are represented with a storage-like interface, but the functionality is severely limited compared to a real USB mass storage device. – Dave Van den Eynde Jul 15 at 20:22
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@Rowland yeah, but you were asking about drivers to connect the camera ... and, as far as I know, no drivers are necessary. At least this is the case with all the Canon DSLR cameras I've had. Doing special stuff with the camera after it's connected, that's a different story ... and isn't related to drivers. – david Jul 16 at 1:06
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@Rowland I guess I would simply call it accessory software. Driver's are pretty specific (at least related to Windows) ... they control how the OS interfaces with hardware. In the case of Canon digicams, the drivers are built into the OS. – david Jul 16 at 14:30
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