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USB Flash Drives
Universal Serial Bus (USB) flash drives are currently the most common form of portable data storage device. Questions about USB drives belong here.
1,651 Questions
How can I get information off of my flash drive?
If you are using a fairly recent edition of Windows and have the appropriate drivers and a working USB port. Plug in the flash drive to a USB port. If you are not prompted to open up the folder then select My Computer either located on your desktop or immediately in your start menu at the bottom of the screen. There should be a number of drives available to choose from, the new one and probably the last one will be the one you want. On some editions it will identify it as portable media.
What are the advantage and disadvantage of primary storage device?
the advantage of primary storage device is
1. a store data temporary when a computer is on example ROM and RAM
2.Is used to store data while a computer is turn on or in use
3.It help to determine the number of characters entered on a computer when a processed data
How much is 4 GB storage in flash drive?
4 GB stands for 4 billion bytes. A byte is bits. A bit, is the smallest unit of information in a computer, it has two possible values, 0 or 1. Put 8 of them together and you have a byte which can hold 256 values. The computer billion is not equal to a decimal billion. A KB, or kilobyte, is 1024 bytes, rather than a 1000. So 4 GB is actually 4,294,967,296 bytes.
USB is an acronym for Universal Serial Bus, the successor to earlier computer peripheral connections such as parallel and serial ports. It is an interface (like Firewire) that connects a wide variety of plug and play devices to the computer. These devices can be connected and disconnected without the need of a restart of shutdown of the PC. USB devices include external HDD's, the USB mouse and keyboard, flash memory devices, and printers.
USB 1.1 is obsolete.
USB 2.0 is currently the most popular interface used.
USB 3.0 is out, but still in its early days.
With each USB version release comes new features, such as backward compatibility with previous standards and speed enhancements.
How do you remove write protection from a mini SD card?
Removing the Write Protection Depends on the Source of the Problem.
Broadly speaking, it can be any of the following scenarios
- There is a write-protection tab on the mini sd card HOLDER. Every time you insert this into your PC or card holder, this tab slides to the write protect position. Either keep resetting, inserting & reinserting until it doesn't slide or tape it down.
- There is nothing wrong with the mini sd card. Simply locate the write protection key and push it.
- The mini sd card has some error: Go for a low level formatting.
- The card has virus: Remove the virus. The link for the steps is present in the related link at the bottom of the article.
There is an easy way to solve this problem: Simply put the yellow lock in the middle of its slider. No sticky tape required, as shown below. But if your still having the same problem i suggest you try the sticky tape.
Problem is only that small moveable yellow lock switch is not making, just put sellotape over it maybe two layers needed to make switch.
Even though what is written below may work, the problem is probably that on the card reader (if you have one) there is a small switch that has lock written on the side. If this is pushed down, the drive is write protected, push it in the opposite direction and it may fix your problem I had the same problem with several cards but eventually found a way around it. DON'T buy a new one!
Make sure the SD card lock is 'off' and then use thin, opaque sticky tape (ie non see-through; eg insulation tape) to cover the whole gap but keep clear of the metal contacts at the back.
Your card should work fine now.
Additional Information:
- Reason #1: The mechanical lock switch accidentally moves to the "locked" position during insertion due to the poor quality of the switch. Hence, by taping it, you are actually preventing the lock switch to travel towards the lock position. i.e. downwards.
- Reason #2: If the above fails, it is likely your SD card reader/writer's fault. But don't discard it or buy a new one yet. Allow me to explain the mechanical design of the SD card lock mechanism. So that you may choose to repair it if you want to. You will need a small paper clip and screw-driver to open your card reader. (Don't proceed if your card reader is still under warranty, please return/exchange with manufacturer) There is a mechanical switch very much like a micro push button (I wish I could show you the picture/drawing). Anyway, depending on the position of the lock switch. You either push or release this micro push button inside the SD card reader.
Due to mechanical wear and tear, or some forceful insertion of the SD card, the micro push button is in its "open" circuit position, i.e. write-protected. In order to make the SD card reader writable, we will need to "close" the circuit. (Note: this is an irreversible process as I will be telling you how to remove the write-protection feature of your SD card reader. Once you do this, you would be unable to use the SD card lock switch to lock your data. So, just be careful not to accidentally delete your data)
To proceed, you need to remove the main circuit board from the SD card reader/writer enclosure. The location of the micro push button switch is the same location as the unlock position of the SD card when inserted in the SD card reader/writer. From the BACK of the exposed SD card reader, insert the unfolded paper clip (same way when you try to poke something like a device reset button) except, that it has to be long enough to allow the micro switch to touch together for contact. Then insert the SD card. Once the contact is "closed", your SD card reader/writer can write again. I understand that without a drawing, this may not be very helpful. Please provide suggestions or better explanation if you can. Thanks.
Or, just tape the lock switch to unlocked. This also works for SD cards in normal size. back up all the files u have on ur card then follow these steps
1. Go to Control Panel
2. Go to Administrative tools
3. Go to Computer management
4. From the tree menu on the left select Disk Management
5. Now on the right side you will have a list of all storage devices connected to your computer. Select the one that is your mini SD card. BE CAREFUL WHEN CHOOSING THIS BECAUSE YOU COULD FORMAT YOUR HARDDRIVE. Double check the name in My Computer
6. Right click on the SD card and select format. A new window will pop up showing format options. Select FAT32 from the file system drop down and check the quick format option and then click on OK
7. Enjoy your mini SD card without that annoying write protection
How do you save emails to thumb drive?
The best way to save email to your hard drive is to convert the email (or emails) to a file type that can be easily stored or moved. There are two common file types for this process: PDF and pst. A pst is created when you use and offline mail client, like Outlook, to backup your email. A PDF can be created from your email in several ways. You can download one of many different PDF printers, or use an online site, to convert and export your emails to PDF for backup. See Sources and Related Links for more information. The benefits of creating a PDF is that most smart phones and tablets are also capable of reading PDF file, while a pst file is the easiest to create when using an offline mail client. Consider looking at the Related Questions on 'How to backup emails?' as this depends on the type of email account and if there is already an offline email client on the hard drive.
Where is drive e on your computer?
The disk drive with the logical drive letter H: can be almost anything; it can be a CD drive, a network share on a server someplace, or a flash drive. It all depends on how you define it.
One of the more common examples of drive letters in the "G" through "J" range are sometimes the multiple slots used by card reader devices. These may include SD chips or CF cards such as might be used by a digital camera.
In many cases, right-clicking on the drive letter in Windows Explorer will give you some information. For example, if "Eject" is one of the options, then this is almost certainly a CD device. Select "Eject", and see which device bay opens.
How many movies can be downloaded in a 2GB pen drive?
That, of course, depends on the size of your flash drive. A typical DVD quality movie would range from 700 Mb to 1 Gb in size. Note that the size mentioned on your flash drive is always a bit more than it can handle!
How you can connect a pen drive card to tv circuit?
You Normally cannot unless you dsing a microprocessor unit similare to older palm computer with Usb Pen Drive Adapter and TV Tuner CArd ... Then transfer image of Pen Drive to TV Screen Via Tuner Card on Micro Palm Computer Adapter ?
Or Just Link you PC to your TV then Us RF Adapter To to as follows :
Pen Card { Possibly USB}
Connect to Computer
Computer Has Add-in TV Tunner / High End Video input/output Card Either Pci, PCI-E v1.X tr 3.X. then out Put HDMI Plugin on rear of PC to input of TV input Remodulateion unit eith Rf Switch Converter / HDMI Switch Conerter with input Antena Line Coaxile and Output Coaxile line to send ectra to TV..
What are the types and capacity of a pen drive?
The storage capacity of a pen depends on its rating. They come in 4 gigabyte up to 64 gigabyte sizes.
Most computer hard-drives are labelled C:
The recovery partition is usually labelled D:
The internal CD or DVD drive is usually labelled E: and
Removeable storage usually gets the label F:
At least - that's how the drives on my laptop are labelled !
USB flash drive does it make computer go faster?
No, Depending on what processor you have and how much ram you have can depend how fast your computer is. also a hard drive RPM speed as well.
Edit: Windows 7 has a feature called ReadyBoost that can increase your RAM by using a USB Flash drive. It only works if your computer would benefit from its use (e.g. you are using a lot of virtual memory, and your hard drive is slower than the USB port). When ReadyBoost is operational, it will increase the speed of your computer by reducing hard drive virtual memory swapping. So the answer is actually "maybe."
How do you save a program to a USB or CD?
While you can install computer software from a CD or DVD onto the local hard disk, you cannot normally reverse this process. Installation typically is more than copying several files into several places, and it is those "other tasks" that cannot easily be reversed. You can uninstall the software through the means provided and re-install it later, provided you still have the installer and all license keys and/or serial numbers. Manually removing portions of some unwanted software by removing or deleting files from the hard disk is NOT RECOMMENDED. At best, the application in question will no longer work. At worst, other applications and components may also suffer from this move. The "other tasks" that are typically done during software installation, in addition to the copying of files and data, include the registration of various aspects of the installed software within the system. Microsoft Word, for example, registeres the .doc file extensions such that you can double-click a .doc file, and Word opens. Many other, more complex, registration steps are typically implemented by modern software.
Is a USB Flash drive an input or an output device?
A USB Flash drive is considered a storage medium. Data can be both read, stored, and sent to / from a USB Flash drive, but it does not in itself input or output any data.
Is a flash drive the same thing as a external memory card?
yes, external memory counts as portable/External Hard drives, USB flash sticks/drives, SD cards, CD's/DVD's and floppy disks (ancient but still count :P). Anything that you can put files,pictures, movies, etc on counts as external memory.
What to do when a usb port on motherboard is failing?
The key to this question is that it is "a port" not all the ports. Updating the BIOS is not likely the best answer. The book this question comes from actually has the answer but many people are not finding it because it is in a blue box. The answer is to disable the port in the BIOS or by jumper and add an expansion card.
<Old answer> upgrade the BIOS or download the latest drivers
What the speed for hi speed USB?
Up to 480Mbits/second, and being increased over time with improvements.
Can you download movies from harddrive to a flashdrive?
Yes. But do to space considerations, as well as the relatively slow speed of writing to a USB drive, you may want to consider a different medium.
Is RAM volatile or non volatile memory?
In prossesor it is volatile but in hard drive it is non-volatile.
Most flash drives are USB. Most modern USB devices are plug-and-play, which means that you simply insert them into an available USB slot, and wait for the computer and windows to recognize it. On the first insert, there may be a driver installation sequence, and you should wait until told that the device is ready to use. On the second insert, it generally only takes a few seconds, and there are a pair of ascending beeps to indicate that it is ready.
Usually, a flash drive appears as a mounted folder on your computer's file system. Depending on your settings, you may automatically be taken to a folder view. If not, go to Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer) and navigate My Computer to find it.
Don't forget to properly eject the device, to force all pending writes to be completed before removing the device. You can do this by clicking on the USB icon in the Status Tray, near the clock, looking like two green arrows or, in Windows 7, an upwards pointing triangle that takes you to several icons, one of which allows you to "eject removable media". If you get a message saying that you can not eject right now, make sure all explorer windows are closed and that all applications and data files on the drive are closed, and try again.
What is meant by low level formatting?
Low-level formatting is the process of outlining the positions of the tracks and sectors on the hard disk, and writing the control structures that define where the tracks and sectors are. This is often called a "true" formatting operation, because it really creates the physical format that defines where the data is stored on the disk. The first time that a low-level format ("LLF") is performed on a hard disk, the disk's platters start out empty. That's the last time the platters will be empty for the life of the drive. If an LLF is done on a disk with data on it already, the data is permanently erased (save heroic data recovery measures which are sometimes possible).
If you've explored other areas of this material describing hard disks, you have learned that modern hard disks are much more precisely designed and built, and much more complicated than older disks. Older disks had the same number of sectors per track, and did not use dedicated controllers. It was necessary for the external controller to do the low-level format, and quite easy to describe the geometry of the drive to the controller so it could do the LLF. Newer disks use many complex internal structures, including zoned bit recording to put more sectors on the outer tracks than the inner ones, and embedded servo data to control the head actuator. They also transparently map out bad sectors. Due to this complexity, all modern hard disks are low-level formatted at the factory for the life of the drive. There's no way for the PC to do an LLF on a modern IDE/ATA or SCSI hard disk, and there's no reason to try to do so.
Older drives needed to be re-low-level-formatted occasionally because of the thermal expansion problems associated with using stepper motor actuators. Over time, the tracks on the platters would move relative to where the heads expected them to be, and errors would result. These could be corrected by doing a low-level format, rewriting the tracks in the new positions that the stepper motor moved the heads to. This is totally unnecessary with modern voice-coil-actuated hard disks.
More input from FAQ Farmers:
- The only time you could low level format a new voice coil hard drive if it you would have bad sector that are not being taken care by the hard disk logic. Most of the time you will have a utility to do this task that comes from the manufacturer of the drive and it will not work with any other brand. Maxtor and late quantum has a utility called Max blast plus and power max and others. They are used to diagnostic but also to fix at the low level.
- Those utilities can many times restore an unstable drive by reformatting at the low level and blocking out bad sector. Of course if the RLL (magnetic data) is low because the read write hardware is defective it will do no good. If the surface was damaged it could give the drive a new life.
- There is also an application called Spinrite (by Steve Gibson) It's not a low level format in itself but it reads and rewrites the data (at the low level) while analyzing the disk. Spinrite is over 17 years old and has been updated to the new technology ever since version 1 (current version is 6). I's a very respected software by all the hard disk service technician around the world. Steeve Gibson is one (if not the best) of the best hard disk low level white hat hacker in the world.
- No software of any sort can truly low-level format today's modern drives. The ability to low-level format hard drives was lost back in the early 1990's when disc surfaces began incorporating factory written "embedded servo data". If you have a very old drive that can truly be low-level reformatted, SpinRite v5.0 will do that for you ( But this is only possible on very old non-servo based MFM and RLL drives with capacities up to a few hundred megabytes. You can still read and write from that "so called" low level but not in the same way it was original;y possible then with old drives.
How many 700mb movies can you store on a 4gb flash drive?
700MB is the size of a CD. A DVD will hold 4.7GB. A full length movie will usually be between 3 and 4GB. Movies can be compressed to a smaller size but at the cost of viewing quality.
The answer to this question lies within your OS (Operating System). If you have Windows XP, plug your flash drive directly into any available USB port on your PC (Personal Computer), then double-click "My Computer". There should be an extra drive letter listed to represent your flash drive. I believe the same goes for Windows ME & Macintosh. I do know however that Windows '98 requires driver software to make a flash drive recognize. It is recommended to first install the software, reboot, then plug in the flash drive upon bootup. Should this order not be followed, problems may occur when attempting to recognize, store or retrieve data.
Install the USB Flash Drive:
Plug the USB flash drive into a free USB port on your laptop (it is an approximately 1/2" slot, either on the side or back of the laptop).
Windows XP operating system should recognize it. It may ask you what you want to do with it. Select "Open folder to view files using Windows Explorer" and click OK.
Operating system should assign it a drive letter (see the title of the Windows Explorer window that opens).
Use the USB Flash Drive:
In Windows Explorer, click Folders button on the menu bar to show the installed drives on the left pane of the screen.
To copy a file from c:\ (hard drive) to flash drive:
Find the file you wish to copy on the c:\ drive.
Right-click it and select Copy.
Right-click the location on the new drive where you wish to paste the file, and select Paste.
(File should now appear in desired location.)
Uninstall the USB Flash Drive:
Close Windows Explorer and any applications (MS Word) that may be using the flash drive.
In the lower right corner of the screen is the System Tray. In it is an icon that when moused over reads "Safely Remove Hardware". Click this icon once to display list of devices installed.
Click the device you wish to remove (probably e:\ drive, will probably be described as a mass storage device).
Notification will appear in the lower right corner saying that it is safe to remove the drive.
(If you open Windows Explorer at this point, it should no longer show this drive in the drive list.)
How do you copy flash drive?
Insert the flash for recognition by the computer. Usually a window will open by itself showing contents of flash. If space permits, open another file and copy what you will by "Drag and drop" or right click "send to" and highlight the flash. Most blink to show files being copied. If it is full, can transfer by "Drag and drop" to the computer of highlight what you want to delete and hit "delete". Sometimes must also erase from recycle file to get rid of items.
More Information:
Your best bet is going to be following the instructions that come with your flash drive. If you haven't bought one yet and are just curious do a google.com search for "flash drive" and look through the results for a computer or tech site where you can read about them.
How To Use a USB Flash Drive
First, if you don't already have one, buy a USB flash Drive.
Second, put the flash drive into the USB slot. Choose what picture, music, e.t.c that you want to transfer to another computer. Then you notice that the USB icon appeared on your desktop, you drag your picture, music, e.t.c to that icon. Now you have uploaded your picture, music, e.t.c to your Flash Drive.
Third, on your keyboard in the top right corner you notice the eject button. Click it and then take out your Flash Drive.
Fourth, put the Flash Drive into the other computer, and you notice -once again-the USB icon on your desktop. Now double click the icon and CONGRATS! You now have your picture, music, e.t.c. And you can download it to your hard drive by dragging it to a Folder of your choice. NOTE: DO NOT take out your Flash Drive without pressing the eject button.
How do you download Windows 7 to your USB flash drive?
Hi,
At First u need to check whether u're USB drive has the capacity on minimum 1 GB, because the operating itself will carry upto 680MB-700MB of space.So check it out that then restart u're system
Goto the BIOS in advanced tab enable the USB option.
Make the boot from other (in that select the boot from USB )
Then press F10 or whatever the required save button for your BIOS and press enter then it will automatically start loading u're operating system files.
