USB and Flash Drive

May 30, 2008

Running WinXP Home 2002 SP2 on a Dell Dimension DE051. When I plug a flash

drive into either USB port on the front, the drive does not appear in My

Computer window. When I look in the device manager it "sees" the drive and

reads that it is operating properly. When I go to stop it, the drive is also

seen. Each of the ports appear as Location 0. The drive works in other

computers and I tested other drives and still the same problem. Any ideas?

Thank you.

May 30, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

sonicj wrote:

> Running WinXP Home 2002 SP2 on a Dell Dimension DE051. When I plug a flash

> drive into either USB port on the front, the drive does not appear in My

> Computer window. When I look in the device manager it "sees" the drive and

> reads that it is operating properly. When I go to stop it, the drive is also

> seen. Each of the ports appear as Location 0. The drive works in other

> computers and I tested other drives and still the same problem. Any ideas?

> Thank you.

Look in Control Panel|Administrative Tools|Computer Management|Disk

Management. See it there?

Do you have mapped drives on your system, as a mapped drive takes

precedence over a USB drive. If both occupy the same letter, change

one of them.

May 30, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

You nailed it! Thank you.

"Big Al" wrote:

> sonicj wrote:

> > Running WinXP Home 2002 SP2 on a Dell Dimension DE051. When I plug a flash

> > drive into either USB port on the front, the drive does not appear in My

> > Computer window. When I look in the device manager it "sees" the drive and

> > reads that it is operating properly. When I go to stop it, the drive is also

> > seen. Each of the ports appear as Location 0. The drive works in other

> > computers and I tested other drives and still the same problem. Any ideas?

> > Thank you.

> Look in Control Panel|Administrative Tools|Computer Management|Disk

> Management. See it there?

> Do you have mapped drives on your system, as a mapped drive takes

> precedence over a USB drive. If both occupy the same letter, change

> one of them.

>

May 31, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

I have the same problem. The USB does not show up in My Computer or Windows

Explorer. I can find the USB drive in Disk Management as per your advice but

there seems to be no duplication of letters. Only the hard disk (C drive)

and CDROM (D drive) are listed as well - the USB is listed as E drive. I

don't know of any mapped drives on my system that would be blocking the USB

but how do I check?

"Big Al" wrote:

> sonicj wrote:

> > Running WinXP Home 2002 SP2 on a Dell Dimension DE051. When I plug a flash

> > drive into either USB port on the front, the drive does not appear in My

> > Computer window. When I look in the device manager it "sees" the drive and

> > reads that it is operating properly. When I go to stop it, the drive is also

> > seen. Each of the ports appear as Location 0. The drive works in other

> > computers and I tested other drives and still the same problem. Any ideas?

> > Thank you.

> Look in Control Panel|Administrative Tools|Computer Management|Disk

> Management. See it there?

> Do you have mapped drives on your system, as a mapped drive takes

> precedence over a USB drive. If both occupy the same letter, change

> one of them.

>

May 31, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

joeth wrote:

> I have the same problem. The USB does not show up in My Computer or Windows

> Explorer. I can find the USB drive in Disk Management as per your advice but

> there seems to be no duplication of letters. Only the hard disk (C drive)

> and CDROM (D drive) are listed as well - the USB is listed as E drive. I

> don't know of any mapped drives on my system that would be blocking the USB

> but how do I check?

>

Mapped drives show up as letters in your My Computer, just like E: F: or

G: etc. If you've never use this, you can share a folder, lets say on

another PC2. Then in explorer you can click Tools|Map Network Drive|.

You type in like \\PC2\Folder (or whatever name you gave the share)

and pick a drive letter. Now you get a Drive but its really a link to

that folder on the other PC2. Its kinda like my network places.

The difference is the path is like F:\xxx.jpg not \\PC2\folder\xxx.jpg.

It's about the same but has flavor differences and side effects in

the OS, like all mapped drives usually reconnect at boot, and if the PC2

is off you get huge delays in bootup trying to connect to missing

hardware. Minor issues.

May 31, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

Thanks - I get it.

Can you suggest another reason why the USB doesn't show up in Explorer etc?

and what I should do about it?

"Big Al" wrote:

> joeth wrote:

> > I have the same problem. The USB does not show up in My Computer or Windows

> > Explorer. I can find the USB drive in Disk Management as per your advice but

> > there seems to be no duplication of letters. Only the hard disk (C drive)

> > and CDROM (D drive) are listed as well - the USB is listed as E drive. I

> > don't know of any mapped drives on my system that would be blocking the USB

> > but how do I check?

> >

>

> Mapped drives show up as letters in your My Computer, just like E: F: or

> G: etc. If you've never use this, you can share a folder, lets say on

> another PC2. Then in explorer you can click Tools|Map Network Drive|.

> You type in like \\PC2\Folder (or whatever name you gave the share)

> and pick a drive letter. Now you get a Drive but its really a link to

> that folder on the other PC2. Its kinda like my network places.

> The difference is the path is like F:\xxx.jpg not \\PC2\folder\xxx.jpg.

> It's about the same but has flavor differences and side effects in

> the OS, like all mapped drives usually reconnect at boot, and if the PC2

> is off you get huge delays in bootup trying to connect to missing

> hardware. Minor issues.

>

May 31, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

joeth wrote:

> Thanks - I get it.

> Can you suggest another reason why the USB doesn't show up in Explorer etc?

> and what I should do about it?

>

> "Big Al" wrote:

>

>> joeth wrote:

>>> I have the same problem. The USB does not show up in My Computer or Windows

>>> Explorer. I can find the USB drive in Disk Management as per your advice but

>>> there seems to be no duplication of letters. Only the hard disk (C drive)

>>> and CDROM (D drive) are listed as well - the USB is listed as E drive. I

>>> don't know of any mapped drives on my system that would be blocking the USB

>>> but how do I check?

>>>

>> Mapped drives show up as letters in your My Computer, just like E: F: or

>> G: etc. If you've never use this, you can share a folder, lets say on

>> another PC2. Then in explorer you can click Tools|Map Network Drive|.

>> You type in like \\PC2\Folder (or whatever name you gave the share)

>> and pick a drive letter. Now you get a Drive but its really a link to

>> that folder on the other PC2. Its kinda like my network places.

>> The difference is the path is like F:\xxx.jpg not \\PC2\folder\xxx.jpg.

>> It's about the same but has flavor differences and side effects in

>> the OS, like all mapped drives usually reconnect at boot, and if the PC2

>> is off you get huge delays in bootup trying to connect to missing

>> hardware. Minor issues.

>>

Sorry, Not off the top of my head.

May 31, 2008

Re: USB and Flash Drive

I've put together some known reasons for external drives not

being shown in the Windwos Explorer:

http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbtrouble_e.html

Uwe