just got a new sandisk 2gb flash drive

it all works just fine but when i open u3 (the program that manages the files (came already on flash drive)) and click eject the light on the flash drive stays on and the program freezes

when i go into my computer (after i put the flash drive back into the computer) it says it is in the computer but when i click on it, it brings up a window that says

G:\ refers to a location that is unavailable. It could be on a hard drive on this computer , or on a network. Check to make sur.... (and the useless information goes on and on)

the only way i can get access to the flash drive is forceing a reboot by pressing the button on the case if i try to log off or restart the computer it freezes on the saving settings screen

got any ideas on how to fix this

 

It's quicker to LEFT click on the system tray USB icon and select the relevant USB device (if more than one). Bazza

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i know you can't eject a flash drive but on the program that comes up that come on my flash drive withc is called u3 it tould me to click on that and then go to eject then take out my flash drive... o well i got fed up with it and formated it so now i got a normal flash drive instead of a smart flash drive or so called

 

You might like to format it to NTFS if you are only going to use it on NTFS PC's, as you will probably find that it is not NTFS format, as standard.

 

when i formated it, it only gave me two options FAT32 and FAT and i chose FAT32

so how do i formate it to NTFS and what are the advantages

also what are the advantages to enableing write caching in windows to improve disk performance... does it copy to it faster or...what? i think i heard somewere it has to do somethign with the files being harder to corrupt or something like that

thanks for the help - yusky

 

My previous post tells you how to format USB memory sticks to NTFS.
Just follow the procedure explained in between the

 

ok but you did not tell me what are the advantages to enableing write caching and useing a NTFS format

 

Can't help you on write caching (out of my league) but NTFS has smaller cluster sizes than FAT so less wasted space. On USB flash drives that can be important. Not so important on a 2 gig one.

Another advantage ( and my prime reason for formatting to NTFS) is that I can load comments for each file on my USB drive, particularly for downloads (so you know what the download is), in case the d/l name is meaningless like setup.zip, for example. Bazza

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ok sweet i also have a 1gb mem stick for my psp should i also format it to NTFS

one more thing when i formated the flash drive it gave me a choice for the Allocation unit size... and i left it at defult... do you know what that is, here are the choices for it... 512 bytes 1024 / 2048 / 4096 bytes

 

Not sure, but I think the smaller the better. Less lost un-usable space, I guess.
Anyone with a more scientific reply, please jump in. Bazza

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i ges i could get off my lazy bum and look for myself