USB Mass Storage Device Not Recognized (XP)

**NooNoo** · November 1st, 2005, 02:35 PM

Welcome to Windrivers ezrock.
What version of XP do you have on your original CD? You can extract them from the cd using start, run and type in SFC then click OK

**pbolduc** · November 3rd, 2005, 02:10 PM

On rare occasions i've actually seen these mass storage devices try and steal a drive letter already in use. Sometimes you may have to open Disk management and manually specify a different drive letter for the removable mass storage device before it will show you a drive letter in my computer

**pbolduc** · November 3rd, 2005, 02:15 PM

If there's something wrong with the mass storage device driver and the actual driver just isn't installing in the device manager try booting off the XP (home/pro/upgrade) CD and try running the repair for that operating system. If you chose to do the repair make sure you're USB devices aren't connected until the repair process is complete. I'm also a big fan of SP2 for XP, I'd recommend the upgrade it has fixed a lot of bugs I had with the initial release of XP. Good luck

**pbolduc** · November 3rd, 2005, 02:22 PM

Usually if a USB Device is not recognized it can be due to 3 common problems. The driver was not installed first before plugging in the device therefore device is unknown. A defective USB port or if it's front USB header the data-, data+ might have been reversed or come lose during setup or in transport. I'd try plugging these USB devices directly into the rear built-in onboard USB ports as oppose to anything else. (Front USB or any motherboard header stay away from) Then go from there.

**chargoldie** · July 13th, 2006, 09:53 AM

I am new to this and have read the posts but am still not getting results. I'll try to explain this best I can. I inadvertantly and prematurely deleted something from my Camera card therefore was going to retrieve it with a program, however the program will only retrieve from a card reader. I have one and haven't used it in a bit but I do know that because I am running XP that I do not need to load drivers as it should act as a plug n play device.....nope....not happening!(It did work before though) I plug it in...the new hardware wizard kicks in and if I go through the motions it tries to install a Mass USB storage driver and completely positively freezes up my system. I have spent hours upon hours reading up on this and it all comes down to the same thing that it should be plug n play. What am I missing? Should I have a download or an update or something that I don't know about that would make this compatiable?
I go into the device manager and it shows the USB Controllers and "Flash Reader" but then under properties it says "No drivers are installed for this device." Which I understand I don't need? But how do I by pass all this and simply (yeah right..lol) plug it in and use it?
Any help would be so appreciated as these pictures truly are irreplaceable and very sentimental. In the meantime I am trying not to delete ANYTHING from my system for fear of loosing those as well.
Please Help!!

Thanks

**Platypus** · July 13th, 2006, 10:13 AM

Replies to chargoldie's question continued here:

http://forums.windrivers.com/showthread.php?t=57560

**chargoldie** · July 13th, 2006, 12:18 PM

I have re-read all the old posts one more time and still can not get it working. I thought it worked at onepoint but immediately thereafter the somp slow to asnails pace and would work thus having to reboot several times.

Thanks everybody for your replies....I have no idea what I'm doing or who asked me what so I'll prattle along here.
I am running Win XP Home with SP2.
I've checkedmy ports which wrok fine with the camera.
PBOULDUC How do I go about assigning a drive lette b/c yes you are correct in that there isn't one. When I plug in the camera it comes up under "Scanners and Cameras" as well with no drive latter.
NOO NOO I did as you suggested with the SFC but didn't notice anything....should I have?
i"m sure there's other things Ive not tried but I'm now going to shut it down as suggested and unplug everything....replug and see what happens. I'm sure I'll be back....thanks again.
OH and I was trying to find "USB storage driver" in downloads and that was not succesfful either. And why am I messing with a driver when I didn't think I needed one?
At the risk of sounding completely daft and hopefully only somewhat rather comp illiterate.....Is there not a wauy to plug and play? When I plug in the Camera....voila'!

Thanks

I've done all the bove and I'm back....still with no luck.

HELPPPPP!

**chargoldie** · July 14th, 2006, 10:02 PM

Well I have the issue fixed and just thought I'd post it in case anyone else has the same problem. After hours and hours on the phone to my OEM and SanDisk, who were of absolutely no help....I checked my bios....enabled my plug and play, did an XP repair from boot......and I'm good to go!! So clearly it fixed something to do with what I presume were missing drivers.

The card reader now works as a plug and play and also in "MY COMPUTER" it shows all my "Removable Storage Drives" that it didn't recognize before.

Not sure if this works for anyone else.....but good luck with it!!

Thanks again PLATYPUS for your help!!

**Platypus** · July 15th, 2006, 12:54 AM

You're welcome, but I didn't really do anything, you solved it yourself! Thanks for letting us know.

**David Dai** · October 1st, 2006, 01:46 PM

Originally Posted by xpman

Hey Spaz,
I fixed my problem!
I copied the old driver files from the un-updated version of xp I have on my machine to the fully updated version I use on a day to day basis.
The files and locations are below:-

(Storage volumes\\Generic volume)
C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\volsnap.sys
File version 5.1.2600.218
File date 26/10/2001

(USB Mass Storage Device)
C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\usbstor.sys
File version 5.1.2600.218
File date 1/7/2001

The old files are some 3 years older than the updated ones but they do work.
If you dont have the files I can email them to you.

----------------------------------------------------
Hi,

Can you please send me the files? I have the same problem. My usb 2.0 flash memory works with other computers but does not work with my computer. I copied the two files from a computer that works with my device. However, this does not work. Please help.

**NooNoo** · October 2nd, 2006, 03:22 AM

Originally Posted by David Dai

----------------------------------------------------
Hi,

Can you please send me the files? I have the same problem. My usb 2.0 flash memory works with other computers but does not work with my computer. I copied the two files from a computer that works with my device. However, this does not work. Please help.

Welcome to Windrivers David

I removed your email address to stop you getting spam. The board has an email facility. These files do not need to be sent to you, they are in service pack 2 - what are your exact symptoms?
Does it recognise that something has been plugged in?
Do you get any error messages?
Have you loaded service pack 2?
Does your computer have usb 2.0 or is it 1.1 only?

**OldToad** · October 11th, 2006, 02:10 AM

Noo Noo
There appears to be a broader issue here. We have numerous USB 2 devices that are no longer "recognized" or are now "Unknown Device" happening on multiple computers. (ASUS P4S800D-X, Toshiba laptop).(XP-sp2) The problem seems to originate with plugging in a USB1 device after USB2 devices were/are already plugged in and working fine (USB Tv Tuners, an Hauppauge and an Adaptec and AcomData HDDs). It appears that the USB stack gets corrupted. It, further, appears the Pid ID numbers become confused. As if the Vid/Pid of a USB1 device was used, by the Vendor, for a USB2 device. Our ASUS with SiS7001 USB controllers was rectified back to sanity by adding in a NEC USB2 board which appears to have, somehow, restructured the mess back to correctness.
However, not being able to do an addin to the Toshiba Laptop, we are still messed up there. Have tried uninstalling all USB drivers, then unplugging all USB harware, and doing "Scan for changes" then plugging in only the USB2 stuff but still get Unrecognized and Unknown issues. I don't know how to rip out all the applicable Registry stuff we see in Karens PC Profiler. Need some serious adult leadership here. If we are in the wrong Forum please redirect me (new to Forum protocols).

**NooNoo** · October 11th, 2006, 02:31 AM

Welcome Windrivers OldToad I came across this utility for sorting out usb drives. See if that helps.

Ripping usb stuff out of the registry is not a good idea if you have no idea what the keys mean. However, rebuilding the usb is possible by uninstalling in safe mode (device manager and add/remove programs) and turning off the usb in bios, rebooting and checking all mention of usb is gone, then re enabling the ports, allowing windows to find them and then update the chipset drivers then rebooting and when it finally gets completely to desktop, add the drivers for the devices, reboot and then connect the usb device.

**barnabas1969** · December 1st, 2006, 12:47 AM

I had the exact same problem with a PNY Attache 1GB flash drive on Windows XP Professional SP2. It turns out that the USBSTOR.INF file was missing from my C:\windows\inf directory. I got that file from my Windows XP installation CD by opening a DOS command window and changing to the i386 directory on my CD drive. Then I ran EXPAND.EXE to de-compress the file I needed. The syntax I used is below (this assumes that your CD drive is drive letter D).

Start > Run
CMD (then press OK)
**command window should open**
D:
cd i386
expand.exe -r USBSTOR.IN_ c:\windows\inf

Then I rebooted and tried plugging in the flash drive again. It worked perfectly. No telling why my USBSTOR.INF file was missing...