Flash Drive hangs

[SmoothTofu]

Hi, I have a problem with my Kingston Datatraveler 2 GB flash drive.

It only started happening about a week ago, but when I plug in the flash drive everything begins to hang once I open the flash drive through my computer or other means. Nothing goes wrong before that, but a second after I open the drive to see the files inside my entire explorer hangs for about 1-2 minutes. During that time, the drive just blinks its green light showing that it's working with data.

Everything outside of explorer still works fine, but things like the taskbar and commands using the windows key just bring up the unresponsive process dialog box. Also, this problem only happens with this laptop, and other computer I've plugged it into had no problems with it.

[Metamorphical]

What have you installed recently? Maybe something is interfering with the drive...

[SmoothTofu]

Woah, fast reply =P But not sure that i've installed much recently, or anything that could cause interference..??

[Charr]

Maybe driver updates? A lot of different things could cause these problems.

[SmoothTofu]

Has anyone else every experienced this problem? 'Cause when I google it turns up no results =(

[SmoothTofu]

Ok, appears that I solved my own problem. I had a 750MB file in the flash drive that was the reason that it hung up, so I deleted it and now the flash drive is ok! But my question remains, why would that file (it's an installer for Portal) cause an explorer hang-up, and why did it only occur on my laptop?

[sinstoic]

The files on the flash drive might be affected by viruses. You Anti-Virus software might be hanging up the system.

[Thangka]

I also am having my system hang with insertion of u3 (haven't tried any other type) flash drives.This has happened with both a brand new san disk cruiser 2 GB and Toshiba 4 GB that worked just fine on my desk top. These two are the only ones I have tried as the machine is new to me. I have AVG as virus protection.

System :
Microsoft windows xp home edition version 2002 service pack 2
Dell Inspiron 1501
AMD Athalon 64 X2
Dual-core Processor TK-53
1.59 GHz 896 MB RAM
15.4 inch Wide Screen XGA Display
Memory: 1 GB DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz, 2 Dimm
Video CArd ATI RADEON Xpress1150
HD 160 GB SATA Hard Drive 5400 RPM
combo dvd and rw drives 8x cd/dvd vurner wirh double layer wirte capability
sound card Integrated audio
wireless netweking cards Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini Card 54 Mbps
Anti virus AVG
Warranty Dell Care Premium
System :
Microsoft windows xp home edition version 2002 service pack 2
Dell Inspiron 1501
AMD Athalon 64 X2
Dual-core Processor TK-53
1.59 GHz 896 MB RAM
15.4 inch Wide Screen XGA Display
Memory: 1 GB DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz, 2 Dimm
Video CArd ATI RADEON Xpress1150
HD 160 GB SATA Hard Drive 5400 RPM
combo dvd and rw drives 8x cd/dvd vurner wirh double layer wirte capability
sound card Integrated audio
wireless netweking cards Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini Card 54 Mbps
Anti virus AVG
Warranty Dell Care Premium

[Thangka]

Ha ha!
Some progress!
On my desk top inserted the san disk cruzer mini 2GB ($14.00 today)
I first deleted u3 with u3 unistall (google it)
Then I had a situation
the flash drive was in the usb but the computer did not recognize it and kept asking me to insert it into drive F
I went to control panel, administrative tools,computer management, disk management.
It took me a while, but I finally realized, that there seemed to be two drives of removable media that could be applicable drive Fand Drive H. Refromatting Drive H (fat 32) and deleting Drive F and now it works! I saved a sample file took the flash to my laptop and 1. my laptop didn't crash and 2. sample file there and fully accesible.


Ok when I put the san disk back into desk top renamed itself drive G and went looking for drive F again. deleted drive F and renamed drive G to drive F, now it seems stable as drive f on both machines.

I did read about the crash perhaps happening in the first place because of name of disk drive-overlapping names. So my next experiment will be using a different flash drive and leave u3 on it and just change around drive names TTFN i'll be using a 4GB toshiba 24 bucks (can I shop, or what!)

well that failed

Hey! SmoothTofu do you use a virtual drive (Daemon) by any chance? I do. But I have it on both the lap and the desk. Hmm.
There do seem to be some issues, but nothing about crashes. Maybe it's still something to do with drive letters and Daemon