Note the CMU driver strictly adheres to the DCAM specification. The toolbox does not support vendor specific DCAM drivers which frequently offer extensions or modifications to the DCAM specification.
Question
Why is my DCAM (IEEE-1394) FireWire camera not recognized by the Image Acquisition Toolbox? I am using a DCAM (IEEE-1394) FireWire camera with the Image Acquisition Toolbox. However, the toolbox fails to recognize my camera.
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Expert Answer
Prashant Kumar
PhD Expert
Answered Aug 16, 2026
The Image Acquisition Toolbox supports connections to IEEE-1394 (FireWire) DCAM-compliant devices using the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) DCAM driver. If the toolbox does not recognize a DCAM camera connected to your computer, most likely the camera has not been configured to use the CMU DCAM driver.
The supported version of the driver is shipped with MATLAB and can be located in the following directory:
$MATLABROOT\toolbox\imaq\imaqextern\drivers\win32\dcam
(where $MATLABROOT is the MATLAB root directory on your machine, as returned by typing
matlabroot
at the MATLAB Command Prompt.)
Be sure to install the CMU DCAM demo application when you install the CMU DCAM driver. To verify your FireWire camera has been successfully configured to use the CMU DCAM driver, try accessing your camera from the CMU demo application. If the CMU demo application can access your DCAM camera, it has been successfully configured and can be used by the toolbox.
For information on configuring your camera to use the CMU DCAM driver, refer to the Troubleshooting section of the Image Acquisition Toolbox documentation:
Troubleshooting (Image Acquisition Toolbox)
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