HP Pen drive not being detected in Windows after being made into bootable Ubuntu install drive

My HP250W 8gb USB pen drive is not detecting only on my Windows OS. But it is detecting on side-by-boot Ubuntu and also on other machines regardless of the OS. Other pen drives also detecting in my Windows. With these facts, I'm pretty sure that there is no complaints in my USB ports and the pen drive.

PS: It stopped detecting in Windows only after I used my pen drive as a bootable Ubuntu installer.

I smell there is something wrong with registry. But couldn't say for sure.

Babu

Posted 2012-12-24T18:14:35.263

Reputation: 123

1Is it displaying in the device manager (type "Device manager" into start search, then press enter)? – Jakob Weisblat – 2012-12-24T18:47:08.983

Remove pen drive, do a real clean using USB Oblivion, reboot, plug in drive and see if it's detected.

– Karan – 2012-12-24T18:51:46.447

Is it formatted with a Linux-specific filesystem? If the drive is formatted ext2/3/4 (like most linux hard drives are), then Windows will not be able to read it. If you used it as a Ubuntu drive, that could be the case. – Moshe Katz – 2012-12-24T19:58:38.277

@MosheKatz: That question's already been asked and answered below. – Karan – 2012-12-24T20:58:08.750

@Jake223 Thanks! I checked the device manager and their my pen drive was showing with '?' mark. I installed the driver again by right clicking properties and it's detecting now. – Babu – 2012-12-25T09:51:34.760

Answers

-1

Look at the device manager (Start, "device manager") and see if the drive shows up there in windows. If it does, you should be able to reinstall the driver and reformat it if necessary.

Jakob Weisblat

Posted 2012-12-24T18:14:35.263

Reputation: 926

It stopped detecting in Windows only after I used my pen drive as a bootable Ubuntu installer.

Looks like the USB drive's formatted to a filesystem Windows can't recognise. Format it from Windows or by using Windows' disk manangement tool or from within Linux.

sudo mkfs.vfat -I /dev/sdc

where /dev/sdc is the device corresponding to the pendrive.

You can get the device by typing dmesg | tail after inserting the USB drive & examining the device

sathya@caldeum:~$ dmesg |tail
[ 9921.681164] sdc: Write Protect is off
[ 9921.681174] sdc: Mode Sense: 23 00 00 00
[ 9921.681178] sdc: assuming drive cache: write through
[ 9921.709138] SCSI device sda: 4030464 512-byte hdwr sectors (2064 MB)
[ 9921.720951] sdc: Write Protect is off
[ 9921.720963] sdc: Mode Sense: 23 00 00 00
[ 9921.720967] sdc: assuming drive cache: write through
[ 9921.721225] sdc:
[ 9921.727896] sd 0:0:0:0: Attached scsi removable disk sdc

Sathyajith Bhat

Posted 2012-12-24T18:14:35.263

Reputation: 58 436

1I've done all the format possibilities from Ubuntu and Windows. It's even detecting in other's Windows installation without any itches. – Babu – 2012-12-24T18:33:03.370