No Drive Letter for USB Drive?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Bob Boyd
  • Start date Start date
B

Bob Boyd

I have a new Dell Inspirion notebook computer that does
not assign a drive letter to USB drives when they are
inserted. I get popup messages that the device was found
and a disk drive but there it doesn't open up an explorer
like when I insert the drive on my desktop.

I can look in the device manager and see a generic
storage device under Disk Drives but there's no way to
access it?
 
Are these flash drives or hard drives or optical ?

If flash drives do you have a card in the drive (reader).
Do you have the flash or hard drives formatted.

See what disk management (right click My Computer icon,
select manage) show?


--
The people think the Constitution protects their rights;
But government sees it as an obstacle to be overcome.


| I have a new Dell Inspirion notebook computer that does
| not assign a drive letter to USB drives when they are
| inserted. I get popup messages that the device was found
| and a disk drive but there it doesn't open up an explorer
| like when I insert the drive on my desktop.
|
| I can look in the device manager and see a generic
| storage device under Disk Drives but there's no way to
| access it?
|
 
Are these flash drives or hard drives or optical ?
Flash
If flash drives do you have a card in the drive (reader). Yes
Do you have the flash or hard drives formatted.
Click to expand...
Yes, I can read the card on another workstation
See what disk management (right click My Computer icon,
select manage) show?
Click to expand...

It doesn't list the drive anywhere... very strange, I see
it go through all the steps like my other machine except
after it pops up the disk drive message, it doesn't open
up explorer or give me a list of options.
 
I not sure about this. I have no idea how flash drivers are
formated. I could be totally wrong about this.

If you flash drive is formated with 2000 ntfs, xp may not be able to
read it correctly and visa versa. I would back up the data on the
flash drive. Then reformat it as fat32 drive.

Brian C
 
you need to assign a letter to it.

right click on "My computer"/click on "Manage"
click "+" next storage/click on "Disk Management"
locate the drive in the bottom right pane
right click in the "White" area
click "Change drive letter and..."




-----Original Message-----
I not sure about this. I have no idea how flash drivers are
formated. I could be totally wrong about this.

If you flash drive is formated with 2000 ntfs, xp may not be able to
read it correctly and visa versa. I would back up the data on the
flash drive. Then reformat it as fat32 drive.

Brian C





Click to expand...
 
Windows XP will automatically read and convert Windows 2000 NTFS drives.

BTW: Most removable media can not be formatted NTFS. Only able to use FAT
or FAT32.


Brian C said:
I not sure about this. I have no idea how flash drivers are
formated. I could be totally wrong about this.

If you flash drive is formated with 2000 ntfs, xp may not be able to
read it correctly and visa versa. I would back up the data on the
flash drive. Then reformat it as fat32 drive.

Brian C





Click to expand...
 
I have a new Dell Inspirion notebook computer that does
not assign a drive letter to USB drives when they are
inserted. I get popup messages that the device was found
and a disk drive but there it doesn't open up an explorer
like when I insert the drive on my desktop.

I can look in the device manager and see a generic
storage device under Disk Drives but there's no way to
access it?
Click to expand...

Make sure any spare drive letters are not disabled and thus not
allowing windows to allocate one. Check with Tweakui to see if
extra drive letters are free (look in My Computer, Drives section).

Peter Hutchison
Windows FAQ
http://www.pcguru.plus.com/
 
Bob Boyd said:
I have a new Dell Inspirion notebook computer that does
not assign a drive letter to USB drives when they are
inserted. I get popup messages that the device was found
and a disk drive but there it doesn't open up an explorer
like when I insert the drive on my desktop.

I can look in the device manager and see a generic
storage device under Disk Drives but there's no way to
access it?
Click to expand...

With the device connected, right click on My Computer and select Manage. On
the following screen, click on Disk Management. It should now show up on the
right hand side of the screen..... assign it a drive letter.

Marcus
 
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