Shoutbox

I'm currently at uni and I have left my camera cable at home so can't upload my pictures. However, my flatmate has a Sony memory stick slot in her comp but when I put my memory stick into it nothing happens (yes it's a Sony, it slots in perfectly). When I take it out of the slot, the comp makes the noise that happens when something has been removed so it must recognise its presence - so why will it not show the drive in My Computer?

It's quite urgent that I get these pictures as they are for a friend who has finished term and is going back to the US tomorrow.
Thanks

do you have the driver fot it? google "<name of device> driver(s)"

Put the stick in.  Allow enough time for Windows to recognize it, then go to Start, Run, and type "diskmgmt.msc" in the box.  Find your memory stick in the list of volumes and change its drive letter to an unused one.

There is a known bug / feature in Windows, which permits plugged in removable mass storage devices to receive duplicate drive letters, already in use by things higher up in the driver hierarchy (such as optical drives and mapped network shares). This leaves the removable device "masked" by the existing assignment and not accessible until the drive letter is changed.

You could have some other issue, but it really sounds like this.

I had this problem when a memory card god fked up, the only thing i did was reformat the card with the camera and I was able to use it again.

Try scandisk in it.

quote:

---

Posted by Supersonicdarky - Today at 03:46 PM
do you have the driver fot it? google "<name of device> driver(s)"

---

I'll try that if nothing else works

quote:

---

Posted by Adeptus - Today at 03:46 PM
Put the stick in.  Allow enough time for Windows to recognize it, then go to Start, Run, and type "diskmgmt.msc" in the box.  Find your memory stick in the list of volumes and change its drive letter to an unused one.

There is a known bug / feature in Windows, which permits plugged in removable mass storage devices to receive duplicate drive letters, already in use by things higher up in the driver hierarchy (such as optical drives and mapped network shares). This leaves the removable device "masked" by the existing assignment and not accessible until the drive letter is changed.

You could have some other issue, but it really sounds like this.

---

OK when I run the command, there is only one volume that comes up and that is the C:.  It makes a noise when I put the memory stick in though so it knows it's there.

quote:

---

Posted by YottabyteWIzard - Today at 03:47 PM
I had this problem when a memory card god fked up, the only thing i did was reformat the card with the camera and I was able to use it again.

Try scandisk in it.

---

I really don't want to format it yet as I would lose the pictures..and everyone knows pictures are irreplaceable


Thanks for the help guys, any more feedback would be great.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Supersonicdarky
do you have the driver fot it? google "<name of device> driver(s)"

---

If the card reader works with other cards, installing a driver is unnecessary. Just give the PC time to recognise the card: it may require a few minutes.

quote:

---

Originally posted by raceprouk

quote:

---

Originally posted by Supersonicdarky
do you have the driver fot it? google "<name of device> driver(s)"

---

If the card reader works with other cards, installing a driver is unnecessary. Just give the PC time to recognise the card: it may require a few minutes.

---

It's been left in for at least ten minutes a time. Nothing happens - no new storage shows up in My Computer, yet when it is inserted and taken out the customary noises occur. Baffled

I think you should really follow adeptus' advice. Have you?

yeah i've had a similar problem with removable discs (my PSP) it just kept adding on drive letters, until nothing would work anymore

however doing a complete power off, format of memory stick and changing a setting or two in windows to recognise and eject the discs in a different way has fixed the problem

quote:

---

Originally posted by kierant
yet when it is inserted and taken out the customary noises occur. Baffled

---

The sound you hear has actually nothing todo with Windows (not) reconizing the disk. The sound is just an indication that "something" is hot-plugged in.

Only then Windows should start up the reconizing stuff (in the form of a driver!) and only then it reconizes the disk as a disk.

If you don't have the proper driver or the driver isn't properly installed, then Windows wont reconize the disk as a disk, but still would reconize that "something" is plugged in (hence just the noise).

------------

Also check your configuration panel > system > hardware devices. And see if your USB drivers are properly installed and running (they probably are, but you never know).

Also try this:
Start > Run > "C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe" shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL hotplug.dll

It will start up the hotswap panel (safely remove hardware devices thingie). Tick the check box option below and see what it states in the list. If all things are good it should list all your drive letters assigned to the different USB ports. If not, there is something wrong with your driver.

If stuff is listed there, select each item and press on "Properties", check again if everything is running normal. After that, select the main top item and click on "end" or "stop" (or whatever the English equivalent of that button is). After that unplug the device and reboot windows and try again.