USB Flash Drive

Kekerusey · December 09, 2010, 04:24:33 PM

OK,

I have an interesting problem with a USB flash drive which I just bought off eBay (and it's entirely possible that that's the problem).

16GB fairly cheap US flash drive ... seemed to work AOK first time but in my infinite wisdom (HRH) I decided to format it as NTFS. That failed (and has subsequently failed at command prompt level). I formatted it at default FAT32 (command prompt after I had an issue with formatting it, outside of computer management, under my work laptop's Vista OS) and that seemed to work OK.

I copied files (a directory structure) to it and that's when it started acting weird ... some of the files and directories didn't get there but were somehow still there because the space was used (fairly obvious because I was copying large video files and the amount of space used equated to the amount copied only many files were missing.

The final issue was that these files which worked on my laptop (and still do) ... appeared to copy OK but when copied off would not play.

I figure this has got to have something to do with how I've formatted the drive (either that or as implied above, it's just cheap eBay cr**) so if anyone has any ideas as to how I should format the drive (for use under Windows) please can you let me know?

Keke

Sіr. Ηaxalot · December 09, 2010, 04:32:04 PM

Right clicking and then formatting through the built in GUI formatting tool should do the work.

It could be a fake drive though, one that is marked as 16GB, and report 16GB, but the real flash memory is much smaller, so it will begin to act funny if you overfill it. I don't know how common that is though.

bommel · December 09, 2010, 04:34:52 PM

Quote from: Sir. Haxalot on December 09, 2010, 04:32:04 PM
It could be a fake drive though, one that is marked as 16GB, and report 16GB, but the real flash memory is much smaller, so it will begin to act funny if you overfill it. I don't know how common that is though.

I've heard stories about such devices too, but not by first hand...

Sіr. Ηaxalot · December 09, 2010, 04:37:49 PM

Quote from: bommel on December 09, 2010, 04:34:52 PM
Quote from: Sir. Haxalot on December 09, 2010, 04:32:04 PM
It could be a fake drive though, one that is marked as 16GB, and report 16GB, but the real flash memory is much smaller, so it will begin to act funny if you overfill it. I don't know how common that is though.
I've heard stories about such devices too, but not by first hand...

Exactly, I've head stories of those, but I've never got one myself, so I don't know exactly how it works. Except that if you find a 512GB Flashdrive from china on eBay for $1, it's probably fake ^^

bommel · December 09, 2010, 04:42:08 PM

Quote from: Sir. Haxalot on December 09, 2010, 04:37:49 PM
Exactly, I've head stories of those, but I've never got one myself, so I don't know exactly how it works. Except that if you find a 512GB Flashdrive from china on eBay for $1, it's probably fake ^^

srane ^^

I would give formatting another try. I own a flash drive that is broken. I can copy files but in maybe 60& of the cases the files are corrupted

Swoka Ikran · December 09, 2010, 07:23:30 PM

Quote from: Sir. Haxalot on December 09, 2010, 04:32:04 PM
It could be a fake drive though, one that is marked as 16GB, and report 16GB, but the real flash memory is much smaller, so it will begin to act funny if you overfill it. I don't know how common that is though.

This is fairly common for Chinese knockoffs.

Friend bought one of these...it was an 8GB drive on eBay for $5. It didn't work correctly if more than ~1GB was copied to it. Disassembly and google revealed the reason: the IC inside was 1GB.

Kekerusey · December 11, 2010, 05:45:08 PM

Guy on my home forum gave me a link to this page: http://www.passmark.com/support/bit_fake_USB_detection.htm

I ran the software in evaluation mode and got:

QuoteData Verify failure
This is a serious error that indicates that the data read from the disk is NOT the same as the data that was written to the disk. This could indicate a hardware error

So I wrote to the seller:

QuoteI'm afraid the USB flash drive I bought has failed, it seemed OK initially but later failed to read back files. When copying large files (a 14Gb directory tree) only some files were present (several empty directories) yet 14Gb used disk space was reported by Windows (tested on XP pro, Vista Pro and Windows 7 64 pro).

The drive fails using Passmark's BurninTest software (a "Data Verify failure") ... according to their website, "This is a serious error that indicates that the data read from the disk is NOT the same as the data that was written to the disk. This could indicate a hardware error" ... it is also regarded as an indication that the drive may not be the capacity it is reporting as. I can send you a copy of the Passmark BurninTest log if you wish.

I believe this drive may be a fake 16Gb & would like a refund. If this is not an acceptable solution or I do not hear from you by end-of-play Tuesday I will escalate the issue to eBay.

Judging by the lack of response so far I'm guessing that on Wednesday morning I will be doing exactly what I have said I will do.

Keke

Seze · December 11, 2010, 10:52:24 PM

Best of luck with that...

Human No More · December 12, 2010, 07:08:15 AM

FAT32 does not support files >= 4GB.

Kekerusey · December 12, 2010, 08:46:40 AM

Quote from: Human No More on December 12, 2010, 07:08:15 AMFAT32 does not support files >= 4GB.

True enough ... bit of a problem with large DVD images!

Keke

Kemaweyan · December 12, 2010, 10:57:24 AM

Quote from: Kekerusey on December 12, 2010, 08:46:40 AM
Quote from: Human No More on December 12, 2010, 07:08:15 AMFAT32 does not support files >= 4GB.

True enough ... bit of a problem with large DVD images!

Keke

Or with movies in HD. For example 1080p BDRip of Avatar is a single mkv file 21Gb

Kekerusey · December 12, 2010, 01:10:53 PM

Quote from: Kemaweyan on December 12, 2010, 10:57:24 AMOr with movies in HD. For example 1080p BDRip of Avatar is a single mkv file 21Gb

Not that big a problem for me coz I don't download movies, TV on ocassion (mostly when I've missed an episode and it isn't likely to be repeated) but not movies ... I prefer to buy them. ANyway, if I did, I'd just use my portable drive which has a 1TB drive at present.

Keke

Carborundum · December 12, 2010, 01:53:01 PM

Quote from: Kekerusey on December 12, 2010, 01:10:53 PM
Quote from: Kemaweyan on December 12, 2010, 10:57:24 AMOr with movies in HD. For example 1080p BDRip of Avatar is a single mkv file 21Gb

Not that big a problem for me coz I don't download movies, TV on ocassion (mostly when I've missed an episode and it isn't likely to be repeated) but not movies ... I prefer to buy them. ANyway, if I did, I'd just use my portable drive which has a 1TB drive at present.

Keked

I don't download movies either, but I still have 150 GB worth of Avatar BDRips on my hard drive.

Kekerusey · December 13, 2010, 01:45:20 PM

Quote from: Carborundum on December 12, 2010, 01:53:01 PMI don't download movies either, but I still have 150 GB worth of Avatar BDRips on my hard drive.

Unfortunately I couldn't rip a bluray disk if I tried on account of not possessing a PC one although I have been looking at some but wasn't sure what I'd need one for ... you've just given me one reason

Keke