Acer Inbuilt Webcam help

Hello I have an Acer Aspire 5732Z running Windows 7. It has an inbuilt Acer Crystal Eye Webcam. The webcam worked for some time after I'd bought the laptop, about 1 year ago, however, I don't use it much so unsure when it stopped working.

Now when I click on the webcam icon shortcut on desktop or access it from the Search menu the application starts but the screen is black. Clicking on Camera or Video does nothing. The options menu is all greyed out.

I have searched high and low on the net for solutions, including installing drivers etc. There are a variety of drivers on the official Acer download site none of which work.

Can anyone help? Appreciate it.

Cheers

Does it work with Messenger, Skype, etc?

I have had the same problem for over 4yrs, but it always works with Messenger/Skype.

I don't use Messenger or Skype, but as a trial I downloaded both and the cam didn't work with either. I think it's got to be a driver issue ...

Have you tried using Hardware Manager to uninstall the cam and let Windows rediscover it?

I hadn't but I did. It automatically found the windows driver and doesn't allow you to instal any other driver from my c drive. So still no go. Thanks for suggestion though.

Post deleted by Sadoldman

Post deleted by Sadoldman

Have a look at the drivers listed here and start with Bison, then Suyin, then Chicony. The Bison unit (If listed) seems to be the most widely used.
Rather than simply run the installer from within it's package, use WinRaR or similar to extract the files from within the package. Run setup.exe from the root of the extracted folder, follow the prompts and reboot when asked. Aclue to a successful installation may be the camera's LED briefly illuminating during boot.
After reboting, return to the folder and have a look for another setup.exe file within the nested AP folder. Run that to install the associated Acer Crystal Eye freestanding camera software.