CDFS partition on Flash drive. . .

[Guest Bill]

Re: CDFS partition on Flash drive. . .

 

Well, I did a little searching and found a utility from OnTrack that removed

the CDFS partition. It completely removed all partitions and left me with

one large unformatted partition. I got it from this link

 

http://web.mac.com/aponteluis/LuisAponte/Blog/Entries/2007/11/29_Removing_Acomdata_HybridDrive_CD_PART.html

 

The author states he has permission from Acomdata to redistribute the file,

but since it is an OnTrack program, I'm not so sure. Anyway, it works with

the instructions given. One word of caution: Backup all data first as it

completely wipes the drive. I ran the file through all my

virus/trojan/spyware scanners and it came up clean, but I would check it

first if you intend to use it.

 

BullDawg

 

"Mort Arditti" <MortArditti@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message

news:E9997FCD-1DC2-4FD8-BA26-9D51FB0B5110@microsoft.com...

> Bill,

>

> It appears that that these dishonest people get paid to imbed crap on

> their

> drives. It occupies some of the capacity and the user is short changed.

> They make the drive ¡®look like¡¯ a CD. You may try and see if Acomodata

> has

> some utility the clear their trash. After my posting, I searched and

> found

> the U3 site. SanDisk U3 drive use the U3 technology to imbed their trash

> on

> the flash drive. The U3 site did have a utility to clean up the drive.

>

> The interesting part is that the SanDisk person was not aware of any

> utility

> to clear up the drive. Looks like they are all messed up.

>

> Going back to the Acomodata hard drive. If they do not have a utility,

> here

> is an old fashioned idea. Remove the drive from the case. If the Hard

> disk

> is PATA drive, use an older computer with a floppy drive. Get hold of an

> older WIN ME boot floppy disk. Connect the hard drive as a master drive

> in

> the old computer, set the bios to boot from the floppy. Boot the computer

> and let it boot without CD support. At the A: prompt, select FDISK which

> is

> the hard drive utility. In this utility it will give you the option to

> delete partitions. Note that you will have the option to delete DOS and

> none

> DOS partitions. Possibly, here you will be able to delete the unwanted

> partition. Once you do this follow the instruction. It may help if you

> can

> get hold of an old DOS 6.2 book.

>

> Once you repartition the drive, go back to the A: prompt and format the

> hard

> drive. It will be FAT 32. Once you have that and if you use the drive in

> WINDOWS XP, you can convert to NTFS. I hope this helps

>

> Good luck.

>

> Mort

>

>

> "Bill" wrote:

>

>> Got the same thing on a 320GB Acomdata USB hard drive. The CDFS

>> partition

>> is 120MB and contains a worthless backup utility and other crap. It was

>> advertised as such (Hybrid Drive) so I guess I have no recourse. Still,

>> I

>> don't like it and wish I could remove the CDFS partition, but a readme on

>> the partition states it is impossible.

>>

>> BullDawg

>>

>> "Mort Arditti" <Mort Arditti@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message

>> news:1EF26880-C0B5-4B74-83E8-B3D0C2EB1161@microsoft.com...

>> > Tony & other similar victims,

>> >

>> > Your experience is identical to mine. You too have been fleeced by the

>> > corrupt business practices of the flash manufacturer. Since the

>> > situation

>> > is

>> > so similar to mine, I am going to mention the company, it is SanDisk

>> > and

>> > the

>> > drive is U3 type. The minor difference between us is that in my case

>> > it

>> > is a

>> > friend¢®?s drive and I am handling this situation.

>> > Even though the small partition is a small fraction of the total, this

>> > is

>> > fraud! The dishonest manufacturer does not deliver the memory capacity

>> > you

>> > paid for.

>> >

>> > My approach was to write a very nasty letter to the company¢®?s CEO

>> > (see

>> > below

>> > for the name and address) and accused them for fraud and demanded

>> > corrective

>> > action. Within a few days, one of their people contacted me and

>> > informed

>> > that I can not repartition the drive. The scheme they use is to make

>> > the

>> > small partition appear as a CD, file system is CDFS. Attempting to

>> > re-partition may render the entire drive ? dead. I informed them that

>> > unless

>> > the problem is corrected, I will publicize it by writing to magazines,

>> > calling radio talk shows (computer related) etc. ¢®¡ÆAs the saying the

>> > pen

>> > is

>> > mightier than the sword¢®¡¾. I lieu of a pen I used a word processor

>> > and

>> > fought

>> > them back. THEY ARE CROOKS!

>> > The bottom line is that they sent me a replacement drive, one partition

>> > and

>> > no crap on it. Very likely SanDisk is paid to embed the promotional

>> > crap

>> > on

>> > the drive, while the users are cheated by not having the memory

>> > capacity

>> > they

>> > paid for. I strongly urge every VICTIM to write to the company¢®?s

>> > CEO.

>> > If

>> > anyone would like to have a copy of my letter, I would be glad to email

>> > it.

>> > It is Microsoft Word format. These crooks must be made aware that they

>> > must

>> > practice HONEST marketing. There is strength in numbers.

>> >

>> > The CEO and address: Mr. Eli Harari, CEO

>> > SanDisk Corporation

>> > 601 McCarthy Blvd

>> > Milpitas, Ca. 95035

>> >

>> > If you would like a copy of my letter, please contact me at:

>> > marditti60@hotmail.com

>> >

>> > I hope this helps

>> >

>> > Mort

>> >

>> >

>> > "Tony Sperling" wrote:

>> >

>> >> I recently bought one of these 4GB USB Flash Drives - it shows as a CD

>> >> in

>> >> my

>> >> filemanager. It had loads of quite useless 'utilities' on it that I

>> >> know

>> >> I

>> >> will never have any need for. I reformated the FAT32 drive as NTFS and

>> >> removed the remaining CDFS partition, but when I boot the next morning

>> >> that

>> >> partition is automatically re-installed. Anybody know if I can delete

>> >> such a

>> >> partition? Partition Manager does not allow it - alternatively, can I

>> >> delete

>> >> it or take measures to have it not be re-installed like this?

>> >>

>> >>

>> >> Tony. . .

>> >>

>> >>

>> >>

>> >>

>>

>>

>>

[Guest Mort Arditti]

Re: CDFS partition on Flash drive. . .

 

Bill,

 

Congratulations for the end results.

I firmly believe that we must challenge these bastards who pre-load their

crap on their memory products. I have no doubt that they get paid for the

pre-loads while we consumers do not the entire capcity. I would not have a

problem with these pre-loads if the manufacturers provide specific

instructions and the necessary tools to remove them. However they do not,

probably because of some agrrement with who ever is paying.

Just consider your wasted time for this clean up.

This is the reason why I always write nasty letters to the President or

company CEO. They must be informed that their deeds are not acceptable.

Unfortunately, many people accept this abuse.

At this time, may I suggest that you partition your drive and use one of

your partitions to back up your entire C: drive, OS and all. I use a program

called Casper ver. 4. It is by fssdev (if you are interested I will find the

URL and send it to you). It works great and it is under $50. You boot from

the casper CD, copy C: (or whatever drive you want) to the backup. If your

C: gets corrupted, again I boot from the Casper CD, and restore. It save me

several time and the recovery takes

approximately one hour. beta having to install everything from scratch.

Regards,

 

Mort

 

"Bill" wrote:

> Well, I did a little searching and found a utility from OnTrack that removed

> the CDFS partition. It completely removed all partitions and left me with

> one large unformatted partition. I got it from this link

>

> http://web.mac.com/aponteluis/LuisAponte/Blog/Entries/2007/11/29_Removing_Acomdata_HybridDrive_CD_PART.html

>

> The author states he has permission from Acomdata to redistribute the file,

> but since it is an OnTrack program, I'm not so sure. Anyway, it works with

> the instructions given. One word of caution: Backup all data first as it

> completely wipes the drive. I ran the file through all my

> virus/trojan/spyware scanners and it came up clean, but I would check it

> first if you intend to use it.

>

> BullDawg

>

> "Mort Arditti" <MortArditti@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message

> news:E9997FCD-1DC2-4FD8-BA26-9D51FB0B5110@microsoft.com...

> > Bill,

> >

> > It appears that that these dishonest people get paid to imbed crap on

> > their

> > drives. It occupies some of the capacity and the user is short changed.

> > They make the drive ¡®look like¡¯ a CD. You may try and see if Acomodata

> > has

> > some utility the clear their trash. After my posting, I searched and

> > found

> > the U3 site. SanDisk U3 drive use the U3 technology to imbed their trash

> > on

> > the flash drive. The U3 site did have a utility to clean up the drive.

> >

> > The interesting part is that the SanDisk person was not aware of any

> > utility

> > to clear up the drive. Looks like they are all messed up.

> >

> > Going back to the Acomodata hard drive. If they do not have a utility,

> > here

> > is an old fashioned idea. Remove the drive from the case. If the Hard

> > disk

> > is PATA drive, use an older computer with a floppy drive. Get hold of an

> > older WIN ME boot floppy disk. Connect the hard drive as a master drive

> > in

> > the old computer, set the bios to boot from the floppy. Boot the computer

> > and let it boot without CD support. At the A: prompt, select FDISK which

> > is

> > the hard drive utility. In this utility it will give you the option to

> > delete partitions. Note that you will have the option to delete DOS and

> > none

> > DOS partitions. Possibly, here you will be able to delete the unwanted

> > partition. Once you do this follow the instruction. It may help if you

> > can

> > get hold of an old DOS 6.2 book.

> >

> > Once you repartition the drive, go back to the A: prompt and format the

> > hard

> > drive. It will be FAT 32. Once you have that and if you use the drive in

> > WINDOWS XP, you can convert to NTFS. I hope this helps

> >

> > Good luck.

> >

> > Mort

> >

> >

> > "Bill" wrote:

> >

> >> Got the same thing on a 320GB Acomdata USB hard drive. The CDFS

> >> partition

> >> is 120MB and contains a worthless backup utility and other crap. It was

> >> advertised as such (Hybrid Drive) so I guess I have no recourse. Still,

> >> I

> >> don't like it and wish I could remove the CDFS partition, but a readme on

> >> the partition states it is impossible.

> >>

> >> BullDawg

> >>

> >> "Mort Arditti" <Mort Arditti@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message

> >> news:1EF26880-C0B5-4B74-83E8-B3D0C2EB1161@microsoft.com...

> >> > Tony & other similar victims,

> >> >

> >> > Your experience is identical to mine. You too have been fleeced by the

> >> > corrupt business practices of the flash manufacturer. Since the

> >> > situation

> >> > is

> >> > so similar to mine, I am going to mention the company, it is SanDisk

> >> > and

> >> > the

> >> > drive is U3 type. The minor difference between us is that in my case

> >> > it

> >> > is a

> >> > friend¢®?s drive and I am handling this situation.

> >> > Even though the small partition is a small fraction of the total, this

> >> > is

> >> > fraud! The dishonest manufacturer does not deliver the memory capacity

> >> > you

> >> > paid for.

> >> >

> >> > My approach was to write a very nasty letter to the company¢®?s CEO

> >> > (see

> >> > below

> >> > for the name and address) and accused them for fraud and demanded

> >> > corrective

> >> > action. Within a few days, one of their people contacted me and

> >> > informed

> >> > that I can not repartition the drive. The scheme they use is to make

> >> > the

> >> > small partition appear as a CD, file system is CDFS. Attempting to

> >> > re-partition may render the entire drive ? dead. I informed them that

> >> > unless

> >> > the problem is corrected, I will publicize it by writing to magazines,

> >> > calling radio talk shows (computer related) etc. ¢®¡ÆAs the saying the

> >> > pen

> >> > is

> >> > mightier than the sword¢®¡¾. I lieu of a pen I used a word processor

> >> > and

> >> > fought

> >> > them back. THEY ARE CROOKS!

> >> > The bottom line is that they sent me a replacement drive, one partition

> >> > and

> >> > no crap on it. Very likely SanDisk is paid to embed the promotional

> >> > crap

> >> > on

> >> > the drive, while the users are cheated by not having the memory

> >> > capacity

> >> > they

> >> > paid for. I strongly urge every VICTIM to write to the company¢®?s

> >> > CEO.

> >> > If

> >> > anyone would like to have a copy of my letter, I would be glad to email

> >> > it.

> >> > It is Microsoft Word format. These crooks must be made aware that they

> >> > must

> >> > practice HONEST marketing. There is strength in numbers.

> >> >

> >> > The CEO and address: Mr. Eli Harari, CEO

> >> > SanDisk Corporation

> >> > 601 McCarthy Blvd

> >> > Milpitas, Ca. 95035

> >> >

> >> > If you would like a copy of my letter, please contact me at:

> >> > marditti60@hotmail.com

> >> >

> >> > I hope this helps

> >> >

> >> > Mort

> >> >

> >> >

> >> > "Tony Sperling" wrote:

> >> >

> >> >> I recently bought one of these 4GB USB Flash Drives - it shows as a CD

> >> >> in

> >> >> my

> >> >> filemanager. It had loads of quite useless 'utilities' on it that I

> >> >> know

> >> >> I

> >> >> will never have any need for. I reformated the FAT32 drive as NTFS and

> >> >> removed the remaining CDFS partition, but when I boot the next morning

> >> >> that

> >> >> partition is automatically re-installed. Anybody know if I can delete

> >> >> such a

> >> >> partition? Partition Manager does not allow it - alternatively, can I

> >> >> delete

> >> >> it or take measures to have it not be re-installed like this?

> >> >>

> >> >>

> >> >> Tony. . .

> >> >>

> >> >>

> >> >>

> >> >>

> >>

> >>

> >>

>

>

>

[Guest Rok Lipnik]

... what utility exactly?

 

... what utility exactly?

 

BullDawg, thanks for the info, but unfortunately the address (http://web.mac.com/aponteluis/LuisAponte/Blog/Entries/2007/11/29_Removing_Acomdata_HybridDrive_CD_PART.html

) is no longer valid (it gives me a 404 error). I was just wondering if you still remember what utility from OnTrack was used to accomplish the goal?