Pen drive blocked-disabled at office or college computer – Unblock it

Posted by Abhishek in how to fix 

11

Jun

Trouble:

We have observed this problem at may places that you need some data on your pen drive but the USB drive or pen drive does not work. Windows gives a notification

New mass storage driver

“Found new hardware, USB Mass Storage Device, please install drivers for it.”

 

Windows will now show a New Hardware Wizard to install the drivers. Lets see in details how we can fix this problem.

 

Fix:

There are more than one ways in which the USB drives are disabled by Administrators at offices or colleges or schools. These methods are:

 

1. By Disabling USB Ports from Device Manager.

2. By Tweaking Registry values for USB Mass Storage Devices.

3. By Un-installing the USB Mass Storage Drivers.

 

We will see how to fix all these situations one by one. But before you begin, you must have administrator rights on that computer to fix the issue. If you don’t have the rights, see this post on getting admin rights on windows computer.

 

Lets go one by one for the solution now.

Unlock USB ports from device manager:

 

 

i) Go to Start > Run, in run prompt type “devmgmt.msc” and press enter. This will open device manager.

ii) Go to Universal Serial bus Controller. See if there are any red colored cross? If yes, right click and enable those USB Ports.

Enable USB at Device manager

Now try and use the pen drive. If it works fine, then great, else read the next two steps also.

 

Correct Registry Value for USB Mass Storage device

 

 

i) Go to Start > Run , type “regedit” and press enter, this will open registry editor.

ii) Navigate to the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR

registry chane to make USB mass storage work

iii) Double-click on the “Start” key to modify its value, change the value to 3 and press OK.

 

Now remove and connect the pen drive again, it should work fine, if it does not, then it means the drivers are missing. Follow the steps below to solve the issue.

 

Install USB Mass Storage Device drivers

 

 

In case the USB Mass Storage drivers are not installed, windows will prompt you to install the driver. In such a case, windows will launch Hardware Update Wizard. If you have USB Mass storage drivers, you can install it and restart the computer, it should work. If not, you can download the USB Mass Storage drivers here. Download and uznip the driver files on your desktop.

i) In hardware update wizard, Select the option to install the driver from a specific location and click next.

Hardware update wizard

ii) Now on this screen, click browse and select the path on which you have un-zipped the drivers and press ok.

NOTE: Windows may give you a warning that the drivers has not passed Windows logo testing, so stop installation or Continue anyway, Select Continue anyway to complete installation.


 

continue anyways

 

Now restart your computer and re-insert your pen drive, it should now work.

Author + Admin: Abhishek Bhatnagar
Hi, I am a Software Engineer by profession and blogger by passion, I write about computer tips and tricks and solutions for computer problems. You can connect with me at twitter or know more about me on www.abhishekbhatnagar.com.

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23 Users Commented In This Post

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Andy says, October 1st, 2008   

My 8Gb pen drive not able to store more than 1 GB and it also takes a lot of time to store the data compared other pen drives. If I try to store data that is more than 1 GB then it creates folders naming 00000, that are not aaccessble. Please help me out

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redankaiah says, October 26th, 2008   

hi friend
in my college using pendrives are blocked.but i want to use. thats why
im going to devmgmt.msc and click the universal serial bus controllers
then rightclick to enable that but i will not get enable option.
only im getting “properties” option.

so pls tell me how to access pendrivers

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khan says, November 16th, 2008   

hi redankaiah.
First open The Device manager,then
click the “universal serial bus controllers”
then find out which port you need to use in your college system.
then “right click in a “USB ROOT HUB” now you get a properties option. click the “properties option”
Now you get a “USB ROOT HUB PROPERTIES” windows .
Now you clik a “General Tab” in a “USB ROOT HUB PROPERTIES” windows .In the Bottom of this window you will get a “Device Usage” option.Here you can set the “ENABLE ” option.

I think my post is useful to you

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PANKAJ says, November 30th, 2008   

HOW WE CAN STORE THE WINDOW PASSWORD IN PAN DRIVE

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dildar says, January 12th, 2009   

I have a problem with USB Flash port, our IT administrator has been blocked our USB port because of virus. now i can’t able to install any software and i can’t bring any changes in my laptop because i haven’t sufficient right to do, so please help me how can i will able to enable my USB port with these all restriction.

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Monish says, February 12th, 2009   

I have tried each and every thing tell by you all but nothing works but when i see my driver information by “Driver MSInfo.Document”

c:\winnt\system32\drivers\usbhub.sys Kernel Driver TRUE Manual Running OK Normal FALSE TRUE

c:\winnt\system32\drivers\usbhub20.sys Kernel Driver TRUE Manual Running OK Normal FALSE TRUE

c:\winnt\system32\drivers\usbstor.sys Kernel Driver FALSE Disabled Stopped OK Normal FALSE FALSE

help me out how can i access the USB drives

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Deyaa Addeen Fahmy Shedeed says, February 20th, 2009   

Thanks.

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Amarnath S.R. says, March 5th, 2009   

Thanks a lot abhishek..I badly needed this..

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chirag says, March 6th, 2009   

When i insert pen drive in my college computer than it appears the black screen and show title that USB lock and PC will shut down in 20 second and if i keep inserted pen drive it shuts down otherwise not

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sunil ranasinghe says, May 8th, 2009   

I cant install win98 pen drivers kingston/DT100/4GB.
SUNIL RANASINGHE.

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keerthy says, June 3rd, 2009   

i have installed virtual cdrom in my windows xp service pack2
after i have uninstalled the virtual cdrom, when i insert any pen drive it displays virtual cdrom h:
how can i change any registry problem.

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Prana says, June 18th, 2009   

i am using a company provided laptop but recently company has installed a symantec antivirus thru this software they block a pen drive access. i tried to qctivate it thru Registry but thru registry its alrady enable.

now how to enable pen drive

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Pranav says, June 20th, 2009   

I am using company owned laptop but administeator hass disabled my Pen drive access. i have used regedit technique but still pen drive is not working.They recently updated symantec Antivirus in my system and by using antivirus they block our access.

please help me

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nmurthy says, June 21st, 2009   

I want to know is is possible and if so how to connect the pen drive directly to the mobile to use it as memory card directly and access the files directly. I tried, but it is not accessing. Pls. explain. Thanks.

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sachin says, August 3rd, 2009   

hi friend
in my college using pendrives are blocked.but i want to use. thats why
im going to devmgmt.msc and click the universal serial bus controllers
then rightclick to enable that but i will not get enable option.
only im getting “properties” option.
i’m not the administrator of the computer…i have a limited account..
so pls tell me how to access pendrivers

mygif
horse says, August 21st, 2009   

my friend i am using an official laptop recenty the ho people took the remote access and they did something by which i am not able to use my web cam which runs throught the usb port as it is external cam nor i am able to connect my mobile with the laptop using the usb port kindly help so that i can use both the things without letting in the knowledge of the it people kindly remember that i dont have the adm pswd so teell how to handle it
kindly mail me the solution
regards

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kovid says, August 24th, 2009   

Hi ,
when I tried your solution, it says that the drivers are corrupted and unable to use my usb,

I have given the location of the usb drivers by using your zip file.
I have updated the registry entry also.

I have got admin rights to the PC
but it has got sp3 installed , ie xp

how to go about it

are there any other driver files
regards

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Ravikant says, September 23rd, 2009   

USB does not recognised in win xp.

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sale says, October 5th, 2009   

I have a problem with USB Flash port, our IT administrator has been blocked our USB port because of virus. now i can’t able to install any software and i can’t bring any changes in my comp because i haven’t sufficient right to do, so please help me how can i will able to enable my USB port with these all restriction.

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Hammet says, October 18th, 2009   

Hi,
Firstly I thank your valuable info.
Our IT administrator has recently locked the USB ports in our network, so the devices are readable ot writable, besides when I wanna change the device managers settings it alerts that the user does not have enough autority to modify the setting, I beleive we are out of access to the registry am I right? pls. let me know if there is a way to write on the flash memories?

Thank you in advance.

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KARAN says, November 7th, 2009   

THANKS YAAR …UR OWSAM

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KARAN says, November 7th, 2009   

one more thing i would like ask u ..i have a 8 gb transend pendrive some i got a error …this drive is write protected ….could u plz help he wht kind of prob is this …plz help me bro

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sara says, November 9th, 2009   

When I try saving something to my flash drive a error message pops up that says “this is write protected”, and it will not let me save anything to it. I also tried updating my ipod and a message came up saying something similar, and would not allow my ipod to be updated. Someone please help!

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