Pendrive not Recognized

[colster]

Hi all

I have a 1gb pendrive i purchased about two weeks ago from argos it has been working great for weeks but today when i plugged it in it shows in my computer but clicking on the icon gives the message "insert disc into removable disc" and i cant access the drive at all. The girlfreinds college work is on the pen and ive not told her yet and not looking forward to it either any help would save my love life as well as my ears.

 

[GuyAmI]

Have you tried it in different ports? What about on a different system?

Are you properly removing it via the Safely Remove Hardware icon in the system tray (by the clock in the task bar)? Double click the icon (it looks like a green arrow sitting atop a grey block.) You should see 'USB Mass Storage Device' listed, double-click it. In the window that pops up, you device should see your device (eg. Manufacturer X USB Device). Select it, click the OK button, wait a few seconds, and now you can safely remove it. Wait another few seconds then reinsert the key. If it's still not being detected then the key may be pooched.

If this is the case and you don't want to suffer your girlfriend's wrath, you can try a data recovery programme like Handy Recovery. I've had a fair bit of luck using it to recover data from floppy discs that Windows wouldn't let me access.

 

[colster]

Cheers Guyami

I must say i dont always remove the drive using the hardware removal process but never had a problem before but i know theirs always a first time. In windows disc management it doesnt see it either, but i get the tone in windows when i plug the drive in and it appears in my computer but i cant access it iam using Vista on this PC but i have tried this on another PC running XP and the same problem but has work in the past on the same two systems.

 

[GuyAmI]

Have you tried it out on different ports?

 

[colster]

Yes ive tried several different ports and the same error message.

 

[GuyAmI]

Looks to me as if your drive is shot.

Your best bet is to see if you can use a data recovery programme like the one I mentioned in my first reply to try and get your girlfriend's work back and then look into getting the drive replaced. Since it's only been about two weeks there shouldn't be a problem with that.