[onemulligan]

I bought a new SanDisk Micro with U3 4GB Flash drive. When I put it in a USB port it tells me it needs a driver. Then it can't find one. It ends up in device manager as an unknown device. I even called SanDisk and they had me contact Microsoft for a patch KB937187. I installed it and it still does not work !! Can anyone tell me why? Do I need one made especially for Vista? This doesn't make sense to me. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you

[piyushsingh]

hello!

Does the automatic driver install give any error code ?

Try manually pointing the driver install dialog box to C:windows and see if it works .

Does the windows disk management show the drive ?

Try plugging the drive and then restarting the system and let it install drivers during restart .

Have you tried using this drive in another PC to make sure the drive is working fine ?

Try plugging another usb drive in this PC and see if it has a similar problem .

Problem that you have stated doesnt have a unique solution, you may have to try a lot of things here. Also you havent stated if this is a 32-bit or 64-bit installation.

[rgreen4]

If you want to use it as a U3 device with portable applications, go back to Sandisk. U3 has noted problems with Vista.

The device should still work as a normal flash drive however. U3 flash drives actually open two devices on your computer when inserted. One is the U3 application that shows up in the system tray and the other is as a temporary drive.

Attached is a picture with a message similar to what you probably getting.



Below is attached a snapshot of Windows Explorer showing the device is showing up as Drive F with files on it.



I have even tried formatting the device to no avail as I think the U3 action is in firmware, although I don't know. I just stay away from them now as they are aggrivating, but they do still work as regular flash drives. I got 4 2GB models on sale right before Christmas a year ago, and have two of them in use. I have never taken the other two out of their plastic display packaging.

[onemulligan]

Hi, Thank you for the reply. I am using the 32 Bit version of Vista. The drive works fine in my Macbook. I have tried telling the computer to look in C: and C:Windows and C:Windowssystem and system32 to no avail. When I go to Disk Management , Drives it does show up as a USB device but not working properly. The strange thing is I have a old 256 PNY flash drive and that works fine. Is it possible there is a conflict somewhere?

[VladTheImpaler1990]

I believe that the usb is not compatible for vista, have you tried downloading drivers for it, did the flash come with a cd?

[onemulligan]

I restarted the computer and the flash is still in Unknown Device in Device Manager. It also shows in USB as USB SD Reader with Code 10 Error. When I go to Management the drive shows and when I click on Properties it shows as Cruzer Mico USB flash drive ?? The only thing that opens when I put the drive in is the U3 which shows as a CD Drive L.

[piyushsingh]

[rgreen|~22087] is having a drive of similar brand and u3 firmware is not working properly with vista on his pc also. Although as he stated the drive should work as a normal usb drive . So maybe he can help you more.


Kingston u3 works as normal drive but i have disabled autoplay , so i dont know whether it also leads to errors similar in the above screen shot . So you may try disabling autoplay for usb devices and see if it goes.


rgreen - you may also try disabling autoplay of usb drives and it wont ever show you any errors when installing. I am doing fine that way with kingston u3 drive . Also the firmware cant be removed by normal formatting , but kingston people have now released a small utility "u3 unistall" for clearing that thing up permanently but i havent tried that as the process is irreversible.


For disabling autoplay , just type "autoplay" in the vista menu and you will have all options there for all type of drive. Hope this helps.

[onemulligan]

I want to thank everyone for trying to help. I decided it just wasn't worth going to all the trouble for a flash drive (which should be very easy to use). I returned it today. I bought a Kingston Data Traveler 1GB, inserted in my USB port and it works fine. I'm disappointed in SanDisk, think their flash Micro Drive just doesn't work with Vista. I do think they should address the problem soon. Bad as Vista is we are all going to be stuck with it soon.

[piyushsingh]

I would say you gave up too early . I have a 6yr old 128mb usb 1.1 drive working without any problems in vista . The problem is not vista. Problem is that the usb drive manufacturers have started to load their drives (some models) with crapware just as factory installed oems.

Anyway thats totally your decision, glad to hear that you got the newer drive working.

[onemulligan]

Well I tried for 2 days to get it to work. Even talked to SanDisk for over 30 min. and they couldn't help. I also have an old PNY 256 flash drive that works fine. It just seems to me that some hardware works with Vista and a lot does not. I worked for 2 years on the beta of Windows 95 and at that time nothing worked !! You would think Microsoft would learn from past mistakes. Vista at this time sort of reminds me of Windows ME. Maybe service pack 1 will help. I recently bought a Macbook. I like it, find it easy to use, but I'm sure I will always be a PC User :))

[Evildave]

Have you plugged this device into another computer and seen it work?

If this is a new Flash card and it won't work on two different computers, I'd tag it as 'infant mortality' and get an RMA.

[VladTheImpaler1990]

Evil Dave this problem has been solved, he has returned the flash drive.

Thanks.

Vlad

[rgreen4]

Gentlemen:

I was trying to show, maybe unsucessfully, the problem is not the drive, and it is not Vista. It is the U3 application.

U3 is basically a mini-OS that piggybacks on NT5 (Win2000 and XP) and works fine on those. Apparently it also works in MacOSX which makes sense because it was written when OSX and NT5 were the operating systems for their respective platforms.

The U3 website has a list of applications, both free and paid that run under U3. The idea was you could take the app and you data on a flash drive, insert it in any PC and run your application with its data. It just never really caught on.

I use my drive as a standard USB flash drive, I just ignore the U3 part of it. However, I will admit that my primary flash drive is a PNY 2GB USB2 only flash drive which is normally in my pocket.

[piyushsingh]

the u3 doesnt seem to be compatible with vista - true. But kingston u3 works a bit better on my pc. Though the u3 utility fails to start. But the driver installation part has no error. The san disk u3 seems to be much more incompatible , that some of their u3 drivers are giving driver installation errors with vista and probably leading to drive not showing up(although it shud work as a normal drive) in some cases.