USB Drive Problems with Vista
- I recently upgraded my HP laptop from XP Pro to Vista Business. Almost everything is working fine. I am having two problems. When I plug in a USB flash drive, or an SD memory card (through the internal reader) it recognizes the device and goes out to search Windows Update for a driver. It finds a driver and begins to install it. It always fails and says "the parameter is incorrect". I have tried all of the solutions I can find so far, but I can't seem to get it working. I did an upgrade install of Vista. I cannot do a clean install without losing all the HP provided software on my machine. I have tried uninstalling all of the USB and memory devices in the device manager. I have tried to install different drivers, manually, for the SD card. I'm out of ideas. Can someone please help me with this?
Answers
I had the same problem with several machines. This is how I resolved it:
Steps to resolve USB Storage Device problem with Vista
1. In the run command (Start menu bar) type "regedit" to bring up the Registry Editor.
2. In Registry Editor, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
3. In the details pane, double-click DevicePath.
4. Add a semi-colon to end of the existing text, and then add the path to %SystemRoot%\System32. The result should be similar to: %SystemRoot%\inf;%SystemRoot%\System32
Do not remove the %SystemRoot%\inf file path from the DevicePath registry entry.
5. Click OK to save the new value, and then close Registry Editor.
6. Delete “INFCACH.1” FROM C:\Windows and C:\Windows\Inf Directories (if it exists)
7. Ensure that there is a copy of the usbstor.inf file in C:\Windows\Inf
If there isn’t – follow the below steps:a) From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory
OR
b) From the problem machine, run Command Prompt ( as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, go to that directory and copy all the files located in that directory to C:\Windows\inf directory
8. Open device manager, uninstall all unknown devices (right click, uninstall) so they all disappear from the list
9. Reboot the computer
10. Plug the device in (the drivers will now install and the device will be usable!)
All Replies
- Have you tried the HP website for Vista drivers for your model laptop?
- I've installed all updates from HP and MS, both.
I am having similar problems
I did an upgrade from Windows XP SP2 to Vista Business
None of my USB devices work now (including my USB Microsoft mouse).
It is now also impossible to go into the registry and edit out the devices so that they are picked up as "new"
I have tried the point the driver search to various location "fix" but this has no effect.
Any solutions ?
Neil
- Have you tried uninstalling the devices in Device manager?
JimR1 wrote: Have you tried uninstalling the devices in Device manager? Yes - the devices appear with the yellow exclamation mark against them - the uninstall process has no effect
- Yes. It was suggested that I uninstall them in safe mode, reboot, and let Windows reinstall them. I've done this before with XP successfully. However, when I tried this with Vista, it imediately reinstalled them even in safe mode and I still have the same problem.
- I am having the exact same problem with all of my USB flash drives -- I've tried a Sandisk Cruzer Profile, several generic flash drives and all with the same result. Every single one of them wants a driver, which it cannot locate either locally or online. What the heck is the deal? My HP has all of the necessary patches from MS and from HP (HP NC8340.) Help!
- I am having USB problems too. I will put in a support ticket tomorrow or somfin and see what happens.
have you tried to install the drivers manually?.When the device manager gives you the option to install drivers manually choose browse and then go to C:windows and make sure that check all subfolders is checked.This has worked for me on an external hard drive plugged in through usb, but I am still getting problems on a new mouse.I keep getting the message
"windows encountered a problem installing the driver software for your device."
anyone got any ideas?
Yep, I've tried that too. No change.
It's strange. I can't read camera memory cards through the built in reader or a USB reader or a PCMCIA reader. I get the same parameter is incorrect error in all of the above. However, I can use a USB floppy, and I can read the camera memory card when I plug the camera into the USB port. All of the above worked on this computer with XP, so this has to be Vista related. Is anyone else getting confused?
Thanks for all the input so far...
I too had the same problem.
I followed the thread on the following forum: "Parameter is incorrect" installing driver for any USB storage device
A solution was posted by darkprojekt.
I had the Netgear SC101 Storage Central software installed (from my XP installation prior to Vista).
I uninstalled the Netgear software and deleted the Netgear SC101 folder to prevent automatic reinstall, and all my USB thumb drives are now working fine
Neil
- That appears to have worked! Thanks!
- I have USB problems, but its with my USB 2.0 HUB. Its been a month since I installed Ultimate and just recently I get BSOD when shutting down. The error says something like BUGCODE USB. I noticed when trying to install the driver, Windows initially sees it as USB 2.0, but then installs the hub as "generic hub". Anyone else having similar issues?
I was having similar problems when running vista ultimate on my PC. My PC has 4 usb ports but all of them do not work until I disable the Enhanced PCI to USB Host Controller in the Device Manager, Vista realizes the devices but they are obviously in “low-speed” mode.
I have tried to disable and renable, uninstall/reinstall but none of this has worked to get my usb ports back to usb2 speeds.
- i have the exact sam problem no flash drive including my ipod works, i just tried disablingth enhanced controller and they work now...but now im at usb 1.
I had the exact problem.
Upgraded from XP SP2 to VISTA Business...
When it says it cant find any drivers, tell it to Search C:\Windows and include all subfolders.
Your flash / external disks should then install ok!
I'm still having the same problems with my Cruzer profile. For what it's worth, the error message is as follows:
Cannot initialize application.
Device not found.
0xe7210005 Device not found.
If there's a KB or hotfix that will take care of this problem... I'm sure we'd all like to hear about it!
This is a complete disgrace and Microsoft should hang their head in shame over this.
I recently purchased the full version of Vista Ultimate (as I hate dealing with the upgrade issues) and have had no end of socialbility issues (which I won't go into here) but the basic one is the issue over USB devices ease of use.
I dropped in my USB flash drive and was presented with the install driver window (hello XP was able to ID my flash drive automatically) so anyway lets go through the motions. It starts searching (god knows where) and after what feels like a minute it says can't find driver and asks me "Would I like Microsoft to find me a solution?" Why the hell not I've just spent x hundreds of dollars on the thing, signed up online, forced to get my microsoft passport and bear my soul, sure give me a solution to an issue you resolve 5 years ago.
So off it goes searching the internet frantically for a solution to this technology catastrophy of a USB Flash drive. Again another minute or so later it reports back can't find a solution. Bam!! thank you and oh your device is not working. Feeling really glad I got rid of XP.
Into device manager (I am determined not to be out done damn them) to see my mystery USB device and I'll update the driver myself. Numerous clicks on "do I authorise this function due to the security risk", later and I'm at the install window, with 2 choices allow Microsoft to find a solution or select a driver location myself. Given Microsoft was incapable of finding a solution last time I doubt they will be able to help now so I'll try myself. It then asks the location for the driver, well I don't know about anyone else but I have never seen a flash drive sold with a vendor driver CD it is assumed that most modern technology (including my VCR) is capable of knowing what a Flash drive is. So without the vendor provided CD I just told Vista to search my C Drive. Well 10 seconds later it reports "installing driver". WHAT??? Where the hell did it go looking before? I would have thought the first place Microsoft automated driver search would look is itself? Obviously I'm mistaken.
But wait it gets better, it doesn't install the flash drive driver but has decided that I need to upgrade the driver of my USB hub.
Once that is done it tells me it has found another new device and we go through the whole "where's my drive gone scenario". Allow Microsoft to solve it for me, sure let’s try again surely they can't get it wrong twice in a row??? Duh no luck, ok lets look at the C drive again, tadda. And now finally we get the install I've been waiting for the driver for "Imation Flash Drive USB Device". Ok finally can copy out those files or am I being just a way to optimistic?
At the completion of that driver it tells me that it has found yet more hardware? All this hardware one my one little flash drive pretty impressive. After going through the same scenario above multiple OK clicks to bypass the security notices and do I really want to do this (I must admit I was starting to question it myself). Now it starts installing the driver "General volume". Done??? I don't think so. Let’s go through this again what do we get now the driver for "Flash Drive". Hey looking good now must be close but no cupi doll just yet. The last driver to go on was "WPD File System Volume Driver". Tadda, finaly now I have a drive letter and can start using mu USB Flash drive.
This whole process of reading through some forums and then going through the above sh*t fight took an elapsed time of nearly 30min.
Great Microsoft good to see that are making our life more efficient through the improvements. Given that I am in technology this was a rediculous waste of effort I feel sorry to the poor Mum and Pop's out there who would have no idea how to resolve something that should occur without any user interaction at all.
It seems Like the Infcach.1 file is corrupted
Deleting INFCACH.1 FROM C:\Windows and C:\Windows\Inf Directory and it began to automatically find drivers again...- Well MAZ, the story of my life. My Dell Latitude D810 gets a rating of 3.7 (is that out of 5 or 100). I did a clean installation of Vista Business and I was quite impressed but then this USB disaster happend. Well thank you for your detailed description of not only the right solution but a clear exsample of my own frustration (pitty to little foul lang). Bottom line the solution works and now I can carry on with my life.
- I just got a new e-machines T5224 with vista home premium . Pluged in a 2GB flash drive to run readyboost . The drive would dissapere . Called tech and they said that vista turns off USB when it goes to sleep . The fix is to go to power management click on advanced and click on USB . It will probably say disable , click enable and close . I did this and have not had a problem . If this works for you too let me know ?
- I must be doing something wrong as to these postings!
Firstly I am running Windows Home Premium 64 bit which might make a difference.
First attempt I have gone and removed IMFCACHE.1 from my machine (after having to set access permission). Rebooted, and re-plugged in my Flash Drive, device recognised BUT I get an error message "Windows found Driver software for this device but encountered error whilst trying to install it - USB Mass storage Device - The system cannot find the file specified. - If you know the manufacturer of the device etc etc.
Second Attempt, as I had 'saved' a copy of IMFCACHE.1 I went and edited the contents (removed contents), same result.
In my version of Vista, IMFCACHE.1 can only be found in C:Windows\Inf and not C:\Windows!!!
I have been in contact with the supplier of the Flash Disk who referred me to this forum. The supplier received this information from the importer/manufacturer - Samsung.
Thirdly, I have checked within Vista as to Power Management, well my Vista 64 bit edition doesn't have such a setting, plus the power setting I can access say nothing about USB etc, just how long the monitor or drive should be on before entering sleep mode. - I got the same problem, but nothing seems to work
Can someone please help? My laptop does recognizes the hardware(photo camera, sd card. or the usb mem stick), it does even recognizes the manufactures of the devices, but Vista refuses to install a driver. Please help, I'm desperate...
edit: I did some investigation, but I think the whole problem has nothing to do with usb. The problem is that all NEW hardware which uses the vista standard driver don't get installed anymore. 1 usb stick that worked before the problem still works and also my mouse still works. But ALL(als tried a joystick) new hardware I attach is recognized but vista can't find the driver.
I guess we thought that it was a usb problem because most new hardware uses hardware.... - I read this solution that seems to have worked for me...
Alexander Hartmaier wrote: click on manual specify location and point it to c:\windows\system32 and check the 'search subfolders' checkbox.
Seems to be a Vista bug...
I had to repeat this 3 times.
Once for Disk Drive,
Once for Generic Volume,
Once for Microsoft WPD Filesystem Volume Driver
I had to do this for each thumb drive I own. Mark Haggitt wrote: I read this solution that seems to have worked for me...
Alexander Hartmaier wrote: click on manual specify location and point it to c:\windows\system32 and check the 'search subfolders' checkbox.
Seems to be a Vista bug...
I had to repeat this 3 times.
Once for Disk Drive,
Once for Generic Volume,
Once for Microsoft WPD Filesystem Volume Driver
I had to do this for each thumb drive I own.This did the trick for my Pentax Digital Camera (had to repeat 3 times as well)
Thanks a lot
TheBish
Mark Haggitt wrote: I read this solution that seems to have worked for me...
Alexander Hartmaier wrote: click on manual specify location and point it to c:\windows\system32 and check the 'search subfolders' checkbox.
Seems to be a Vista bug...
I had to repeat this 3 times.
Once for Disk Drive,
Once for Generic Volume,
Once for Microsoft WPD Filesystem Volume Driver
I had to do this for each thumb drive I own.
I had numerous Code 31 errors when I tried to do this for my LaCie flash drive. Doing it 3 times didn't help. It also doesn't explain why my Flash Card reader isn't working either. There is a major problem with USB items in Vista. I didn't have this problem in XP. So far, tech support has been useless.- Hi pipc, Well I had similar issues the only difference was that I did a clean installation. Have you tried the solution supplied by MAZ in this forum? That worked for me perhaps have a look at that one. The thing is when your pc found new hardware and can't find the drivers or have issues with drivers that it did find select the option to select where it should look for drivers and sepcify c:\windows directory it will take a while but it should find the right driver for your device to add madness to the problem it will request you to do this over again three times before it will come up and say that all is working then you should be able to access the USB device via MyComputer or Explorer.
I still get problems with installing new USB devices, despite removing the Netgear software (see my posting earlier in this thread). Most recently it was a WD Passport USB hard drive. Said it couldnt find drivers etc (despite the packaging proudly stating that the device "Works with Vista"). It took several attempts for it to find the necessary drivers, and in the end I told the computer to search from C:\ where it (eventually) found the driver.
Maybe Vista SP1 will resolve these issues
Only time will tell.
- Uninstalling the Netgear software worked for me. I still have a problem with a PC Card serial port, but everything else seems to be working fine. I was just told about a hot fix that might help the serial port, but haven't had a chance to track it down yet.
If you're not comfortable with the registry, don't do this!
Solution:
1. In the run command (Start menu bar) type "regedit" to bring up the Registry Editor.
2. In Registry Editor, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
3. In the details pane, double-click DevicePath.
4. Add a semi-colon to end of the existing text, and then add the path to %SystemRoot%\System32. The result should be similar to:
%SystemRoot%\inf;%SystemRoot%\System32
Do not remove the %SystemRoot%\inf file path from the DevicePath registry entry.
5. Click OK to save the new value, and then close Registry Editor.
6. Open device manager, uninstall all unknown devices (right click, uninstall) so they all disappear from the list, then use the icon at the top to "Scan for Hardware Changes." You'll get a prompt to locate device drivers, click it, and you're done.
P.S. my bogus URL and email addy are for http://www.projecthoneypot.org/?rf=35081 (Project Honey Pot) .
- My problem is once it finds the drivers it is unable to install it- particularly USB Mass Storage driver. Still under my 90 days of support, so I'm hoping eventually MS figures it out, and I'll post the solution here.
AntonS55 wrote: I had the exact problem.
Upgraded from XP SP2 to VISTA Business...
When it says it cant find any drivers, tell it to Search C:\Windows and include all subfolders.
Your flash / external disks should then install ok!
do this and your USB Stick or whatever... will work
- Thank you Maz and the rest, search windows c system 32 manually.........all for a usb mouse to work, hurry up microsoft and get an update out...........money well spent!!!
- I too am having problems with USB Drives.
I have a 2GB drive that works fine with no issue. However, when I attempted to plug another USB Drive in, I had the same issues described above, with Windows failing to find the driver. I have tried pointing it at the System32 folder Vista claims to have found the driver but then says:
"Windows found the driver software for your device but encountered an error while attempting to install it. The system cannot find the file specified".
Ive tried doing everything three times and nothing, and tried deleting the .inf file suggested above and nothing.
Interestingly, the second USB Drive worked fine in another Vista-running laptop identical to mine, and my working USB drive DIDN'T work in the other Vista laptop. It seems that both laptops can only handle a single USB drive.
Anyway, any solutions to this problem would be very much appreciated.
Thanks - I wanted to let everyone know that the solution MS came up with was an "in-place" upgrade. Basically a non-destructive re-install from the original DVD. Everything is working great. All my USB devices including my iPod.
Still seems to be a major bug in Vista- hopefully they figure this out so others don't go through this hassle. - Damn, still no solutions that worked for me.
Since MS is not looking at this problem I give it up. I'm gonna format and install the old XP tomorrow. Vista
I saw this issue on my coworker's machine where the system failed to mount any USB Thumb drive or USB Multimedia Card Reader.
I believe that possibly during Vista installation, usbstor.inf (inf that installs "USB Mass Storage Device") got corrupted or got accidentally deleted from c:\Windows\inf. When usbstor.inf was restored to c:\Windows\inf and the system was rebooted, the drives mounted normally again when the device is plugged in.
There are two ways to get the usbstor.inf file
1. From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory)
2. If you only have 1 Vista system, run Command Prompt (Run as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, copy it to the C:\Windows\inf directory if it is missing from it. (I remember it being in the driver store cache somewhere on the HDD)
Cheers
- PC Tester,
I just wanted to say that your fix for this problem worked for me. I copied the usbstor.inf file to the windows\inf directory and everything seems to be working now. I have been searching for a solution for about a week or more now. I had USB keyboard, mouse & printers hooked up with no problems. All external HD's, flash drives & card readers(even the ones on the printers that where the printer worked) wouldn't work. I've tried some many solutions, I was about to reinstall Vista Ultimate and I had already done that several times for other reasons I won't go
into. Just a long message to say THANKS.
Now I just have to figure out why Vista reboots randomly on my computer and I might start to
like it.
SandMAN - When your system reboots randomly, after getting to the desktop, are you presented with a message "the system has recovered from a serious error"? If so, are you opting to send your crash information via the internet to Microsoft? If you do, you may get a response telling you what the fix it.
- You are my here!! I was about to format my pc and install XP. Now all usb sticks work flawless!
_O_ - Yay! Finally I get the USB drives to work as I consider wiping Vista and reinstalling it. Now I can get my external laptop drive to work again. This man/woman deserves a knighthood.
- Yes, I send the crash info most of the time but not always. All of the answers from Microsoft
say they don't know what the problem is and don't help at all. It hasn't been a big problem yet. The Vista machine will be on for a day or two and reboot when I'm not there. It may also be possible that since I fixed the USB problem that the problem has gone away. Vista has way more problems that I have experienced than any other Windows versions. I really hate that Microsoft has messed up the sound. I have an X-Fi Fatal1ty card and even with the new Vista
drivers installed, I have problems and it doesn't work like it should. Talked to Creative and it seems that they no longer support MP3 without first purchasing their mp3 add-on pack. But support for the WMA format is available.
Guess this isn't much different than XP. I remember it had problems and I guess once the SP came out it finally became something worth using. Well, that's enough ranting on for me and I apologize for posting this without setting up another post. Hope that the fix that PC Tester put
out helps people get their USB problems fixed.
SandMAN - Thanks for the tip. That worked for me. The mouse and keyboard on my HP DV5000 laptop worked but none of the external drives and DVD drives were working. I did see in the INF directory in Windows directory that there was nothing with the name of usbstor.inf, but I had no clue before reading the post that it could be the problem especially when I had done an upgrade. I downloaded the usbstor.inf after doing a search on Google and plugged the drives and they work. Thanks for the tip and ending one month of gala frustration. Now on to other problems.
- Thanks, this was helpful. Did you used to teach at ECPI.
- I am having similar problems, but even stranger. All my flash drives work on XP. Some work on VISTA Ultimate, some don't. It says it can't find the drivers insert the install CD - don't have any - and then I tell it to search the C: drive, including sub folders, still can't find it. Really frustrating - it seems to be hit and miss. Some old ones like my Attache 256MB don't work, my pqi 4GB works, Cruser 4 GB works, FV 16GB does not work and so on.
i have a problem whit the Flashdrive Cruzer Micro. The app don't work on Vista Ultimate - Business. I get error 0xe7210005, the app to un-block the encrypted partition is not compatible with Vista.
Any ideas?
Thanks!
I cannot get my usb portable drives to work on my Vista home premium computer. The Usb port will not even recognize that I have put the drive in, but it does recognize my usb cord for my digital camera. Not really sure how to fix the problem. Any Ideas for me?
Hi PC Tester,
Thanks to your posting I have been able to access my two flash drives and my card reader again. I now need to track down the problem stopping Windows Media Center from running so that I can synchronise my phone with Outlook.
Btw I got my copy of usbstor.inf from: http://www.infdump.com/download-inf-files_new.php/inffiles/U/USBSTOR.INF/5.1.2600.0/download.html
Had enough of MS - after 20 yrs of them the next computer I get is going to be a Mac!
Muchas gracias mi amigo.
- I have a TomTom 910 and vista will not install the driver for it. i did what you did but i still will not install, so i am sill reading and trying. good advice though
- i get exactly the same message when plugging in my sandisk cruzer profile. have you found a solution?
- PCTester solution worked fine for me(as I mentioned before)....
Thaler wrote: i get exactly the same message when plugging in my sandisk cruzer profile. have you found a solution? - as earlier mentioned i have problems installing my usb sandisk cruzer profile stick. what happens is: i plug in the usb stick - a window opens "cannot initialize application" Code 0xe7210005 Device not found.
the funny thing that happens next is that windows vista actually installs the usb stick under the right name. in the device manager i can find 2(!!) entries SanDisk Cruzer Profile USB Device.
when i open the windows explorer there are 2 new drives G: with 10MB and H:. when i try to use H: i'm told to format. formatting does not work i receive the message "windows cannot finish formatting the device"
can anyone help?
deleting infcache.1 did not make any difference
thanks - Is your drive going bad? Will the same drive format on an XP system right now?
Fantastic. Worked perfectly.
Thanks,
Chris
Yay! Reading all these posts about USB problems, I don't feel so alone in the world anymore! So everyone else is having USB issues. Great! In my case, Vista won't recognize any kind of USB flash memory. Funny, because my USB wireless keyboard/mouse and USB scanner work totally fine. It's just the flash memory. I have two types from two different companies (Buffalo and Elecom) and Vista refuses to read both of them. Problem is, I'm scared of fiddling around with the USB controller too much because it controls my keyboard/mouse, meaning one wrong step and I can't manipulate my PC. Can't Microsoft just come up with simple update that will fix all these problems? I mean, I did dish out a Benjamin and then some for the measly Vista Home basic upgrade. I know, I know, y'all gonna tell me it was money flushed down the drain. After spending the last 5 hours wrestling with this problem, I'm too tired to argue....
- I have signed up to this forum only to thank PCTester for his help.
You helped me solve a big problem.
It's nice to found people like you on the Internet.
Thank you. The Music player I had bought would not be recognised in vistas. When I came across the same issue in the forum I went thru the posts and found that pointing the search for the device driver to c:/windows/system32 with the 'Search Subfolders' option ON proved the easiest way, though vistas tries to install three devices I gave the same path three times and all it matters is the device works now.
Thanks for the post that helped me
- I have the same problem, but a little different. My case has 4 memory card slots and Vista recognizes well. I have a 2Gb Kingston Data Traveler and Vista recognizes well. I have some generics Mp3/Mp4 players and Vista doesn´t recognizes anyone. Now what I consider fantastic. I bought a 4Gb Kingston Data Traveler and Vista doesn´t recognizes. Incredible!!! My Windows/inf directory didn´t have the Usbstor.inf. Then, I downloaded it from the address that was posted here and copy it to this place. Now, Vista recognizes all the pen drives, but didn´t find the driver. Vista didn´t attach a letter to the pen drive, but listed it in the icon in the taskbar (remove hardware with safety). I read in another forum that exists another file called usbstor.sys that is essential in these cases. Any tips ?
Wow...I can't believe it's this hard to get a USB Flash to work! As it happens I had to do a couple of additional steps so figured I'd post a comment...
Following PCTester's instructions, I found usbstor.inf_0000000 (zeros are replaced by whatever numbers came up), however copying this file into the INF folder did not fix the issue, so what I had to do was to paste it onto my desktop (it wouldn't let me rename it in either the driverstore folder or in the INF folder), rename it usbstor.inf (no underscore or random numbers) then copy that newly renamed file into the INF folder, Vista found the drivers correctly after that.
And now to vent...Are they for real???? A device that auto installs from Windows ME onward and all of a sudden I have to go through this much nonsense to read my Flash drive??? Come on!!! It's a good thing I'm an experienced tech, and knew to check out Tech Net (Maybe MS Developers might want to stop by and check out this thread)
It's silly *** like this that is turning everyone I've spoken to off towards Vista! All of my friends who bought it have gone back to XP...you know the OS that actually works...
- Maybe this hotfix:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/940199/ I have smilar problem.I have a toshiba laptop with vista home edition (32 b).I have linked my canon ip4200 pixma printer to my laptop and the answer was "usb device not recognized".I tried a lot of way but i couldn't solve these problem.
Is there any master who can solve this Vista problem..
thnks
Thanks a lot !!
I was facing this problem for many days.
It worked.
thanks loads -- been struggling with this problem ever since I got new Vista pc. Glad to find this and finally get it fixed. MS is such a pain!
- Does anyone have a copy of ths KB article http://support.microsoft.com/kb/940199/
I still continue to have this Vista USB issue but can not find answers anywhere.
thanks a lot..
it worked super..
i was looking for it for ages.
I almost format my drive and put new system on it.
thnaks again
PCTester wrote: I saw this issue on my coworker's machine where the system failed to mount any USB Thumb drive or USB Multimedia Card Reader.
I believe that possibly during Vista installation, usbstor.inf (inf that installs "USB Mass Storage Device") got corrupted or got accidentally deleted from c:\Windows\inf. When usbstor.inf was restored to c:\Windows\inf and the system was rebooted, the drives mounted normally again when the device is plugged in.
There are two ways to get the usbstor.inf file
1. From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory)
2. If you only have 1 Vista system, run Command Prompt (Run as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, copy it to the C:\Windows\inf directory if it is missing from it. (I remember it being in the driver store cache somewhere on the HDD)
Cheers
My first post here, just to tell you thank you. My friend's laptop (Toshiba Satellite A135 with Vista Home Basic) was having this problem. I burned that usbtstor.inf file linked an earlier post to a CD, copied it to the C:\Windows\inf folder and rebooted. The USB thumb drives and her iPod Nano installed perfectly, as it should.
Cheers!- Just wanted to say thank you to PCTester. His solution worked brilliantly. Thanks!
I am having trouble getting my computer to recognize my ipod. it is the only usb device ive had trouble with so far. im running vista (32 bit) and it keeps saying that it cannot locate the drivers or that theyre not installed properly. my ipod shows up as "generic usb mass storage" under my devices, wtih a yellow triangle next to it. the driver for this "mass storage" is located in C:\Windows\System32\drivers.
ive tried following pctesters instructions: i located my usbstor.inf files in 2 separate folders under C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore. one folder is dated earlier than the toher. ive tried pasting both of them in the windows\inf folder and neither have worked.
Ive also tried most everything else I could find on this thread and on other forums and I still get “device drivers software could not be found”. im pretty frustrated that Microsoft hasn’t come up with a fix yet and my only option seems to be to return my computer to Dell and request a new one with XP. However, dealing without a computer for more than a day is a lot worse than dealing without updating my ipod for however long it takes….
- Thanks so much for this information I now have a Garmin GPS unit working a Sony memory stick and an Ipod all working correctly with Vista. You are the man.
I had the same problem has all of you. I was able to reproduce the problem with 3 different USB keys. I am glad to share a solution that worked for me.
1) Remove the update KB936824 and reboot.
2) Install your USB key, it will detect properly. :-) Remove "safely" the USB key.
3) Reinstall the update KB936824 with Windows Update and reboot.
You have fixed your problem. Enjoy.
Eric
I also had issues with my Vista usb ports. They used to work with my flash drive (months ago) but now they don't. The drives work in other computers and the usb ports work with other usb devices. But when I put my flash drive in (Sandisk cruzer micro) the drive just stays lit up and does nothing else (not even asking for drivers). It doesn't show up under my computer. If I try disabling or uninstalling it or any of the ports or even scanning for hardware changes it just sits there continually running for hours. When I look at the properties of the USB it is enabled, working properly and has the most updated drivers. I can plug the drive into a usb I know works (for instance the one that just had the mouse in it) and I get a USB device not recognized error but this doesn't always work sometimes it just sits there doing nothing. I've tried every bit of advice in this thread so far and nothing has worked. This seems to be a slightly different problem from most of the other posts. Any suggestions?I am having the same problem too!!! USB device is recognized but drive is not mapped to any drive letter. If I go into control panel -> computer management -> disk administration, I can see that the filesystem is there but if if I change to assign it to a drive letter, it gives me an error that the MMC has out of date information.
Got the same result even after trying a few times. I fixed the problem the last time by upgrading my Vista Home Premium to Vista Ultimate, I am not going to upgrade my OS every time this happens!!!
Someone please help! I can't believe this is happening in a product which Microsoft has spent 5 years developing!
yeah, im with you too the command prompt bit, but i cant find the usbstor.inf file.... its it shows up on command prompt as a serial number, buts thats it...
regards
Hi
Try find the usbstor.inf file in C:\Windows\System32\Driver Store\File Repository\usbsore.inf_xxxxxx
The xxxx are numbers. If you find two folders with same name but diferent xxxx, is because they have diferent dates. Choose the most recent. Copy paste the usbstore.inf and usbstore.PNF files to the Driver inf directory.
When Windows ask for drivers send the search to the Drivers inf directory.
I hope that this tip is useful, it worked for me.
Regards
LJPM
unbelievable!it really works!thanx!
I have the same issue...however i cannot find the C:\Windows\inf directory...I am using Vist Home Premium. I am trying to hook up a WD external hdd via usb 2.0
Thanks,
drjank
- That is the right directory C:\Windows\inf.
My problem was the same.
My is Vista home Premium too. After read your post I checked another computer with Vista Business and the inf directory is at the same place.
Make a new search, not to late at night this time..
Regards - Hello Guys,
I have purchased a ATMT HDD Scart Media Drive and am having trouble getting Vista to recognise that it's there.
The CD that came with the product has not installed properly and when connecting through USB it's just not working.
I've read on here that you can copy a certain file from somewhere and paste in a certain directory?
Or, another solutions was to tell Vista to install the drivers for the Drive from C://Windows?
Could someone please take 10 minutes of their time to give me an idiots guide on how to do either to get this thing working?
Would really appreciate some help on this!
Kind Regards
Mike - Hi
The solution is easy do perform.
Go to C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository
There you have one or two directories with the name usbstor.inf_xxxxx.
The xxxx are a mix of number e letters and the diference of the two directories are the date of creation, so choose the most recent.
Inside you find two filles called usbstor.inf and usbstor.PNF.
Copy the files and paste in C:\Windows.inf
When you connect the external HD and Vista ask for the driver sent it to the C:\Windows.inf directory
Good luck
LJPM I've found the usbstor.inf file, but inside there is the usbstor.inf file but no usbstore.pnf..
I've searched it and the file isnt on my laptop, but there is no known download for it...
any ideas?
regards
Pat
I am having a similar problem...my USB storage devices are not installing correctly (Crizer Micro Thumb Drive, iPods). When I plug them in the system recognizes that there is a new device present, tries to find the drivers and then errors out after checking Windows Update.
I have copied usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf to the C:Windows\Inf folder and still no luck!
I am running: Win Vista Home with 3GB RAM (I thought I read something a while back about 3+GB RAM causing a similar problem???)
Thanks to anyone for their help!
autiger
Copy the USBSTOR.SYS that is in the same folder where you find the usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf, and paste it in the C:\Windows\inf directory.
When Vista ask for the driver send it search the inf directory.
If the problem is not solved try to reduce the RAM to 2GB. I read several posts about problems with 3GB, but I d'ont know if the two problems are connected.
Regards
Thank You, Thank You! I was unfortunate enough to buy an SC101 NAS, and after losing all my data on a drive that I backed up, I no longer used it as my primary storage anymore, but nonetheless, I still used it. I waited to upgrade to Vista for 9 months so that I could use the Vista drivers from Netgear, and then both my laptop as well as my roommates laptops stopped reading all external mass storage, and we have been looking for weeks to the cause of this. The SC101 drivers was the last thing I would have expected. Thanks for posting this!
- PCTester,
I have searched far and wide for the solution you just provided. Microsofts tech support is terrible.
Your solution worked and within 5 minutes of copying the file I was up and running with my USB devices.
Thank You , Thank You, Thank You
Kim MacLeod YOU ARE A GOD IN MY BOOK PCTESTER & YOU SHOULD RECEIVE SPECIAL TREATMENT & CARE FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE MY MAN!!!!!!! A MEDAL OF HONOR IF I DON'T SAY SO MYSELF!!!! THIS FIXED MY PROBLEM IN A JIFFY-NO TIME FLAT!!! THANX, COULDN'T GO ON LIVIN' WITHOUT SOMEONE LIKE YOU IN THIS CRAZY, NUTTY WORLD WE LIVE IN. BOBBIE
PCTester wrote: I saw this issue on my coworker's machine where the system failed to mount any USB Thumb drive or USB Multimedia Card Reader.
I believe that possibly during Vista installation, usbstor.inf (inf that installs "USB Mass Storage Device") got corrupted or got accidentally deleted from c:\Windows\inf. When usbstor.inf was restored to c:\Windows\inf and the system was rebooted, the drives mounted normally again when the device is plugged in.
There are two ways to get the usbstor.inf file
1. From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory)
2. If you only have 1 Vista system, run Command Prompt (Run as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, copy it to the C:\Windows\inf directory if it is missing from it. (I remember it being in the driver store cache somewhere on the HDD)
Cheers
THIS IS THE EASIEST ROUTE TO FOLLOW! I WAS UP AND RUNNING IN NO TIME FLAT! CLEARED IT RIGHT UP! TOOK ME ALL OF 5 MINUTES! JUST PERFORMED WITH THE LAST 30/45 MINUTES. SATURDAY 11/18/07 12:00 A.M.! GET THE .INF FILE FROM HERE: (http://www.infdump.com/download-inf-files_new.php/inffiles/U/USBSTOR.INF/5.1.2600.0/download.html) YOU CANNOT GO WRONG AS LONG AS YOU FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS MENTIONED ABOVE! BOBBIE-THANKS AGAIN PCTESTER FOR THIS POST & MUCH GRATITUDE AND RESPECT SHOULD BE GIVEN TO THIS MYSTERY PERSON WHOMEVER YOU ARE! ROCK ON!
P.S. I HAVE A WINDOWS VISTA DESKTOP & WINDOWS VISTA LAPTOP. NEXT, MAC P.C., OH YEAH I SAID IT MICRO$H!T! HAVE A NICE DAY ALL!
I had the same problem with several machines. This is how I resolved it:
Steps to resolve USB Storage Device problem with Vista
1. In the run command (Start menu bar) type "regedit" to bring up the Registry Editor.
2. In Registry Editor, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
3. In the details pane, double-click DevicePath.
4. Add a semi-colon to end of the existing text, and then add the path to %SystemRoot%\System32. The result should be similar to: %SystemRoot%\inf;%SystemRoot%\System32
Do not remove the %SystemRoot%\inf file path from the DevicePath registry entry.
5. Click OK to save the new value, and then close Registry Editor.
6. Delete “INFCACH.1” FROM C:\Windows and C:\Windows\Inf Directories (if it exists)
7. Ensure that there is a copy of the usbstor.inf file in C:\Windows\Inf
If there isn’t – follow the below steps:a) From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory
OR
b) From the problem machine, run Command Prompt ( as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, go to that directory and copy all the files located in that directory to C:\Windows\inf directory
8. Open device manager, uninstall all unknown devices (right click, uninstall) so they all disappear from the list
9. Reboot the computer
10. Plug the device in (the drivers will now install and the device will be usable!)
- Wow thanks troyjadams. i tried everything else people have recommended on this forum and nothing worked until i did that thing with the registry editor and deleted the infcache file. i just finished syncing my ipod and it works great! thanks again
- No worries! Great to hear it worked for you!
- Hi, I downloaded the usbstor.inf copy it on my desktop and then copy to the inf folder and viola my 2gb data traverler is working at last, now I'll be testing on anorther usb drive. Thanks so much for this .inf....
- I had no problems with my Windows Vista Desktop P.C. after I followed the instructions above, but until I tried to install a new U.S.B. device all hell broke loose. A new set of problems arose, and after hours of trying to correct the situation even with the info. listed here forementioned, nothing worked. I resorted to having to reformat the hard drive to clear the issues/troubles. I didn't like having to do that, but when all else fails, it worked! All is swell again! This time I have and will NOT install another U.S.B. Drive until either after Service Pack 1 or 2 come out and have fixed the bugs, errors, loopholes, etc. with Vista. My advice to everyone and anyone considering an upgrade to Vista from XP, buy a MAC! HP and Compaq suck and I have only heard mixed reviews from Dell users. Also, stay away from eMachines, PLEASE!!!!!!! Bobbie
Hey guys, I have a problem with my USB ports. I have an HP DV2000, and am using Windows Vista Home Premium. The problem I am having is all of my ports were working fine, I had a mouse plugged in, I went to sleep, woke up and none of them worked. They will power some devices, like charging my Zune a little bit, and turning on certain hard drives and mice, but Windows will not register anything. Now, I contacted HP, and did everything they said to do, save for sending in the laptop. They said to reformat the computer using their recovery cd's....did that....I rest the BIOS for the laptop, I disabled everything and re-enabled it, I uninstalled drivers and rebooted to let windows reinstall them....I even download new BIOS and chipset drivers for the computer, and I'm still having the same problem. Can anyone give me any clue as to how to fix this problem?? I even had a techy here take apart the laptop and inspect everything, and he said that everything should be working perfectly. I'm almost lead to believe that Windows or something else isn't allocatting enough power or something to the ports to get the devices to run and show up correctly. Thanks.
-Ryan
thanks for the info; it worked for my Garmin 305 GPS watch which had been refusing to install for ages (no credible help from Garmin!).
I was however unable to delete the INFCACHE.1 file due to permissions; thankfully the device driver was found and installed correctly and I'm happily using the device again!
Bravo
troyjadams
wow, I got really frustrated, almost reinstalled Vista, thank you, solved all problems.
thank you
mickproud wrote: thanks for the info; it worked for my Garmin 305 GPS watch which had been refusing to install for ages (no credible help from Garmin!).
I was however unable to delete the INFCACHE.1 file due to permissions; thankfully the device driver was found and installed correctly and I'm happily using the device again!
Bravo
right click on the file, go properties, click Security tab, edit, pick your login, check full control. then you can delete it.
I've read all of the posts and tried everything but still NG. I changed the registry setting and deleted the INFCACH.1 file, I downloaded the usbstor.inf and replaced the existing one with it but still NG.
I have 3 different USB flashdrives and all will not install correctly. My Sandisk Micro Cruzer 1GB will light up and then go out, and if you leave it in will light up again and then go out so it seems to be trying something ? If I have explorer open it shows as a CDROM drive and never changes to a diskdrive? If i try to click on it, it hangs the system and the only way to recover is to pull the flashdrive out and then everything returns to normal.
This is a new PC and the other USB devices work OK ( Printer, USB HDD Maxtor-External)
Any ideas?
Is there an easy way to go to XP?
thanks
downwardvd
- The posting from Eric above solved my problem with a Sandisk Contour 8GB usb. Sandisk could not figure it out. This worked right away.
Tried what Eric said about uninstalling the update, did it and the usb drive was recognized correctly but then it was acting real flaky....couldn't write files to it, sometimes the light would just go out on it? Still very mad that a simple usb drive that works on every other computer running XP won't run on Vista?
Tried both USB drives and they both act unstable.
Any other ideas?
thanks
downwardvd
Did you find a solution to this problem?
I am having the exact same problems, I can plug in my camera, my ipod no problem
BUT when I place information on to my USP memory stick and then try to download on to my laptop
VISTA does not reconize it-NOTHING EVEN COMES UP
I also have problem with taking information off my desk top, onto a disk and downloading same programs on VISTA.
It is great that Microsoft is running the ADS to admit there are problems, but what are they doing to help fix them??
nope, still battling this joke of an operating system Vista!
Did the rollback of update KB936824- did not solve the problem
Changed the devicepath registry setting
Replaced the usbstor.inf file
deleted the infcache.1
still my usb devices do not work correctly, I can get the drive to show up for maybe one minute and then it hangs the system until I unplug it.
This is a brand new PC!!!!!!!!!!
Help
I tried all this and still no success. Each time Vista reported “The system cannot find the file specified”.
After searching the web for a couple of frustrating hours I cam across this entry by WickedMX…
I’ve been experiencing the same problem with usb storage devices for the last few weeks and have visited numerous forums discussing it. After having no joy I decided to take a look around my system folders and have now got these devices working again. While looking around I discovered 2 points of interest:
In C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository I had two folders named “usbstor.inf” but each one had a different set of numbers attached to the end of the folder name. - could this be where part of the problem lies?
When I looked in my C:\Windows\inf folder I discovered the usbstor.inf and usb stor.pnf files were missing - this definitely had to be an issue.
Once I discovered these anomalies, I proceeded to copy the pnf and inf files from the most recently updated usbstor.inf folder to C:\Windows\inf. I then went back to the update driver wizard, pointed to the inf folder and what do you know but they all started working again.
So with some scepticism I tried this approach and it worked.Hi
That is a solution, it worked for me too.
If you don´t have the usbstor.inf_xxxx directory you can copy it from another computer.
Regards
LJM
This is the best, simplest, easiest, and only advice/way I can/could give to you all that are still having nightmares with the Vista Operating System and the USB Drives to restore and correctly fix it. I tried all the suggestions listed on all 7-8 pages here, and yes, for a brief time it/they worked, but resorted to having to reformat the drive/s anyway. I know, it is a pain to have to do this, but if you want the demons to be gone DO IT & DO IT NOW I TELL YOU!!!! When all has been reinstalled, my thoughts are, USE 1 USB PORT FOR ONE ITEM ONLY!!! I am beginning to think the flaw lies when too many devices are being used for the same usb port/s. Since formatting my Laptop and Desktop Vista PC's a few weeks back now, all is swell again in my neighborhood, so enjoy. DON'T WORRY, BE HAPPY!!! Bobbie
downwardvd wrote: nope, still battling this joke of an operating system Vista!
Did the rollback of update KB936824- did not solve the problem
Changed the devicepath registry setting
Replaced the usbstor.inf file
deleted the infcache.1
still my usb devices do not work correctly, I can get the drive to show up for maybe one minute and then it hangs the system until I unplug it.
This is a brand new PC!!!!!!!!!!
Help
- I have been having this problem as of late with a USB flash drive
This worked for me:
go into device manager and unistall drive. DO NOT UNPLUG the device.
Restart windows.
When it finds device and asks for driver. HIT CANCEL.
Device now shows up and works fine.
Occassionally, it still asks for driver when booting up, but CANCEL always works. What a pain in the #@^. - I tried this: having the wizard search in the "C:\Windows" directory and including all the subfolders. Orginally, I wasn't able to see my USB external hard drive as well as my SD card from my integrated SD card reader in my laptop. It solved both of my problems (although I had to do this twice for the USB HDD).
- Vista made my life hell. I don't know what MS technical people doing. My 80GB external hard disk freezes when i browse.
Only way i can browse it through Dos prompt. I tried all solutions.. none of them work. I guess I will have to go back to Windows XP. I dont know of this is still going to be helpfull but I know the solution;
You need a pc with XP or other operating system that the cruzer profile supports then you need to plug it in there and follow instructions for adding fingerprints. If you have added a fingerprint then you can access you gigate on vista. Vista will ask for launching something but that won't work. If you go to your computer you will still see two drives, one drive you cant access, yet. If you just slide your registred finger on the reader you will notice the flashing led. Let him finish flashing and then refresh your computer and tadaaa you can access it.
I hope this was still helpfull.
- you know i have the same problem can anyone help me?
Mark Haggitt wrote: I read this solution that seems to have worked for me...
Alexander Hartmaier wrote: click on manual specify location and point it to c:\windows\system32 and check the 'search subfolders' checkbox.
Seems to be a Vista bug...
I had to repeat this 3 times.
Once for Disk Drive,
Once for Generic Volume,
Once for Microsoft WPD Filesystem Volume Driver
I had to do this for each thumb drive I own.Hi-
I have a e-machine with Vista. None of my many USB ports are working properly. Infact. When I put something in my CD-ROM player that came with the machine, a icon shows up in the tray that says "USB Monitor? Anyway, bought an LG
external DVD burner. It is not working-not in any of the USB ports. It can't find drivers. It is not recognized as a drive by Vista. It doesn't even read the software disc that comes with it. The light just blinks four times and is done. It is a paper weight now. I think my USB Storage Device or something is damaged?
Will your usbstor.inf fix work for me? If so, not good with DOS commands. Can you restate how to enter and copy exactly? Please
. Or maybe another fix?Thank you in advance.
Greg
- hi, I want just to say thanks men, great job, it work for me at 100 % on vista home basic I have do the same what you say
I tried serveral of the fixes posted on here without sucess. I tried installing Service Pack 1 RC, and it fixed everything. I can finally use a thumbdrive in Vista.
After it was installed, I uninstalled the thumbdrive device in Device Manager, then clicked the "Scan for hardware changes" button at the top. It was discovered and installed without asking for drivers (for once!).
- I had problems with a databar 4gb memory stick, I contacted the company who made it they said vista sometimes(nearly always) has problems finding the inf files. They suggested making a directory naming suppliment then copy all the files from the inf directory into it. Now if it looks for drivers, point it to suppliment dir and normally it will work. Hope this helps
- I had similar problems as most of the people on this thread. For me my Canon C5060WZ and extra hard drive (IDE Western Digital 80 GB) were not being recognized. Followed all of the fixes posted in here and the HD started to be intermittantly recognized, but rarely would last between restarts. Finally I gave up and upgraded to the Service Pack 1 RC 1. Solved all problems, including realizing that I had 4GB of RAM rather than 3.2 GB. Yay! Finally stopped wondering if it was time to go back to XP.
I don't understand exactly what you mean. When I put my flashdrive in my laptop with Vista it looks for drivers that it can't find. I had it look under file repository and it keeps saying INF file is invalid. Is there anyway you can give me like a step by step of what to do, I need it for school and have tried everywhere for help. It would be greatly appreciated.
Ok, so I found out why vista has problems installing USB drives. Here's how to fix it:
1. In C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository I had two folders named "usbstor.inf" but each one had a different set of numbers attached to the end of the folder name. - could this be where part of the problem lies?
2. When i looked in my C:\Windows\inf folder i discovered the usbstor.inf and usb stor.pnf files were missing - this definitely had to be an issue.
Once I discovered these anomalies, I proceeded to copy the pnf and inf files from the most recently updated usbstor.inf folder to C:\Windows\inf. I then went back to the update driver wizard, pointed to the inf folder and what do you know but they all started working again.
I did this for my lifebox and flash drieve and as soon as I reconnected it, it recognized it and worked immediately.
This worked for my Vista Ultimate 64-bit hope it works for you.- I already has SP1 RTM installed and while swaping out my readyboost thumb drive, all these problems with usb not finding drivers started. I tried everything in this thread and none of it worked. I now will have to get a prior clone of my hard drive and re-apply sp1. I was really hoping the fixes in here would work. I wonder what why they didn't on mine? Oh well, it's always something when youy least expect it. This area of Vista should be 100% unbreakable. There is no excuse for this whatsoever. M$ needs to stop wasting time running after yahoo etc and get us a OS that is bullet proof for this sort of thing. Simply no excuse for this.
i dont have a usbstor.pnf file.....what am i to do?
Not even in:
C:\windows\system32\driverstore\filerepository\usbstor.inf_xxxx\ ??
If not you could give your e-mail address & I or someone else here could send it to you or do you know someone else with vista.
Mick
oh that would be so great if you would guytonkanisha@hotmail.com im forever greatful
Sent you the file, hope it works
Mick
I have a Toshiba Satellite and im running program Windows Vista Home Basic. And no matter what I plug into my usb hubs I keep getting the same message " ONE OF THE USB DEVICES ATTATCHED TO THIS COMPUTER HAS MALFUNCTIONED. AND WINDOWS DOES NO RECOGNIZE IT. I puzzles me because all the things i used have worked be for then they just stopped. I have went and bought new products like new web cams, digital cams, and MMC Readers...etc. etc. etc. I erased the cache thing ....it did not work. I replaced the usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf files...it did not work. I even erased everything on my laptop be setting it back to factory settings....it did not work and i did the regedit thing...still dont work. I would be very greatful if anyone has any sugesstions as to whats wrong with my laptop and what I can do to fix it.
Kanisha.
I think I have the same tosh as you,
I had the exact same problems, I wouldn't play around with the .pnf or .inf files I did that and nothing worked at all, I found a hotfix which worked, only thing is that you have to have one usb port per device... TBF its Vista.. Windows... what do you expect..
I'm not good good at this shiz, but i hope it helped...
I have tried looking for the hotfix you have to apply for but i cannot find it...
Just do what i did install XP or buy a mac!
Hi!
Experiencing the same problems as all of us here. With one exception: nothing helps. When pointing it to Inf directory (infstor.inf and pfm are there) it just doesn't find any suitable driver. When pointing it to FileRepository it finds something but states that "the system cannot find the file specified".
Huge gratitude to everyone considers my usb-hell.
- Hi,
I had same problem since last fall. But I resolved it today!!!
I have a HP Pavilion a6028x desktop with Vista Home Premium. (32bit)
I tried...
1. Delete USBHUB from Device Manager
2. Reinstall Vista (It worked at the first time, but it happened the same problem again)
3. Delete INFCACH.1, Copy usbstor.inf, Modify registry (tried several times with different files)
But my usb flash drives/iPod/internal card reader (usb printer was working all the time) were still not working...
And today, I tried to disable one of my USB HUB no.2 (I have two USB HUB(s) on Device Manager) from Device manager.
I tested to able USB HUB no.2 again with my usb flash drive on the slot. The same problem happened again. So I disable it again. Now I have only one USB HUB enabled.
So far my USB flash drives/iPod are working. I still have a problem with the internal card reader, but I have an external one for now thank you so much for your help. I FINALLY FIXED IT!!!!!!! I pulled out my warrenty and got me a new laptop
OMG, I thought I'd be good for now. I had problems before and #3 from above (mewky's post) worked like a charm. now after a while (maybe two months) and plugging in and out all kinds of USB devices I got back to where I started. I plug in my camera which worked fine a couple days ago and the nightmare starts again. Cannot find drivers, fails. I repeated the steps from #3 but not only did I loose the camera, now I lost a number of other devices as well which don't want to install.
MS, this is a nightmare. There is one thing that I did differently. I have a 7port USB2 hub (powered) and 4 in the back of the PC and 2 in the front. I never touched the ones in the back after installing Vista and plugging in my main devices. I only used the 7port hub so far without problems. Now I used the two in the front of the PC for thumb drives. Maybe this messed up the hub settings? I am clueless, but apparently so is MS.
speechless. I am rolling back a week in System Restore to temporarily fix the ones that worked.
maybe I should go back to XP after all.
- Manage to find a more permanent solution that worked for me.
After you insert a USB device, a thumbdrive in my case:
- do a manual search for drivers and point to c:\windows\winsxs
- Vista will show some warning about drivers not being signed or something, ignore and click continue
After 3 weeks of searching for a fix from many forums this option finally worked for me, can now access all USB thumbdrives and external disk.
System: Apple Macbook Intel Penryn 2.1MHz running Mac OS X Leopard & Vista Home Premium on Boot Camp. It's very useful to me! Thanks!
Thnx Dennistan,
This finnaly worked for me..
- Hello!
I am also having this problem but when i go to download the hotfix i get this message:
"We’re sorry, but there is no Microsoft.com Web page that matches your entry. It is possible you typed the address incorrectly, or the page may no longer exist. You may wish to try another entry or choose from the links below, which we hope will help you find what you’re looking for."
Am I doing it wrong or is the link broken? Is there another way to get this update? PCTester wrote: I saw this issue on my coworker's machine where the system failed to mount any USB Thumb drive or USB Multimedia Card Reader.
I believe that possibly during Vista installation, usbstor.inf (inf that installs "USB Mass Storage Device") got corrupted or got accidentally deleted from c:\Windows\inf. When usbstor.inf was restored to c:\Windows\inf and the system was rebooted, the drives mounted normally again when the device is plugged in.
There are two ways to get the usbstor.inf file
1. From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory)
2. If you only have 1 Vista system, run Command Prompt (Run as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, copy it to the C:\Windows\inf directory if it is missing from it. (I remember it being in the driver store cache somewhere on the HDD)
Cheers
I was having the very same problem that everyone else here was having at this solution, given by PCTester FIXED IT!
THE FIX IS HERE!hi, i can'f found the usbstor.inf file...can u email me the file, please..also, i can't delete the INFCASH.1 file (destination folder access denied - you need permission..).
please, helppp....tq sir!
DennisTan wrote: Manage to find a more permanent solution that worked for me.
After you insert a USB device, a thumbdrive in my case:
- do a manual search for drivers and point to c:\windows\winsxs
- Vista will show some warning about drivers not being signed or something, ignore and click continue
After 3 weeks of searching for a fix from many forums this option finally worked for me, can now access all USB thumbdrives and external disk.This fix worked for me after hours of reading and attempting to fix this issue!
- Thank you soo much mate!
What a hassle!!
I even have SP1 Installed, but that never seemed to fix the issue, but now it's working fine
Ta,
Nathan - Frankly I don't give a DAMN. As a yearslong windowsuser and manager I simply wonder why MickeySoft isn't able to perform on such a trivial item as having a USB mem device simply to install. Under XP there are no real issues in this field however when I insert a simple Maxell usb device it doesn't get recognized and one needs to be a F@#king pioneer to try to get an decent answere within MS.
I don't realy care about having to visit techsites. I do care for decent solutions that excistet in the first place for something damn simple as inserting a standard usb device without the bloody hassle one is now is encountering. Don't read his wrong, under Vista I expect simply everything to run like under XP without any hassle. If MS isn't capable to handle such trivial matters and treat co-companies with the arrogance portrayed today, they desirve my mayhem dislike and counter as stated in here.
I am a customer, I have payed for my product, I am in title of proper support. Certainly not the arrogance of Bill FA Gates and his lot. So if any one have a simple idea for me how to insert a simple usb stick into an usb port and get it to recognized by Vista I would be very greatfull. I mean com on, this isn't rocket science.
René Civile
IT Change & Release Manager
City Council Amsterdam, Netherlands
+31 [0]6 2936 1218
r.civile@numoquest.nl
PS,
Bill Gates, It still is surprizing where you lot get away with. If I would display your kind of arrogance it would be an insult to the trade in my field and I was sacked years back!
NareshV wrote: If you're not comfortable with the registry, don't do this!
Solution:
1. In the run command (Start menu bar) type "regedit" to bring up the Registry Editor.
2. In Registry Editor, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
3. In the details pane, double-click DevicePath.
4. Add a semi-colon to end of the existing text, and then add the path to %SystemRoot%\System32. The result should be similar to:
%SystemRoot%\inf;%SystemRoot%\System32
Do not remove the %SystemRoot%\inf file path from the DevicePath registry entry.
5. Click OK to save the new value, and then close Registry Editor.
6. Open device manager, uninstall all unknown devices (right click, uninstall) so they all disappear from the list, then use the icon at the top to "Scan for Hardware Changes." You'll get a prompt to locate device drivers, click it, and you're done.
P.S. my bogus URL and email addy are for http://www.projecthoneypot.org/?rf=35081 (Project Honey Pot) .
- Simply one word: NOPE!
"I saw this issue on my coworker's machine where the system failed to mount any USB Thumb drive or USB Multimedia Card Reader.
I believe that possibly during Vista installation, usbstor.inf (inf that installs "USB Mass Storage Device") got corrupted or got accidentally deleted from c:\Windows\inf. When usbstor.inf was restored to c:\Windows\inf and the system was rebooted, the drives mounted normally again when the device is plugged in.
There are two ways to get the usbstor.inf file
1. From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory)
2. If you only have 1 Vista system, run Command Prompt (Run as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, copy it to the C:\Windows\inf directory if it is missing from it. (I remember it being in the driver store cache somewhere on the HDD)
Cheers"
-------------------------
Perhaps I'm doing it incorrectly, but the above instructions didn't work for me. Still getting the same error message when searching for drivers when I plug my CF card reader in. This only started happening today, and I don't have SP1. I'm not really sure what it is, but I've tried 3 or 4 different methods of fixing the issue to no avail.
Can you maybe explain the steps in further detail, please? Thanks a mill.- "Go to C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository
There you have one or two directories with the name usbstor.inf_xxxxx.
The xxxx are a mix of number e letters and the diference of the two directories are the date of creation, so choose the most recent.
Inside you find two filles called usbstor.inf and usbstor.PNF.
Copy the files and paste in C:\Windows.inf
When you connect the external HD and Vista ask for the driver sent it to the C:\Windows.inf directory"
----------------------------
1. Found one directory named usbstor.info_xxxxx
2. Inside there was usbstor (but not usbstor.inf) and usbstor.PNF
3. Copied them to C:\Windows.inf, but they were already there, so I replaced.
4. When I plugged in the USB cable, Windows asked if I wanted to automatically find the driver, ask me again later, or never ask again for this device. I don't have a choice to point it to Windows.inf
5. So, when I went to the Device Manager to update the driver, and pointed it to Windows.inf, I still got the same error message:
"Windows found driver software for your device but encountered an error while attempting to install it.Microsoft WPD FileSystem Volume Driver
The specified service does not exist as an installed service.
If you know the manufacturer of your device, you can visit its website and check the support section for driver software."
Okay, so then I went to Microsoft's website and downloaded a Vista plugin to possibly fix this issue, and still no resolution.
**what now?**
- Nothing has happened, its a bull ***. real pain with vista
- I Have spent the last 6 hours on my computer trying get a few simple usb devices to work. I wish i could charge Microsoft the time I am missing with my family!
I have done EVERYTHING in this thread and all have failed. I keep getting error 32. Apparently there might be a device or driver deactivated.
Please help me someone! I was so much looking forward to my new computer and vista. Now I am really thinking about installing something other than Windows!
Regards
Bone3
I've been trying for 2 weeks now Nothing seems to work I'm tryin to install a usb keyboard on my gateway laptop who woulda ever thought it would be this hard??? Any help please! Ty, Nunies- I have looked for a solution to my usb problem. A few people have been saying that the problems occur when running a system with more than 2 GB and a NVidia driver. Can anyone confirm this?
I found this Article/Hotfix from Microsoft:
Stop errors occur on a Windows-based computer that has 2GB or more of RAM and is using an NVIDIA nForce USB controller
Link: hier
I am at work at the moment and cannot try the fix. If someone else would like to give it a shot, be my guest.
Bone3 - Hello MAZ (or anyone listening). I know this was from over a year ago, but I'm having a USB recognition problem with Vista. It used to work, but stopped working yesterday. When I plug in my 1G flash drive, a directory letter comes up, but when I click on it I get a message saying I need to format the disk before I can use it. I'm not a computer geek, but I've never heard of formating a USB flash drive. Also, the directory window does not automatically come up like it used to. I'm a layman when it comes to computers. Would you be able to provide some simple instructions on the process you went through?
- Hello. I did this search for winsxs and came up with a bunch of folders. What do you do next?
Hi,
I posted a solution that was useful to some people, here it is again:
After you insert a USB device, a thumbdrive in my case:
- do a manual search for drivers and point to c:\windows\winsxs
- Vista will show some warning about drivers not being signed or something, ignore and click continueNo need to mess around with the registry....
Dennis
This is the suggestion that worked for me. So simple. And just a 5 minute solution to 3 month problem.
How did you come across this answer, Dennis? Was it trial and error or supreme knowledge?
I can only endorse what Dennis has written. It's the simple answer to a bothersome problem.
Well done. And thank you.
I did a search for USBSTOR.INF/S and it is no where in my directory. What else can I do?
Thanks. I will try this tonight.I have a problem with my USB Drive too, I thought I'd reply to this one rather than create a new topic creating spam.
I click on my computer and it comes up Removable Disk F. It says there is a USB in one of my USB slots but there is none. It also comes up with the option to Eject or rename and when I try to eject, it says Remov Disk F is in use.
Save any files on this disc and then, close the files or programs using the files before trying again. If you choose to continue, the files will be closed, which may cause data to be lost.
I only have one word, LOL
Anyone encountered a problem like this
Windows Vista Home Edition, UK-user 18yrs GMT -0
Check again in the C:\windows\winsxs directory.
If it's not there, copy it from somebody else's computer.
I am having this same issue. nothing on the forums helped.. not copying the file and putting it into the windows/inf folder, not changing the path on "regedit" local machine/software/windows/currentversion/ DEVICE PATH ... nothing works.. my MOUSE mx revolution , is still not able to work. i have to navigate using my keyboard.. what a pain this is. My computer wont find the software i dont know what else to do.
I cant re install the windows OS i have too much on here. Any help? This all happened.. because one morning recently my computer over heated and i turned it on and it turned off and did so every 20 seconds .. and i think something happened in that time frame that messed up my computer.
please respond with ideas at aimezxomoi@aim.com
thank you.
I have a solution to offer that worked for me after trying everything else like deleting infcache.1 and correcting the directory address when searching for drivers. First, my symptom:
Absolutely NO USB storage device, (Western Digital USB "MyBook", 2 GB Patriot flash drive, 4 GB PNY flash drive, 128MB Generic flash drive) would work with my computer. I would plug in the device (front and back USB ports) and Windows Vista Ultimate would report that "One of the USB devices connected to this computer has malfunctioned". That may not the the exact wording, but it should sound familiar. Anyway, Windows would search for drivers and ultimately assign a status of "Unknown device" in device manager. Any attempt to update the driver would result in a message that "Windows has determined the best driver for this device is already installed." I tried every solution you could search for in Google with no results.
Other USB devices worked just fine. A drawing tablet, a scanner, and a printer worked great. Only my USB storage devices were affected.
If you have tried everything else, try the following. In fact, you may want to try this before trying anything else, because it involves making very few actual changes to your computer. The first thing to try is simple: Totally unplug your computer from the outlet. Just unplug the cable from your power supply and let it sit for half an hour. Seriously give it a try if everything else has failed. After the time has passed, plug back in and give it a try.
The next isn't that hard, either. Enter the BIOS of your computer and disable USB 2.0 support. If you go back into Windows and find that your flash drives work after doing this, but it gives the message that the device could work faster using USB 2.0, you are probably in luck. Go back into your BIOS, re-enable USB 2.0 support and DISABLE legacy USB support. Keep in mind, this may cause you to lose some functionality in an older device, but you can always switch it back on. I personally can't do without my storage devices, and I haven't had any of my other devices fail to work after trying them all out. It's worth a try. I'm back up and running.
There may be some more tech-savvy folks out there that can explain why the second solution works, but the first one is an old trick that has worked for multiple problems in the past when I repaired computers. Unplugging your computer allows the power supply to get rid of any residual electricity that may be keeping your motherboard in a perpetual malfunctioning state.
I hope this gives someone a solution.
credde wrote: DennisTan wrote: Manage to find a more permanent solution that worked for me.
After you insert a USB device, a thumbdrive in my case:
- do a manual search for drivers and point to c:\windows\winsxs
- Vista will show some warning about drivers not being signed or something, ignore and click continue
After 3 weeks of searching for a fix from many forums this option finally worked for me, can now access all USB thumbdrives and external disk.This fix worked for me after hours of reading and attempting to fix this issue!
I tried everythn from page 1 to 10 and nothn fixed the proplem... till i found this one so thnx buddy..
and i recommend u try this solution...
dont know y but as windows gets better it gets worse too !!!
Hey buddy I did the above steps the drivers get updated for my JF V30/ 2GB. In the device manager it is showing under disk drives as JetFlash T2GJFV30 Usb Device where as in other devices it still shows unknown device.When i click on my computer its not showing up in disk drives. I use windows vista dell xps M1330. Pls help me its really frustating
- I got a flash drive from a business convention (dad gave it to me)in the corner it has the little drive thingy with the green dot says installing deviceit installs the USB Drivethen Mass storage device then it saysMicrosoft WPD FileSystem Volume Driver..... Waiting for user inputcan anyone help me
- when i do it I get an error when installing but i have vista home basic does anyone have other ideas
- Thanks for this detailed recap, and for the entertainment!
Off I went to see if I could follow your path... Mind you, yesterday I was flailing trying to get my new flash drive installed and working. I have Vista Personal on the kids' computer, and it recognized it without hesitation - ReadyBoosting like a pro. Big benefit! Here I am on Vista Professional, and nada...
Ok, so it's the next day. I plugged it in, and... um, it installed it. That left me someone pleased, dazed, and confused.
I did run JKDefrag yesterday, but other than that, I just turned on my computer after having it powered down for about 14 hours.
No, it's not letting me do any ReadyBoost yet, but I have 3GB RAM, and I've read that I wouldn't get a benefit from it anyway.
Vista does not reconize cameraI'm in disbelief that this is still a problem. There still has been no patch for it, other than the hotfix. And the hotfix refuses to install! When is Microsoft going to get around to fixing the new hardware driver problem? Vista has been out over a year now. How long are we supposed to use an operating system that can't use any extra hardware?
Hi there,
I am not very 'computerfied' and have had an acer vista basic home laptop for 3 months. everything has worked fine until now. I have plugged my camera in today to upload and nothing happened. the usb lead is connecting to the device but the computer is not recognising it. i also tried connecting both my phones at the same happened. the usbs connected to the device but nothing happens. i thought my software for the phone was out of date, so downloaded it from samsung again, and it still didnt work. so i kept thinking i had done something wrong and tried again but the same thing. the software is there, the usb connects to the device but the computer is playing dumb as if nothin is there! what is wrong with it! is there a driver i can download or something? or a way of restoring without losing all my stuff? thank alot sorry for the confusing waffle!! x
DennisTan wrote: Manage to find a more permanent solution that worked for me.
After you insert a USB device, a thumbdrive in my case:
- do a manual search for drivers and point to c:\windows\winsxs
- Vista will show some warning about drivers not being signed or something, ignore and click continue
After 3 weeks of searching for a fix from many forums this option finally worked for me, can now access all USB thumbdrives and external disk.
System: Apple Macbook Intel Penryn 2.1MHz running Mac OS X Leopard & Vista Home Premium on Boot Camp.Thanks much, Dennis. I have tried about 30 of the fixes in this forum and others and this worked perfectly for me. I was having problems with a thumb drive and also with my Olympus digital camera. I have probably spent 10 hours on this bull ***. It is ridiculous that Microsoft has not published a simple fix for this. There are about 1000 forums out there that discuss this problem so it becomes a trial and error situation and you can't know which one is going to work until you go through each one -- and some of them take quite some time.
Again, thank you -- my problem is finally solved!
DennisTan wrote: Hi,
I posted a solution that was useful to some people, here it is again:
After you insert a USB device, a thumbdrive in my case:
- do a manual search for drivers and point to c:\windows\winsxs
- Vista will show some warning about drivers not being signed or something, ignore and click continueNo need to mess around with the registry....
Dennis
Hi,
I did this and it seemed to install the driver just fine (comes up on my computer as just being called USB Mass Storage), but when I put my USB stick in it says I need the driver software for 'USB DISK 2.0 USB Device'. Are these the same thing and it just hasn't worked or is it something different I need to be looking for.
LauraAt the risk of appearing stupid, how do I do a manual search for drivers and will this work for windows os?
Update: My computer (Vista Home) would not reconize my Olympus camera.
After contacting Olympus support, they directed me to upgrade to Olympus Master 2, which by the way is a free upgrade.
No more problems with USB and cameras.
Hi Idon't Know Why I Shoul Find This Problem Solution Here !!! (!!! Why Microsoft Didn't Have Effective Solution Like This!!!)
http://teknobabble.wordpress.com/2007/08/18/vista-driver-problems-installing-a-usb-media-reader-a-solution/#comment-396
Just Poin Install Dir To :
C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository
And It Works Nice .
- I am trying to install a Netgear usb wireless adaptor wpn111 which is vista compatable, but vista cant find the driver.
I installed the adaptor on XP computer no problems. Kocmar wrote: I have smilar problem.I have a toshiba laptop with vista home edition (32 b).I have linked my canon ip4200 pixma printer to my laptop and the answer was "usb device not recognized".I tried a lot of way but i couldn't solve these problem.
Is there any master who can solve this Vista problem..
thnks
troyjadams wrote: I had the same problem with several machines. This is how I resolved it:
Steps to resolve USB Storage Device problem with Vista
1. In the run command (Start menu bar) type "regedit" to bring up the Registry Editor.
2. In Registry Editor, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
3. In the details pane, double-click DevicePath.
4. Add a semi-colon to end of the existing text, and then add the path to %SystemRoot%\System32. The result should be similar to: %SystemRoot%\inf;%SystemRoot%\System32
Do not remove the %SystemRoot%\inf file path from the DevicePath registry entry.
5. Click OK to save the new value, and then close Registry Editor.
6. Delete “INFCACH.1” FROM C:\Windows and C:\Windows\Inf Directories (if it exists)
7. Ensure that there is a copy of the usbstor.inf file in C:\Windows\Inf
If there isn’t – follow the below steps:a) From another Vista system (copy it out of another Vista system and copy it directly into the C:\Windows\inf directory
OR
b) From the problem machine, run Command Prompt ( as administrator). From C:\ do a dir usbstor.inf /s . Wherever the file is found, go to that directory and copy all the files located in that directory to C:\Windows\inf directory
8. Open device manager, uninstall all unknown devices (right click, uninstall) so they all disappear from the list
9. Reboot the computer
10. Plug the device in (the drivers will now install and the device will be usable!)
I tried this solution, but right when my computer started from the reboot, it automatically installed an "Unknown Device" and nothing was connected when it happened. I've been having this USB problem for about two months. The weird thing is I don't have SP1 installed because of some install error that stops it from installing onto my computer. I got a Toshiba Satellite A Series with Vista "Basic".....
i just wanna ask why i cant delete INFCACH.1- None of the solutions worked for me, but this one from Exiles posted on 03 Mar 2008, 9:28 AM UTC here :
http://forums.microsoft.com/technet/showpost.aspx?postid=2505738&siteid=17&sb=0&d=1&at=7&ft=11&tf=0&pageid=1
Just assign a drive letter to all USB - Sticks, Card - Readers.....
Regards
Michael - i just joined this forum to give thanks.
it worked for me .. may be PCTester's solution !
i did many things described here before i finally checked if it's working... so pretty much unsure what was the exact problem.
anyways, thanks to each & everyone.