Laptop will not display USB drive in My Computer

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riscbroker

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I have a Toshiba Satellite L30, did a full OS (XP Home, SP2) repair to try and resolve this problem, and have googled this ad nauseum, tried various fixes, but no joy.
The machine finds the new hardware when I plug in my flash drive but I am not able to see it in 'My Computer'. I tried going to Disk Management but I can't view the flash drive or the hard drive, only the DVD drive. Device Manager displays the HDD and flash drive but has no volume information. The flash drive works as expected in any other machine that i test.
Further clues: I cannot analyze or perform disk defrag on the HDD, or check for errors. :confused:
 
format the flash drive with fat system and try again.Tell me does it say you must initialize the disk in disk manager.Also install sp3 just for security sake.
 
The problem is not with the flash drive, it works fine on any other PC. I'd like to establish why I cannot see the contents of the flash drive on this particular laptop
 
well sometimes the virus program will not allow you to, cause of autorun files or some virus.Try this plug it in the back ports and disable youe virus program.Then use explorer to browse it if it shows up in my computer
 
The USB port may be off. Check if it is on as follows.
Start > Settings > control panel > System > device manager.

Check if USB is enabled. if it is disabled something something is switching it off.
 
thanks gents, I'm busy uninstalling Norton on the machine in question and will try in safe mode presently
 
The flash drive has info on it that is read by any other PC that I checked it on.
 
Sounds to me like it has no drive letter assigned to it. Possible causes are the drive letter that XP wants to assign to it is in use by another drive/partition.

Try going into Administrative Tools (I think you will find it under Control Panel - I use Vista) and then select disk management. If the drive can be seen there (it will be visible as a device with a partition) right-click and assign an unused drive letter. If it is not visible under disk management.

This should work.
 
This fixed the issue for me when I had it recently on a client's machine.
 
I tried going to Disk Management but I can't view the flash drive or the hard drive there, only the DVD drive.
 
dablakmark8 said:
You mean your own hardrive.Tell me do you have windows7 installed to(duel boot system)
Click to expand...

Yes, I mean that I cannot even see the hard drive that is in the laptop when I use Disk Management. This is a full repair installation of XP Home, SP2, no dual boot.
I'm still completely baffled by this, none of the fixes I've tried have made any difference
 
As far as AV goes, I'd like to clear something up - AV does not disable viewing of disk's or other hardware, regardless, of whether its removable or not. If there was an infection on the device, it will block access to the specific file and or remove the file, but the device will still be visible...

If you want to blame AV, maybe blame the AV product you are using for potentially letting malware through, as I know of a piece of malware (name escapes me now) that tends to lead to this scenario. But I doubt you have it. To check, download a rootkit scanner and use that...
 
Thanks for all the tips and assistance, nothing seems to resolve the problem so I've decided to format the machine, just collecting drivers.....
 
Hehe, something I forgot to mention - check that you are an owner of the hard drive (on your machine).

The situation you describe mentions fits the symptoms exactly - You re-installed the OS, thereby creating new tokens for users. The harddrive for some or other reason (most liekly not your primary hard drive) still recognizes the old owner id, hence your new token doesn't have the permissions to make changes or whatever.

Try this:
1. right-click hard drive and select properties
2. select securities tab
3. select "advanced" button near the bottom
4. under permissions, add your username by selecting "add" button (another window will appear for you to enter the information in).
5. select owner tab and change the owner to your username
6. ensure the checkbox at the bottom is checked - this will carry changes made to files and folders on the hard-drive.

This should work. If you have problems changing the owner, let me know...
 
PC Direct said:
Faulty usb port?

Tried another..
Click to expand...
This could be the problem. Try cleaning your usb port with a soft brush or a computer vacuum cleaner to remove the dust particles. If it doesn't still work, replace your usb post with a new one.
 
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