[SOLVED] USB flash drive help

[jtoya85]

So I've had this 8GB flash drive since shortly after high school and I've used it mainly for installing Windows whenever I needed to. I have a Seagate HDD that I noticed could use a firmware update, with their own tool might I add, and I went to their site and got all the software they recommended. With their poor instructions on how to install the firmware I got to an understanding of using one of the pieces of software to install some files to said USB drive and that worked totally fine. After everything was on the USB I could've sworn that the instructions said to start a program from the ones from Seagate and I did, I didn't notice anything happen so I tried it again, still nothing. All of a sudden the USB drive became unrecognized and the device manager started saying that the drive was an "Unknown USB Device (Invalid Device Descriptor)." I looked around for a few hours for "fixes" that didn't work like uninstalling the device, restarting after doing that or just by itself, running a check disk, changing USB ports(both 2.0 and 3.x), trying the USB drive in my laptop, nothing worked. I don't think the drive is dead because wouldn't it just NOT even be seen to give the error?

I know 8 gigs is nothing by today's standards, and I can go get a 32 gig+ for really cheap, but I already have it and it had been working beautifully until this incident. If anyone else can think of anything else to try I would be grateful.

 

[Super8731]

Try using diskpart . Use this command:

list disk

when your flash drive is shown there maybe as disk 1 if you only have 1 hard drive in computer.

select disk <disk number of your flash drive>

assign letter <Letter of your choice>

See if it helps.

 

[jtoya85]

the flash drive isn't even showing up

 

[hang-the-9]

Not seen in any system, it's dead. Flash drives are not very reliable, it's not odd when they fail.

 

[jtoya85]

But it is being seen in device manager, does that still mean it's dead?

 

[jtoya85]

Does anyone have any clarification on this? doing the command prompt doesn't show the drive, as advised by Super8731, but the Device Manager still tells me that it is an "Unknown USB Device (Invalid Device Descriptor)."

 

[hang-the-9]

But it is being seen in device manager, does that still mean it's dead?

Device manager may see the USB electronics, but the actual flash memory may be bad, or some other part is bad. It's like if you get stabbed in the back, you may know you have a sharp painful thing there but would not know if it was a steak knife, a bowie knife, a sword, etc... Same thing with this, the computer knows something is connected, but not exactly what.

 

[USAFRet]

and it had been working beautifully until this incident

Electronics work, right up until the moment they don't.

This one has seen that moment.