FAT(32) media sometimes accessible, sometimes not -- strange solutionfound

[Percival P. Cassidy]

I wrote earlier of a problem on one machine with XP Home SP3. It would
not read floppies of FAT32-formatted thumb drives that were readable on
other machines. I could format a floppy on this machine, but DIR claimed
that it did not have a recognizable file system. RMB -> Properties
showed the file system as RAW.

Now I find that this happens only if the machine is booted with no
FAT32-formatted media attached. If I boot up with a FAT32-formatted
external drive or thumb drive in place, it can read them and will
continue to be able to read FAT(32) media even when the one(s) present
at boot time has/have been detached.

Is this behavior normal? If not, how do I remedy it?

Perce

 

[Uwe Sieber]

Re: FAT(32) media sometimes accessible, sometimes not -- strangesolution found

Percival P. Cassidy wrote:
> I wrote earlier of a problem on one machine with XP Home SP3. It would
> not read floppies of FAT32-formatted thumb drives that were readable on
> other machines. I could format a floppy on this machine, but DIR claimed
> that it did not have a recognizable file system. RMB -> Properties
> showed the file system as RAW.
>
> Now I find that this happens only if the machine is booted with no
> FAT32-formatted media attached. If I boot up with a FAT32-formatted
> external drive or thumb drive in place, it can read them and will
> continue to be able to read FAT(32) media even when the one(s) present
> at boot time has/have been detached.
>
> Is this behavior normal? If not, how do I remedy it?

I have seen such reports before but I've never
seen a cause or a solution. I have NTFS only
computers without a floppy drive, and there is
no problem with FAT formatted USB drives under
XP SP2+SP3.

Creating a very small FAT formatted partition on
the internal drive and removing it's drive letter
would be a cure.


Uwe

 

[Percival P. Cassidy]

Re: FAT(32) media sometimes accessible, sometimes not -- strangesolution found

On 02/15/10 07:29 pm, I wrote:

> I wrote earlier of a problem on one machine with XP Home SP3. It would
> not read floppies of FAT32-formatted thumb drives that were readable on
> other machines. I could format a floppy on this machine, but DIR claimed
> that it did not have a recognizable file system. RMB -> Properties
> showed the file system as RAW.
>
> Now I find that this happens only if the machine is booted with no
> FAT32-formatted media attached. If I boot up with a FAT32-formatted
> external drive or thumb drive in place, it can read them and will
> continue to be able to read FAT(32) media even when the one(s) present
> at boot time has/have been detached.
>
> Is this behavior normal? If not, how do I remedy it?

OK, I think I found the real problem: the sptd.sys file left behind
after an apparently incomplete uninstallation of Daemon Tools, a utility
that allows an .iso file to be treated as a CD or DVD.

I had to download the stand-alone Daemon Tools installer and select the
Uninstall option. Running the uninstall process that had been installed
along with the original installation apparently had not been entirely
successful.

Perce