I have a very old Knoica Minolta laser printer at home. And when I tried to install it on my newly installed Windows 8 machine, I was told that the driver can’t be installed because the INF file is not digitally signed. It doesn’t even give me the choice to go ahead anyway. So how can I bypass this restriction to have my un-signed driver installed?
Here is what I figured and did to get around it.
First, press win + I to launch the charm bar, and click Change PC Settings at the bottom.
Then, go to General, and scroll to the bottom of the page, click Restart Now button under Advanced Startup section. Remember to save all your work first before clicking it.
Note that on Windows 8.1, the Advanced Startup option has moved to Update and recovery section under Recovery.
The computer reboots to a startup menu, in which click Troubleshoot.
And click Advanced Options at next screen.
Choose Startup Settings next,
And click Restart button.
The computer reboots and prompts another menu to choose. One of the items is to Disable driver signature enforcement. Press number 7 or F7 to continue booting to Windows 8 with digital sign enforcement disabled.
And then I was able to get the Windows Security warning window offering me to install this driver anyway.
It was successful! Restart computer once again to re-enable the digital sign enforcement.
I would suggest changing the UAC settings first to see if the Install Anyway window prompts out. The solution showing off in this post should be the last resort to try out. And make sure the driver you are about to install is safe, though not digitally signed.
I’m quite surprised the driver continued to work after re-enabling signature enforcement. It wouldn’t if it was a boot driver (e.g. video), that’s for sure.
That does not work for all drivers anyway
What a stupid system. Why not let users opt out. It’s not as if MS is losing money on support calls.
I still have problems getting the legacy driver running permantly on every windows start. Even with “test mode enabled” windows won’t accept the driver. I always have to go through the start up procedure as described here. Is there any other option to get the driver working on every new startup?
I think that’s the only to get the legacy uncertified driver installed on Windows 8. If you are often building a lot of similar systems, you may want to look at building your own imaging system, like this one – https://nextofwindows.mystagingwebsite.com/how-to-build-your-own-image-system-with-imagex/. 🙂
My driver also stops to work when I restart my computer, making Windows boot in normal mode again. When I verify the reason why the device is not working properly it says: “driver was not digitally signed”. It works again just if I restart the system in “Disable driver signature enforcement”. Microsoft is just stupid….
I agree. “Test mode enabled” doesn’t do squat. Have to restart my goddamned machine and select the above mentioned option to make it work.
My Lord! What a mess!
is it the same on 8.1 ??
Pretty much the same.
I had to press F8 just after restart to open another menu!