Removing "WriteProtection" of an External drive on Windows 7

1

I'm facing this problem where I'm not able to make any change to my external flash storage drive (I'm saying Flash here because my external hard-drive is fine). I cannot delete any file in it.

It was fine till a few weeks ago. I'm not sure what went wrong. I google'd and got a number of answers. Tried whatever I could but it does not help.

  1. Regedit: Change value of "WriteProtect" to 0 (Zero).

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrrentControlSet\Control\StorageDevicePolicies
    • The key "StorageDrivePolicies"/"WriteProtect" do not exist. So I couldn't change the value of WriteProtect. Note: I checked another laptop, the keys aren't there.
    • On one site it was suggested to manually created the reqd. keys and change the value. I did the same but it didn't work.
    • On another site someone suggested to change the values of all the keys under "USBstor" (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet1/2\Control\USBstor) to 0 (zero). IIRC the keys had 4 sub-keys. Editing/changing the values of the sub-key under "USBstor" key of ControlSet1/2 do not help.

  2. I thought formatting the system would do so I formatted c:. Problem remains unsolved.

  3. Formatting drive is not an option. Someone asked why, the reason is simple: I can't. It's Write Protected and I cannot even format it.

NabJester

Posted 2013-07-25T19:12:54.057

Reputation: 11

What makes you think the drive is write protected? – Ramhound – 2013-07-25T19:39:49.450

the key should be StorageDevicePolicies not StroageDevicePolicies. Also, it looks like your flash drive might be dead – Sathyajith Bhat – 2013-07-26T04:03:34.650

Answers

1

I'm not familiar with the Windows registry, but it sounds like you've explored that side of things.

If formatting the stick is not an option and you can't retrieve the data off the stick when it's plugged into another laptop/Windows machine, my suggestion would be to boot a live copy of a Linux distro e.g Lubuntu using another USB pen drive or CD then plug the stick in and see if you can retrieve whatever data it is that you need. You can then use whatever partitioning software is on the distro to delete and repartition the USB drive.

I'm sure more knowledgeable folk may be able to identify the problem from the info you've posted.

archery1234

Posted 2013-07-25T19:12:54.057

Reputation: 144

It may sound long winded but it'll be a lot quicker than the clean install ('formatted the system') which is what I've assumed you've done. – archery1234 – 2013-07-25T21:04:08.963

Ramhound, when I tried to delete a file in it system throws up an error "Device is write protected". Sathya, I don't think it's dead. Because I'm using it on my phone even now. It's my memory card (faced the same problem with a pendrive). And I can move files (cut/paste) in it to phone memory using my phone itself.

@archery1234 sadly I don't use Linux so I have no clue in mind. And yes I did a clean install of Windows. My question is: is something wrong with my registry? If no then what could be the problem? Would be great if anyone can come forward with a solution. – NabJester – 2013-07-26T06:03:58.450

Ah, so you've got the data off it but it's not usable. Have you tried using the command prompt and fdisk and format tools in Windows 7 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/255867).

– archery1234 – 2013-07-26T10:48:10.373

Asked: 2013-07-25T19:12:54.057

Viewed: 450 times

Active: 2013-11-05T19:30:31.940