can't acces usb pen drive in XP

[brianmgb]

Hello all,

I have frequently read advice from these columns,now I'm hoping for more good advice.

I am using XP on a toshiba satellite 100 and trying to connect to a 256MB philips usb drive,I have oartitioned it with GParted via bootable CD and when inserted it is registered as "E" removable disk however when I try to copy a file to the drive i get the following message "please insert a disk".

Do I need specific drivers for this stick ifso anyone know which/where

brian

[Ponch]

What did you try to achieve using GPartEd ? Did you make a second partition ?

[brianmgb]

Hi,

I followed the advice of someone who sells such devices and who always formats the device before sending on to the customer as manylaptop had complained that they couldn't access what they had bought.

I formatted in fat32 as I also use win98se on other PC's.

I suspect the problem is driver(s) I wanted to be able to transfer between PC's,I am in the unenviable position of having my main PC crash with HD failure and shortly after my backup locked up and my backup image wouldn't install properly.I have bought a second hand toshiba so at leasr I can reach the internet.

[jaclaz]

You don't need "specific" drivers under 2K/XP, they are built into system.

Just format it again from Windows XP, it is possible that gparted partitioned/formatted it with "wrong" or however "wrong for XP" partition data/bootsector data.

If it still does not work, use the HP formatting tool, see FAQ #4 here:

http://home.graffiti.net/jaclaz:graffiti.n...SB/USBfaqs.html

Independently from the fact that it will also be made bootable, the stick will be partitioned/formatted properly (single partitions).

If you need two or more partitions on it, you will need to install a filter driver (either Hitachi Microdrive Filter cfadisk.sys or Anton Bassov's dummydisk.sys), otherwise only first partition will be visible/accessible from XP.

jaclaz

[brianmgb]

Here i am again.

I have tried formatting via XP and also using the HP programme without success,I have bought a new 4GB drive which should install without problems but this I also cannnot format.

After inserting this drive I can see the drive as "E" "removable 3.75GB,in computer management it is marked as"basic-no file system-active-capacity 3.75GB-freespace 3.75GB"when I try to format I get the message"this partition is active,all data will be lost" if I then attempt to format in fat32,the sequence begins but fails with a message as "cannot format or similar".

Is there a setting in XP that is incorrect or what.

My lack of knowledege of XP is a problem I am a longtime user of win98se and know my way about,with XP it's a learning curve,which I would rather not have to run but can't avoid.ince I was able to format using the bootdisk and GParted it must be a problem of settings in this laptop or XP itself.

brian.

[Kelsenellenelvian]

"this partition is active"

That is your issue XP is seeing it as an active partition...

[brianmgb]

Hello all,

I have bought and installed a 500GB USB disk,formatted as fat32 on several partitions,all under 130GB.

XP recognizes all partitions and shows them as active but not (apparently) having a file system.

I must conclude that my XP install would seem unable to deal with Fat32,is there any sort of file permission in XP that might cause this.

I have also managed to network to my old win98se PC but again cannot access the files (fat32 partitions)

desperate

Brian

[Ponch]

I have bought and installed a 500GB USB disk,formatted as fat32 on several partitions,all under 130GB.

XP recognizes all partitions and shows them as active but not (apparently) having a file system.

1) you cannot have more than 1 active partition on your disk (well, you can, but then you can't use them), so maybe this is your only problem for now.

2) how did you format them if you say your system sees them but no filesystem. I mean, is it the same XP system that formatted them that then say there is no file system ?

3) What you are trying to achieve by creating more 130GB FAT partitions (see them with W98 over network// use the disk with 98 ?) is probably not necessary // won't work. Please explain.

[dandnsmith]

One thing it cannot be is the basic ability of XP to cope with FAT filestructures. I have systems with XP installed on both NTFS and FAT, and the system I'm working on now, while based on NTFS, has no-problem access to multiple FAT based filesystems on the same machine.

I've heard of oddities connected with USB drives (where we're talking about the little sticks, not conventional drives in USB enclosures) - and these seem to manufacturer-linked. It has been said that some must be formatted as FAT16 or FAT12 as FAT32 doesn't work! I don't know how to progress from here, alas.

[brianmgb]

thanks all for the comments so far.

I formatted the disk with acronis the first partition as primary fat32 and then an extended containing the others.

I kept the partition size down for convenience and ease of use with win98,i will probably use it (if I can get it to work) with my other win98 PC's for backup and file transfers etc.

computer management reports the disk as "J" 465MB with partition shown as all logicals.I shall have to go back and check that the partitioning was correctly carried out.

It should be one primaryof 100 and an extended within which 3 partitions of about 100 GB.

Elsewhere on the net I have seen remarks on backward compatability with older OS's (I presume that is fat32) does that have to be specifically set??

I'll come back again tomorrow after I have done some checking on the disk.

see you soon.

brian

[brianmgb]

Hi all,

Now I am totally confused.

Somehow or other all partitions were logical,i.e. no primary.

I changed that to what it should have been,now have one primary and extended.XP "sees" these partitions as "raw",so I tried to format one partition from out XP as NTFS,this as usual failed.

I am beginning to think that I will have to do a complete reinstall of XP,any advice hereover with respect to saving drivers setting data files etc???

My hard disk is 40GB and only as C with 35 GB free,I am considering formatting two partitions D,E as respectively ntfs and fat32 each of 10GB,any comments??

thanks

Brian

[jaclaz]

I sincerely doubt that anything is wrong with your install, it seems to me that you still have a mis-formatted/fdisked USB device.

There has been a few reports that in some occasions to "refresh" correctly a USB stick it has been needed to "zero" out the initial sectors, but this has never been the case with USB hard disks.

Can you download HDhacker:

http://dimio.altervista.org/eng/

and backup both the MBR (Physical disk) and bootsector (logical disk) of first active partition of the USB disk?

Compress the two files together in a .zip and attach them, I'll have a look at them and see if I can find what is wrong with them.

jaclaz

[brianmgb]

Hello again.

I now have access to both pendrive and usb hard disk,I think that is because when I powered up these were active before I started the laptop!!

I still have to try and get the network between this XP and my other win98 PC's up.From win98 I can see shared documents but don't have full access to all files,I know XP is differently organised so I will have to learn more about it.I presume there is a way of sharing as with win98 which will require permissions,more later.Thanks for all previous help.

PS the pendrive was/is formatted from acronis.

Brian

[brianmgb]

hello all,just to say that I can now access both my pendrives but only if they are already inserted at laptop startup!,I thought that they could be withdrawn or inserted "hot" and work,apparently not.but I'LL LIVE WITH IT.

[dandnsmith]

As to how to get the sharing to work with XP and 98SE, it may depend on whether you have XP Home or XP Pro (the facilities are different) as to how you configure them. I have it working between WinMe Win98SE XP Home and XP pro.

One worthwhile comment is that the workgroup names should be the same, and any shares created before a change to the workgroup name in XP are likely not to work (cannot think how many systems I've sorted because of this, little publicised, Msoft feature).

I have a number of these pendrives, which all work under XP for hot plugging, and the support for Win9x isn't quite so good, with special drivers and so on sometimes being needed.