I had been using my Huawei E220 on Windows XP for a couple of years until I got my new Dell XPS with Windows Vista pre-installed. I could not wait to get my first Internet experience on Vista and plugged my HSPA dongle in to come online as quickly as possible as it used to be on XP. Then only I realized that my Huawei E220 mobile broadband modem was not working on Vista. Apparently the device driver was failing to detect the plug-and-play device on Vista.
I started to Google looking for some solution and found that it required a firmware upgrade. An office colleague of mine also told me that he managed to get his Huawei E220 to work on Vista by doing a firmware upgrade. Yesterday I also managed to get my dongle to work on Vista after a firmware upgrade.
This is how you go about doing this simple upgrade process.
1. Go to http://www.huawei.com/mobileweb/en/doc/list.do?type=-1&id=736 and download the file E220 Client Software WINMACB300D00SP02C03 (UTPS11[1].002.03.16.03_MAC11.201.01.00.03) for WinXP&2K&Vista & Mac.zip.
2. Fix your dongle into a 32-bit Windows machine (say Windows XP) and execute this file to do the firmware upgrade. Please note that your dongle can become completely unusable in case you disturb this upgrade process.
3. Once it is done, you can use your newly upgraded Huawei E220 HSPA modem on your Vista machine without any issue.
Happy upgrade and Good Luck !!!
