USB and FireWire Problems: Fixing Problems with USB and FireWire Connections - Page 2 |
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USB AND FIREWIRE PROBLEMS - PAGE 2
Visit the USB and FireWire section of this site for information on those serial standards.
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1. - How can I to write-protect a flash/thumb/key/pen drive?
2. - My USB flash drive used to work but now it won't install
3. - USB flash drive recognised but doesn't show up in My Computer
4. - Windows XP - USB 2.0 memory stick - unrecognised device
5. - Using a USB flash drive causes a USB card reader to fail
6. - A new USB 2.0 adapter card makes my computer crash: a problem with IRQ sharing
7. - Why can't I find a router for my USB DSL modem
8. - "Performance of FireWire devices may decrease after you install Windows XP Service Pack 2"
9. - How do you format a USB flash drive under Windows XP?
11. - I can't use my USB mouse and keyboard in Safe Mode in Windows XP
13. - USB printer problem: "USB Device Not Recognized"
15. - Will a Hi-Speed USB 2.0 external hard disk drive work with my old USB 1.1 computer?
16. - I can't get my external Creative USB Audigy 2 ZS sound card to work on my notebook computer
17. - Solving USB problems with Hewlett Packard peripheral devices - printers and MFPs
| Click here! to go back to Page 1 of USB and FireWire Problems & Solutions |
How can I write-protect a flash/thumb/key/pen drive
Problem
I need to have several utilities/tools on a USB flash drive in order to be able to fix other people's computers, but I'm afraid that malware might transfer itself to the drive. If the drive has one, does a write-protect switch prevent malware from being written to it?
Answer
Not all flash drives provide one, but a write-protect switch or tab should prevent anything from being written to a flash drive. If the drive doesn't have a write-protect switch, there is a Windows Registry hack that should work on any flash drive. You will have to employ it on the computer that you are working on.
Registry Hack to Disable Writing to USB Drives -
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/...
Whichever method you employ - a Registry hack or a hardware switch - verify that the write-protection is working by copying a test file to the flash drive. If the test write fails then it is protected from malware.
My USB flash drive used to work but now it won't install
Problem
I was able to hotplug my EasyDisk 128MB USB flash drive for over a year in my PC that is running Windows XP Home Edition. My system has two USB 1.1 ports on the motherboard and four USB 2.0 ports on a PCI adapter card. It ran properly from a USB 1.1 port. Then, one day, before removing the device, I clicked on the green/grey unplug icon in the Notification Area in order to remove it safely. A message came up saying that it was safe to remove the device. I disconnected the drive and another message came up saying that I had wrongly removed the device. I then discovered that I couldn't access the drive at all. At startup the flash drive lit up briefly and was shut down immediately by Windows. I connected the drive to a USB 2.0 port. It installed properly and was running as it should until I installed a cable modem on one of the USB 2.0 ports. Now I can't get Windows XP to install the flash drive properly, even though I have reformatted my hard drive and should have a clean system. It doesn't light up and Windows recognises it only as a USB mass storage device, and not the EasyDisk as it originally did, and doesn't appear in Windows Explorer. However, when I jiggle the drive in the USB port, it lights up, Windows recognises it as an EasyDisk drive, claims to be installing the software, and an unplug icon appears in the Notification Area. However, when clicking on the icon, two USB mass storage devices are shown. The first one is described as unknown and the second as an EasyDisk drive. The drive doesn't appear in Windows Explorer, whether it is lit or not. I don't think that the drive itself is faulty because it lights up.
Answer
You will usually find that a USB mass storage device is recognised properly until you plug in another mass storage device. Then neither device is recognised. This kind of problem is usually due to messed-up device drivers.
Sometimes the problem may be a hardware issue with that particular device.
If you have access to one, the first action you should take is to find out if the drive is recognised and works properly in another PC, because it is odd that Windows can recognise the drive after you have jiggled it in the USB port. That may be due to a damaged contact on the drive making only an intermittent connection.
Sometimes the device is recognised properly in Device Manager, but doesn't appear in Windows Explorer. The most common cause of this is a conflict with a mapped network drive letter. If your PC isn't part of a network then the following information is not relevant to your case.
When Windows creates a mapped network drive, its files can be shared by the workstations on a network. When Windows allocates drive letters to removable devices, such as USB drives, it doesn't check to find out if the drive letter is already in use for a mapped network drive. So if you map a drive letter to a remote network drive, choose one at the end of the alphabet so that there are many unused drive letters between the mapped network drives and your hard drives and CD drives. Allocate letters such as U, V, W, X, Y and Z to mapped network drives.
External USB hubs can be the cause of problems, so, if possible should not be used for mass storage devices such as external hard disks and flash drives. If you use an external hub, if it has its own power supply, use it, because The USB port from the PC might not be able to provide sufficient power for devices connected to the hub.
You should have the latest USB drivers installed for your USB devices. They can be downloaded from the device manufacturer's site.
Windows XP originally came without built-in support for USB 2.0, so, in order to be able to use it at least Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1) should be installed. You should have the latest service pack, which is currently Service Pack 2 (SP2), and updates installed. Windows XP SP2 provides some important USB fixes. If you have Windows XP up to date, you should also have the latest drivers for your motherboard's chipset installed. Note well that if you haven't installed XP SP1, installing certain chipset drivers before installing SP1 is a known cause of problems. Also note that SP2 incorporates SP1, so you don't have to install SP1 before installing SP2, just install SP2.
When you upgrade Windows drivers through Microsoft Update, it will not replace the device drivers for brand-name devices. This may cause problems if you have installed USB 2.0 drivers that device manufacturers may have provided before the official Microsoft USB 2.0 drivers were made available.
If the flash drive works properly in another PC, you should clear the USB drivers in your PC. To do that, remove all of the USB devices listed in the Device Manager, disconnect all of USB devices, and reboot. To make sure that all of USB drivers have been removed, you need to remove the hidden USB devices in the Device Manager.
To do that you have to set the Device Manager up to show all hidden devices and details of devices that are installed but which are not currently attached to the computer. It is not sufficient just to open the Device Manager, open its View menu and enable Show Hidden Devices.
Open a command prompt window by entering cmd in the Start => Run box and enter the following commands exactly as they are written. Press the Enter key after entering each line:
set DEVMGR_SHOW_DETAILS=1
set DEVMGR_SHOW_NONPRESENT_DEVICES=1
start devmgmt.msc
This sets up and opens the Device Manager. Click the View menu item and choose Show Hidden Devices to see the entries for the devices that have been installed before but which are not currently connected. These will appear as faded grey icons compared to the other icons for devices that are installed.
Double-click on each of the entries for Disk drives, Other devices, and Universal Serial Bus (USB) controllers, right click on any icon that is greyed-out, and choose Uninstall from the menu. For example, under Universal Serial Bus controllers, there may be several greyed-out entries called USB Mass Storage Device. These should all be removed.
Next, open the Registry Editor by entering regedit in the Start => Run box.
Note well that before you make changes to the Registry, you should always create a restore point in System Restore under All Programs => Accessories => System Tools so that you can recover the system from Safe Mode should you erroneously remove entries that prevent Windows from booting.
By clicking on the + signs beside each name, navigate to Hkey_Local_Machine => System => CurrentControlSet => Enum => USB and remove Registry entries that refer to vendor ID (VID). You remove an entry in the Registry by right clicking on it with the mouse pointer on the entry and then you click on Delete in the menu that comes up. The entries that are required will be redetected when Windows restarts and you connect your USB devices. Note well that if you use a USB keyboard or mouse, don't remove the VID entries for them, because doing so could prevent Windows from starting properly.
If you can't delete a key, you may need to change its permissions by right-clicking on it and choosing Permissions. Select Everyone and then select Full Control in the Permissions section. Click Apply and then OK.
When you reboot the computer, your USB devices should be recognised correctly.
USB flash drive recognised but doesn't show up in My Computer
Problem
When I plug in my USB flash drive, I hear the short musical sound that Windows XP Home makes when it detects and installs a USB device, but no drive appears in My Computer. The same USB flash drive appears as it should in another computer running the same version of Windows. I also have Windows XP Pro installed on the problematic PC. When I boot into it, the drive is installed properly. I have tried going into Device Manager and deleting the USB drivers, making them reinstall themselves when the computer reboots, but it didn't work.
Answer
1. - Enter diskmgmt.msc in the Start => Run box to bring up Disk Management.
The top half of the window should show whatever drives are connected to your system. In the bottom half of the window, you should see a list of drives (Disk 0, Disk 1, CD-ROM 0, etc.). One of those drives should be the USB drive.
2. - Under the Volume heading in the top section, click on the USB flash drive with the right mouse button.
3. - Select Change Drive Letters and Paths... from the menu that presents itself.
4. - Click the Change... button and select a new drive letter.
The USB flash drive is probably attempting to use a drive letter that is already in use by another drive, such the DVD-ROM drive. Therefore, the system can't access the data, because when you click on the drive letter it shows you the DVD drive and not the USB drive.
5. - Choose a drive letter from the drop-down box. You can pick any letter you want, but using drive letter U (for USB) is a good idea because it is near the end of the alphabet and you'll know which letter to look for.
6. - A pop-up box should appear warning you that "Changing the drive letter of a volume might cause programs to no longer run. Are you sure you want to change this drive letter?" Click Yes and the drive letter will change to the one you selected.
Note that changing the drive letter would only be a problem if you made Windows install programs on the flash drive, because it would look for them on the drive that it installed them on.
7. - Open My Computer and double-click on the new drive letter and you should be able to see the files on the drive.
Every time you plug in the flash drive it should show up as the same drive letter. In a dual-boot system (with more than one operating system installed), you would have to make the same changes when booted into the other operating system if you wanted to use the same drive letter when using it. This method can be used with any computer that you plug the USB drive into if you want it to use the same drive letter.
Note that the flash drive installed properly when you booted another computer with the drive already plugged into it, because, during startup, Windows automatically chooses new drive letters for all of the drives and so doesn't get confused.
Windows XP - USB 2.0 memory stick - unrecognised device
Problem
I have purchased a USB 2.0 memory stick so that I can transfer files between several computers that run Windows XP without having to network them. However, when the stick is plugged into a computer running Windows XP Pro, it reports an unrecognised device. But when the settings in the BIOS setup program are changed from USB 1.1 + USB 2.0 to just USB 1.1, the stick works but very slowly. I have checked in the Device Manager to make sure that a USB 2.0 Enhanced Host Controller is present to show that USB 2.0 is installed.
Answer
A USB 2.0 memory stick, also known as a Flash Drive or Micro Vault, will function very slowly no matter which type of USB connection is used. These finger drives are naturally very slow devices. You should disable any Legacy USB setting in the BIOS and, if possible, flash it with the latest update.
Using a USB flash drive causes a USB card reader to fail
Problem
You are using Windows 98 SE, which doesn't have the driver for a Flying Drive USB flash drive, so you had to install its driver file in order to use the drive. The flash drive worked, but when you tried to use a USB card reader, it failed to work. You removed the software for the flash drive, but when you tried to use the card reader, Windows wouldn't load if the card reader was connected to a USB port prior to booting. If you hotplugged the drive after Windows was loaded, a blue screen of death (BSOD) came up, identifying the fault as: 0028:C15BDCF7 in VXD APIX(01). The information contained in both of the error messages don't contain anything that might help to solve the problem. You have unsuccessfully searched the Windows Registry for entries referring to the flash drive by entering regedit in the Start => Run box, and have removed and reinstalled the card reader's software to no avail. However, strangely, all of your other USB devices - a printer, modem, and scanner - work normally.
Answer
Luckily, you could see immediately that installing the flash drive caused the problem with the card reader. If you had installed the flash drive before the card reader, diagnosing the problem might have been much more difficult.
It looks as if the USB flash drive (also known as a thumb drive, a USB memory stick, etc.), installed an incompatible version of the Apix.vxd driver file - a virtualisation protected-mode driver, which all have the extension .vxd.
Apix.vxd is part of the Advanced SCSI Programming Interface (ASPI) layer device drivers, which were originally developed by Adaptec for SCSI devices. However, Apix.vxd is also needed for virtual drives such as USB flash drives and USB card readers. ATAPI devices such as CD writers also use it.
Windows comes with a Microsoft version of the file, however, many devices require an Adaptec version. Unfortunately, other devices have problems with earlier Adaptec versions of the file, which are, for instance, installed by older versions of the Roxio EZ-CD Creator software.
The ASPI layer consists of these files: Apix.vxd, Aspienum.vxd, Winaspi.dll, Winaspi32.dll, Aspi32.sys, and Wowpost.exe. If they are present in the system, which they don't have to be, all of these files should have matching versions.
You can enter sfc in the Start => Run box to run the System File Checker to find out if the original Windows version of the Apix.vxd file has been replaced by another version.
Or use Start => Find => Files or Folders to locate the Apix.vxd file, right-click on it and click Properties. Under the Version tab, you'll see the manufacturer and version number listed. The first edition of Windows 98 came with an Apix.vxd file dated 11 May 1998 and version number 4.10.1998, but strangely, Windows 98 SE came with a version dated 23 April 1999 and with a version number of 4.00.952. Although it's a lower number, it is the correct version.
Adaptec Apix.vxd files have version numbers such as 4.57, 4.60, and 4.70. Versions 4.57 and 4.60 are known to cause problems, so, if your system is using the Adaptec files, installing the latest versions of all of the ASPI layer files from http://www.adaptec.com should fix any incompatibilities.
A new USB 2.0 adapter card makes my computer crash: a problem with IRQ sharing
Problem
My computer, which has an AMD Duron 1.2GHz processor and 256MB of PC133 RAM, runs Windows 98 SE. In order to be able to use USB 2.0 devices, I bought and installed an Innovision Extreme IO Hi-Speed USB2 PCI Host Controller Card (which comes with the Windows 98 device drivers) in a free PCI slot on the motherboard. But when I tested the card by connecting a digital camera to it, which is USB 1.1 device, the computer crashed and produced the following error message:
"An exception OE has occurred at 0028:C00140DB in VxD VMM(01) + 000130DB. This was called from 0028:C18514CF in VxD PPP MAC(04) + 0001A1CF. It may be possible to continue normally."
Pressing any key made the computer reboot. I then tried a USB 1.1 scanner, which worked, so I tried the digital camera again. It worked for a while but then the system crashed and produced the same error message.
Answer
In Windows 98, this kind of error message is almost always the result of a problem with sharing interrupt request (IRQ) lines.
An IRQ line is one of many electronic circuits that connects peripheral devices to the processor. For example, when a PCI network adapter card needs to send data to the processor, it sends its request to the processor via its assigned IRQ line. To process the data, the processor then stops what it was doing momentarily and runs the assigned interrupt handler, which is part of the network card's software device driver.
There are a limited number of IRQ lines available for use. In Windows 98, only IRQ lines 3, 5, 9, 10, and 11 (of the sixteen lines numbered from 0 to 15) are available for general use. There are 23 IRQ lines available to Windows 2000 and Windows XP if the system has an APIC mode setting in its BIOS. Click here! to read more about this on the BIOS page of this site.
Apart from the IRQ lines reserved for the use of the essential devices such as PS/2 mouse and PS/2 keyboard, and IDE hard disk drive(s), a typical computer requires IRQ lines for the USB Controller video, sound, network cards, and modem. In short, there are usually more peripheral devices than there are IRQ lines to handle their requests, so a system called IRQ sharing was developed that allows several devices that use the PCI bus to share a single IRQ line.
In theory this arrangement would work perfectly if the device drivers were properly programmed, which, as might have been expected, is not always the case. Windows 95 disables IRQ sharing by default, but Windows 98 has the feature enabled by default. If the drivers for a device haven't been written properly to be able to handle IRQ sharing, there can be problems with getting the device accepted by the system.
Some types of device drivers, especially network interface card (NIC) drivers, do not take well to sharing an IRQ line, and can therefore cause the kind of crashes and error messages that you've experienced. Virtual memory is the swap file that Windows creates on the hard disk drive to swap data in and out of RAM memory from. An exception OE is an error produced by the Virtual Memory Manager (VMM), and IRQ sharing is an extension of the virtual memory management. The 0028 in an error message is used to indicate virtual memory and IRQ sharing errors, and can also be reported if the RAM memory itself is faulty.
It's clear that the problem was caused by adding a PCI card to the system - nothing else. To fix it requires either installing updated device drivers that do so, which will probably not be possible, because no further development of drivers is taking place for Windows 98 - or changing the IRQ assignments so that each of the conflicting devices has its own IRQ line.
To achieve the latter choice of fix, you have to find out which devices are using the IRQ lines. In Windows 98, Open the Device Manager by using the right mouse button to click on My Computer => Properties. Double-click Computer at the top of the list and you will be presented with a list of the system's IRQ assignments.
Ignore entries called IRQ Holder for PCI Steering, which Windows 98 shows there when IRQ sharing is enabled. Each category of device that uses the PCI bus will have an IRQ Holder for PCI Steering entry assigned to it.
If you aren't using the two serial COM ports, disabling them in the BIOS frees up IRQ 3 and IRQ 4. Some video cards don't require an IRQ assigned to them, so, if the system's video card appears in the list, you can try disabling its IRQ assignment in the BIOS to free up its IRQ line. The setting is usually called Assign IRQ for VGA, and it appears on the PNP/PCI Configuration page of the BIOS. If the system produces display problems afterwards, just reboot and enter the BIOS at start-up and re-enable the setting. If you use a USB mouse, you can disable the PS/2 mouse setting in the Integrated Peripherals page of the BIOS to make IRQ 12 device-free.
When you have freed the unused IRQ lines, you turn off IRQ sharing in the Device Manager, and enable a setting in the BIOS that allocates a separate IRQ line to each of the peripheral devices when the system is rebooted, but this, of course, must only be done if the number of free IRQ lines equals or exceeds the number of devices that require them.
To disable IRQ sharing, open the Device Manager and click System devices => PCI bus. Double-click on PCI bus and click on the IRQ Steering tab. Uncheck the box that has Use IRQ Steering beside it and reboot.
When the system reboots, press the key that runs the BIOS setup program and open the page that is usually called PNP/PCI Configuration and enable the setting called Reset Configuration Data or Reset ECSD. This makes the BIOS re-direct all of the hardware devices and assign new IRQ lines to them. Windows can change these values if it needs to, but it tends to retain the assignments made by the BIOS.
If there are too many devices that require an IRQ of their own, you will have to share some IRQ lines. Usually, the best way to achieve this is to try installing the affected cards in different PCI slots on the motherboard.
Note that, if possible, it's advisable to avoid having a PCI network adapter (NIC) card and the PCI USB Controller adapter card share an IRQ.
Each motherboard has its own method of assigning IRQ lines to PCI devices. Often PCI slot slot 1 shares the same IRQ line as the AGP card that is in the AGP slot next to it, or PCI slot 2 or slot 4 (the PCI slot furthest from the AGP slot) shares an IRQ line with the onboard USB adapter, which your motherboard has, but which only has USB 1.1 ports, hence the reason for buying a PCI USB 2.0 adapter card for USB 2.0 devices.
Find out if the information about which slots share IRQs is provided by the motherboard's manual, which can usually be download from its manufacturer's site if you don't have it, or experiment by moving the adapter cards to different slots.
To protect them from static electricity, before touching sensitive electronic components, remember to earth yourself by touching the computer's case with the plug in the mains socket and the computer switched off. You have to enable the Reset Configuration Data setting in the BIOS every time you move a PCI card to a different slot, because the setting only works once (it disables itself every time it is used).
The Q&A called How things can go wrong with a USB device: an IRQ conflict on Page 1 also deals with an IRQ-conflict problem.
"Performance of FireWire devices may decrease after you install Windows XP Service Pack 2"
After you update a computer to Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), the performance of a 1394a (FireWire 400) or 1394b (FireWire 800) device, such as a digital camera that uses S400 speed, may be greatly decreased.
There is an update available from this MS Knowledge Base article - http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=885222 - that should fix the problem.
How do you format a USB flash drive under Windows XP?
Problem
During a new install of Windows XP Pro, I deleted all partitions seen in the WinXP partition manager, which unfortunately included my 128MB USB flash drive that was left plugged in. The problem is now I have a flash drive that WinXP cannot format. FDISK, of course does not work with WinXP. If I try to format the flash drive using WinXP, I get the message "Windows was unable to complete the format". WinXP sees the drive as FAT32 with an unknown capacity. Why Microsoft decided to make the WinXP partition manager only accessible on a new installation and to do away with FDISK is beyond me.
Answer
Who told you that you can only partition and format drive with a new installation? You can partition and format hard drives at any time by using the partitioning and formatting utility that is made available from the Windows XP CD, or you can enter diskmgmt.msc (the quickest way) in the Start => Run box to bring up the Disk Management window and format hard drives and flash drives. USB device drivers are not usually installed until Windows boots fully, and the device has to be running before it can be accessed, so you should use Disk Management to partition and format a flash drive. USB devices can be plugged in while the computer is running. Windows detects the device and installs the drivers.
Here is what XP's Help and Support says about Disk Management:
Using Disk Management
"You might need to have a computer administrator account to perform some tasks. Disk Management is a system utility for managing hard disks and the partitions or volumes they contain. With Disk Management, you can initialize new disks, create volumes, and format volumes with the FAT, FAT32, or NTFS file systems. Disk Management enables you to perform most disk-related tasks without shutting down your computer; most configuration changes take effect immediately. To open Disk Management Open Computer Management (Local). In the console tree, click Disk Management. To open Computer Management, click Start, and then click Control Panel. Double-click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Computer Management. For information about using Disk Management, in Computer Management, click Help on the Action menu."
In Disk Management, the drives and partitions are represented by rectangles, starting with Disk 0, Disk 1, etc. The CD/DVD drives installed are also shown.
Here is what Help and Support says about using it: "Disk Management is easy to use. Menus that are accessible from the right mouse button display the tasks you can perform on the selected object, and wizards guide you through creating partitions or volumes and initializing or converting disks."
That means that you right-click each rectangle that represents a drive or partition on a drive with the mouse to access the available features, such as creating partitions and formatting them. Note that you cannot resize partitions, you can only create them if the disk space is available, or delete them. If you delete a partition all the data will be lost. You need to use a third-party partitioning utility, such as Symantec's PartitionMagic, to resize partitions without destroying the data.
Is it OK to run a program (an .exe file) from an external USB hard drive running from a Windows XP system?
Question
Is it OK to run a program (an .exe file) from an external USB hard disk drive? I've read some reports that say that it's fine to do that while other reports don't recommend it.
Answer
It depends on the executable .exe file. If it's a standalone file that doesn't have or need supporting files, such as a .dll files, etc., then it can be executed safely. Many .exe files require companion .dll files in order to run, so you would have to have the supporting files installed with the .exe file.
Remember that the Windows Registry retains information on where a particular .exe file was run from, and would expect the file and its supporting files to be located on the drive letter that the external USB hard drive was allocated. Moving the .exe file to another drive - even though it is a standalone file that requires no supporting files - would probably confuse Windows.
True standalone .exe files are fine. There are a great number of such files made for, say, flash drives. They are self-sufficient and don't require companion files. I have over fifty favourite standalone .exe files on a flash drive. The drive letter the flash drive is allocated by Windows differs on nearly every computer that I plug it into, but the files all run properly.
In fact, it is possible to run entire portable application programs from a flash drive. You can use them to work from any computer that has a USB port, save the files to your own application programs on the flash drive, and then save any documents you create to your main computer. At http://johnhaller.com/jh/ you can download portable flash-drive versions of many office and multimedia applications - email clients, browsers, Open Office, Winamp, FTP programs, HTML editors, Instant Message (IM) programs, and personal management calendars are available. With the new U3 standard - visit this page for information on it - http://www.everythingusb.com/u3.html - it is even easier to use a flash drive as a portable computer. Suitable software can be found here - http://software.u3.com/ - much of which is free.
It is also possible to boot some versions of Linux from a flash drive.
HowTo: Linux bootable USB key - http://openfacts.berlios.de/index-en.phtml?title=Linux_bootable_USB_key_HOWTO. More information can be found via this customised Google search: http://www.google.com/search?q=linux+bootable+usb.
Booting a system rescue setup from a USB flash drive
As yet it is not possible to boot a full version of Windows from a USB flash drive. However, if you have a flash drive that is bootable (some but not all of them are), it is possible to boot to a recovery system - a 'preinstalled environment', such as BartPE - from one. You can add all kinds utilities to it that are able to diagnose hardware problems and/or aid in the recovery of a system. The following articles tell you exactly how to do it, including how to format a bootable flash drive. Note that not all motherboard BIOS setup programs, especially the older ones, support booting from the USB interface. If the BIOS doesn't support it, then you can't use a USB drive of any kind to boot the system, but if it is supported, the option to enable such a system boot exists in the BIOS. However, even though the BIOS supports booting from a USB drive, there may be other incompatibilities that prevent it from being possible. The following article goes into the details in depth.
XP On Your Thumb Drive - http://www.informationweek.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=177102101
If you find the option to print the second Information Week article, you are provided with it on a single page that you can save to read instead of having to visit several pages.
Click here! to go to information on USB flash drives on this site.
I can't use my USB mouse and keyboard in Safe Mode in Windows XP
Problem
I got a new wireless USB keyboard and mouse and all is working fine. A few weeks later I needed to start my Windows XP Pro in Safe Mode, which requires you to press the F8 key during startup, but I wasn't able to do that. I had to switch to my wired keyboard to be able to go into Safe Mode via F8. Any idea about a workaround for this problem?
Answer
Your motherboard's chipset has to support what are known as USB legacy devices, and the settings for the mouse and keyboard have to be enabled.
The device drivers for USB devices are not loaded when you press the F8 key, so the BIOS setup program has to install them so that they can be used when you press the F8 key.
The settings are located in Integrated Peripherals section of your PC's BIOS setup program, unless your PC is too old to have a BIOS with that feature.
If you have a manual for your PC's motherboard, its BIOS section will explain the settings. If you don't have a manual, identify the make and model of the motherboard and download a copy of the manual in the PDF format from its manufacturer's site. You need the free Acrobat Reader to read it. You can use the free CPU-Z utility to identify a motherboard from within Windows.
If the latest available BIOS update for your PC's motherboard does not support USB before Windows loads, you can't use USB keyboard or mouse at that level.
External CD/DVD drive won't work: My PC only boots into Safe mode so I can't save files to an external USB CD writer
Problem
My PC runs Windows 98 SE. It will only boot into Safe mode and shows vertical lines on the screen. I think that it's on the way out, so I want to copy my many files to CD-R discs on my external USB Iomega CD-RW drive and then transfer them to my other computer. The problem is that I can't access the USB CD-RW drive from Safe mode. Is there a way out of this situation?
Answer
You need Windows to be running in order to be able to access USB devices, because the device drivers have to be loaded before they can function, and they aren't loaded by Safe mode. Therefore, backups made to an external USB device are not usually of much use when Windows isn't working. However, there are several possible ways to solve your problem.
I take it that the PC has a standard internal CD/DVD drive installed. Reinstalling Windows 98 SE over itself without formatting the C: drive first is the first option you should try to get Windows itself operating in normal mode. The file structure and data files will be preserved, but all of the programs will have to be reinstalled because Windows installs a new Registry that has no knowledge of them and therefore can use them. To do that, if the PC's BIOS supports booting from a CD drive, you can set it as the first boot drive, boot from the Windows installation CD, and follow the setup procedure that unfolds automatically.
If attempting that didn't solve the problem, check the motherboard's BIOS setup program to find out if it supports a "Boot from USB" setting for a CD drive. The settings for the CD-ROM drive boot priority (which includes CD and DVD drives) are usually on the second page of the BIOS, which is usually called something like Advanced BIOS Features. The older the computer, the less likely you are to find the required setting. If the option is there, you can enable it and then try booting from the external USB drive with the Windows 98 SE installation CD in it. If the PC supports booting from a CD, the Windows 98 SE is a bootable CD.
If the "Boot from USB" option is there, but won't work with your CD-RW drive, consider using a cheap USB flash drive. For under £20 you can buy one that can hold an operating system such as Puppy Linux from http://www.puppyos.com/, which can be used to boot the system.
Google search:
http://www.google.com/search?q=dos+win98+boot+flash+thumb+drive
Solving USB Boot Problems -
http://www.informationweek.com/shared/printableArticle.jhtml?articleID=28700158
If you can get the external USB CD writer to boot from a CD, you can also make use of a version of Linux that runs from a CD to rescue your files. You have to download an .iso file and burn it to a CD by making use of CD-burning software, such as Nero Express, which comes with many CD/DVD writers. Puppy Linux will allow you use the USB CD-RW drive, copy files, make backups, etc. Click here! to go to information on this site on this subject.
If you can't get the external USB drive working directly, you can use a normal MS DOS boot floppy disk with USB drivers and access the drive via Windows 98's inbuilt MS DOS. Trial-and-error can be involved in finding drivers that work with each make and model of CD drive.
The following Google searches should provide you with links to suitable information:
http://www.google.com/search?q=usb+from+dos
http://www.google.com/search?q=dos+drivers+cd+cdr
When you have an MS DOS boot disk with USB drivers that works, if you are familiar with them, you then can use the MS DOS Copy commands to rescue your files. At a DOS command prompt, entering copy /? provides you with options that are available with the Copy command.
Using external drives for backups is not advisable because any backup that depends on a particular hardware and software setup leaves you vulnerable when it doesn't work or can't be accessed. For that reason, a backup image is a much better option, because it can be created on or restored to almost any Windows computer.
Using a BartPE boot CD to access an external CD/DVD USB drive
Using a BartPE CD that you can create on a Windows XP system provides a bootable Windows XP system that supports USB devices.
Read How to create a boot (startup) CD for Windows XP on this site for that information.
Including a CD-burning program such as Nero Express would allow you to burn files to CD. You can also add a program such as Ghost32 to the BartPE CD and use it to create an image file of the system.
While the BartPE system doesn't natively support FireWire devices, an external drive with both USB and FireWire support will be seen by BartPE as a USB device, even when plugged into the FireWire port.
USB printer problem: "USB Device Not Recognized"
Problem
"I have a USB printer (HP1020) that doesn't work properly in WinXP. At first I had WinXP Service Pack 2 and when I connected my printer into USB port, I got the message "USB Device Not Recognized", then after several tries and connecting it into different USB ports, at last I got the message "New Hardware Found" and I could install the printer's driver, and it sometimes worked, but sometimes didn't work at all.
"Then I searched on the Internet for a solution to my problem. I found that lots of people have asked the same problem from different professionals, but nobody could give them a good solution. I found that some of these people say they have WinXP SP2, so I thought maybe the problem is with my Windows version, so I formatted my HDD and installed a new version of WinXP Media Center. I could set up my printer's driver properly, but the printer doesn't work at all now. I know that the problem is not with my printer and with its cable, because the printer is new and it sometimes worked, and also because when I connect it to USB ports the computer found that something is connected. I also know that my USB ports are OK, because I tried a flash memory [USB flash drive] on all of them and all worked OK (except the front USB ports). Now, what can I do to make my printer work properly?
"My computer is a Pentium 4 3.0 GHz. Mainboard: MSI 915PL Neo-V. And when I go to Control Panel -> Printers and Faxes -> r.c. HP 1020 -> Properties -> Ports, it shows that this printer is connected to "USB virtual port for printer". When I go to Device Manager, it shows no USB virtual port for printer. When I went to Device Manger in my previous windows version (SP2), it showed a printer USB between USB ports. Now what can I do to make my printer work?"
Answer
This problem was solved by the man himself.
"I found the solution. The problem was with the USB cable. I replaced the cable, and the problem was gone."
How can I turn off the AutoPlay list of options that comes up when I insert a CD or DVD or install a USB flash drive?
Question
My computer is running Windows XP. Every time I insert a CD or DVD or install a USB flash drive it presents a list of options, including Open folder to view files and Edit pictures. I want to do my own thing, so is there any way to turn off this list, or modify it so that it has options that I can use.
Answer
This feature is called AutoPlay. You can use Microsoft's TweakUI utility to turn it off.
Visit this page to obtain TweakUI for Windows XP, which is part of the PowerToys:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/powertoys/xppowertoys.mspx
Click the + beside the My Computer category in TweakUI, and then click the + beside AutoPlay. Select the Types category. It presents the enabled options, which are Enable AutoPlay for CD and DVD drives and Enable AutoPlay for removable drives [USB flash drives, etc.) Remove the check marks in their boxes to disable AutoPlay for those types of drives.
To modify what each option does on the AutoPlay list, or remove and entry, select the Handlers category.
If you want a specific AutoPlay option to be selected automatically, the setting for each device has to be set individually by clicking on the entry for the device (e.g., a DVD drive) with the right mouse button in My Computer, and then clicking Properties. The settings are under the AutoPlay tab.
You can choose the listed options to set for a number of categories of files, such as Music files, DVD movie, Music CD, etc.
Note that you may have to activate the Removable Storage service in order to make the changes stick.
To do that follow this clicking path: Start => All Programs => Administrative Tools => Component Services => Services (Local). In the right window, scroll down to Removable Storage. Double-click on it. Under Startup type, you can choose the Manual or the Automatic option. Choose the latter option.
Will a Hi-Speed USB 2.0 external hard disk drive work with my old USB 1.1 computer?
Question
My ageing self-built computer runs Windows 98 SE, has a 500MHz Pentium 3 processor, and has USB 1.1 ports on the motherboard. The 12GB hard disk drive is running short of space. I intend to upgrade all of the hardware when Windows Vista becomes available, but in the mean time I would like to buy an external USB hard drive, but the are all listed as using Hi-Speed USB 2.0. Will I be able to use one of them on my PC?
Answer
The USB 2.0 standard is fully backward-compatible with the USB 1.1 standard, so you can use any Hi-Speed (USB 2.0) external hard drive with your computer. However, the USB 1.1 standard can only transfer data at a maximum speed of 12Mbit/s (12 megabits per second), which is slow if you want to copy a large number of files or large files to the drive. With the USB 2.0 standard, the maximum data transfer rate is 480Mbit/s. If your computer has a spare PCI slot on its motherboard and you want to use USB 2.0 with the drive, all you have to do is purchase a PCI USB 2.0 adapter card for about £10/$20 that can add two or four USB 2.0 ports to it. The card will come with its own device drivers.
You can enter a search term, such as pci + usb2 + adapter, as is, in the Google search box at the top of this page (with its Web radio button enabled) to find local vendors.
I can't get my external Creative USB Audigy 2 ZS sound card to work on my notebook computer
Problem
My Acer Ferrari 4005 WLMi notebook computer, bought in late 2005, runs Windows XP Home Edition, but I can't get it to work with a Creative USB Audigy 2 ZS sound card. The installation routine detects the card and attempts to install the drivers, but after a reboot it is not recognised. A message saying A USB device attached to the computer has malfunctioned. When I click the bubble containing the message, a list of USB devices is shown, with Unknown Device in bold type, which I take to be the sound card. If I enter the Device Manager while the card is connected there is a USB Composite Device that has a yellow triangle that contains an exclamation mark next to it. When I right click with the mouse on the entry and then click Properties in the menu that comes up, it says: Code 10: The device is unable to start. Interestingly, the sound card works perfectly on my desktop PC. I have tried plugging the device into each of the four USB 2.0 ports on the motherboard, and installing the latest drivers for the card from the Creative.com site. Any ideas on how to resolve this problem?
Answer
USB is fine for connecting mice, keyboards, and printers, but USB sound cards push the USB 2.0 standard to its limits; a standard that has, in any case, always been somewhat temperamental. This is especially the case when using it for demanding peripherals. USB 2.0 has improved the situation somewhat, but, even with it, there are still far too many issues involving device driver and motherboard chipset incompatibilities.
The Acer Ferrari 4005 WLMi laptop uses an ATI Radeon Mobility Xpress 200P chipset, which is well known for its weak USB implementation. It has been found to be very slow at USB data transfers and uses about double the normal amount of processor usage. Other USB chipsets are about twice as fast. Indeed, some of the manufacturers of motherboards that originally used this chipset have replaced it with one made by another manufacturer. Since the USB standard itself can have difficulty working with demanding peripheral devices, combining that characteristic with a problematic chipset certainly won't produce fewer problems.
I would start by downloading the latest BIOS file for your computer from the Acer website in order to use it to reflash the BIOS, or make use of any Live BIOS Update feature, the software for which has to be installed. It will also be made available from the Acer site for that model of notebook. You should also obtain and install the latest motherboard chipset and USB drivers, which can be obtained from http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers. If you haven't installed Service Pack 2 (SP2) for Windows XP, you should install it, because it contains an important USB fix.
If none of those measures allow you to use the sound card, it is unlikely that you'll be able to get a USB sound device to work with that laptop. However, you could buy a USB 2.0 PC card for laptops that will come with its own drivers, which will probably solve your problem.
Solving USB problems with Hewlett Packard peripheral devices - printers and MFPs
Problem
My computer runs Windows XP Professional edition, and I am experiencing frustrating problems with my HP PSC 950 multifunction peripheral (MFP) device. The USB printer functions properly on a computer running Windows Me, but can only print one sheet when connected to a Windows XP Professional computer, and when I try to print two copies of a page, the printing continues until it is half way through the second copy, and then the printer comes to a halt. The printer icon in the System Tray changes, and a warning comes up saying: "There is an error. The printer has been turned off", but the printer is switched on. The printer can then only print again if the system is rebooted.
I have installed all of the service packs and all of the sundry patches for Windows XP Pro. HP has a driver update that is supposed to deal with this very problem, which you have installed, but it didn't solve the problem.
Possible solutions
The cause of problems between a computer and USB printers are often difficult to diagnose and put right.
The more recent HP printers have a tendency to suffer from this kind of problem. HP has tried to pin the blame on the USB support provided by motherboards, which is partially true, because the USB standard has not been very well defined or implemented, and several motherboard chipsets have not implemented the standard well enough. However, this does not explain why HP MFPs seem to suffer from more such trouble than other USB devices.
Below is a list of the actions you can take to remedy the situation. Try applying them one at a time in the order that matches your particular situation.
1. - Make sure that you have installed all of the updates for the version of Windows being used. Use Microsoft Update.
Make sure that the printer is using the latest printer drivers. HP says that it is important to remove the previous drivers completely before installing the new ones. You are advised to disconnect the MFP and uninstall the driver software according to the instructions in an HP document called Uninstalling the HP All-in-One Software (document bpu01843 from http://www.hp.com/). Note that some drivers have to be removed by running a special software cleanup utility, so make sure that you use it if one is listed as a requirement for your printer.
Even if no driver update is available, problems can often be sorted out by uninstalling and then reinstalling the HP device drivers, which you would do via Printers in the Control Panel. Problems can also occur when Windows is upgraded. HP recommends uninstalling HP drivers before you upgrade Windows, or even install Service Packs.
2. - The USB standard allows for a cable up to 5 metres in length, but some USB Controllers won't work with cables more than 2 metres long, so, if you are using a long cable, try using a shorter one.
3. - You should not connect a printer to the USB ports that are built into a USB keyboard, or to a USB hub that is unpowered. If you are using an unpowered USB hub (that draws its power through the computer), try using a USB hub that has its own power supply.
4. - If you have plugged the device into a USB port on the front of the computer's case, try using a port that is built into the motherboard instead.
5. - Try disconnecting all other USB devices (a scanner, a camera, an external hard drive, etc., but not the keyboard or mouse), and if the MFP works on its own, reconnect the other USB devices one at a time. You can try hotplugging the device while the computer is on, and if that doesn't work have the device connected and then reboot the system, because some USB devices like to have the driver loaded by Windows at startup and don't like being hotplugged. If the MFP stops working after you have connected a particular device (if necessary in both of those ways), you should try purchasing a self-powered USB hub, or consider uninstalling the software that runs that particular device.
6. - Check the website of your motherboard manufacturer for a BIOS update for the make and model (or revision) of motherboard, and install it. This action is of particular importance if your motherboard has some of the earlier SiS and AMD chipsets for the AMD Athlon processors. Microsoft Update for Windows XP usually includes chipset and other driver updates, but often the motherboard's site has the latest updates, which should also be downloaded and installed. Users with motherboards with VIA Controllers should install the latest VIA Hyperion "4-in-1" drivers, and install the USB Filter patch from http://www.viaarena.com/. This patch is supposed to solve problems that occur when transferring large amounts of data.
HP has stated that BIOS setup options that change RAM timings can cause USB problems, so, if your motherboard has a VIA chipset and its BIOS has a setting called Chip Performance Speed or System Performance, try setting it to Normal instead of Strong, Turbo, Optimal, or Fast.
7. - Power management issues can be the cause of the printer not being recognised by Windows, because it turns off the power to USB devices when they are inactive for a certain period of time. In Windows XP, open the Device Manager and locate the USB Root Hub, which is under the USB Controllers entry. Right-click on it and select Properties. Click the Power Management tab and remove the checkmark from the option called: Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power.
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