Is there a way to make a USB HDD act like its smaller cousin the USB memory stick (flash stick).

I have left USB thumb drives connected for day on end, restarted numerous times, yet windows never grabs the drive for system restore.

On some systems my USB HDD, it takes a reboot before windows grabs it, on others it does this imidiatly... that prosses take about 4 GB on my USB 40GB one, and 8.9GB of my 80GB one....

I have had to resort to permanatly turning off system restore on my system, but i am looking for a solution that i can put on my drive so i don't have to configure everyone elses machine...

Please Help....

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5 Mar 06

Does anyone have anything???

Edited March 6, 200620 yr by BrandonS_Mil

Anyone?????

Control Panel -> System -> System Restore; click the drive, click Settings, and turn it off.

Yeh, but that will only turn off system restore (which he can already do). He wants a fix so that all computers will not attempt to set asside space for system restore not just his.

This is a tricky problem and you will probably need to use modified firmware. I have no solution but you may be better off asking this sort of question at somewhere like CD Freaks. Those guys regularly screw around with the firmware on optical drives, so they might be able to help you.

Thank you quinriva for the guidance...

Something you "could" try (no warranties implied ), is to apply the "Hitachi Microdrive Filter" as in here:

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14292&st=7

(actually the other way round)

or maybe fiddling with the Registry as suggested here:

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14292&st=5

The simplest would be to disable the system restore service:

http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_restore.htm

or reduce to 0% the space allotment:

http://www.theeldergeek.com/set_system_res...e_allotment.htm

But both ways you need to actually "install" or "merge" Registry info, so it is not a "final" solution.

jaclaz

Edited March 6, 200620 yr by jaclaz

I like your thinking, but that was not the scope of my problem...

I just want a USB HDD to act like a USB flash key. IE no sytem restore (ever, even after reboot).