SOLVED 31.5Gb Flash Memory FAT 32 crashes W7 explorer

[Plado]

Can a kind soul here advise why my 31gb Flash Memory with FAT 32 file system containing 6gb of music files, refuses to access on my Windows 7 Home Premium, crashing or hanging up Windows Explorer and refuses to End Task?

I haven't yet found out how to get an error table to post up here what the trouble is, but I'll willingly do so if someone could show me how to access the error details.

My Windows 7 is of course NTFS file system. What is more of a puzzle is that the 31.5gb flash memory works perfectly on a Macbook laptop and it reads all the folders and files without the slightest trouble.

I've tried turning off my Avast Anti-virus file protection and still it gets stuck with the blue circle spinning for half a day! I haven't tried accessing it in safe mode with networking yet.
I thought I'd ask a few experts here first.
Thanks and hope you can help.
It's service pack 1 by the way.

 

[Ian]

Can you try looking in event viewer (just type that in to your start menu) and see if there are any additional crash details at the time you try to access the drive?

Does Explorer crash when you're browsing the drive or is it at a specific point?

 

[Plado]

Can you try looking in event viewer (just type that in to your start menu) and see if there are any additional crash details at the time you try to access the drive?

Does Explorer crash when you're browsing the drive or is it at a specific point?

Thanks for this attention to my plight. Well I had best add a bit more detail here.
I have fetched the Event viewer up and have no idea which parts I should post up here to reveal what's going on. Admin events? Windows Logs? Select source log; custom log?
And none of the windows seem to allow select Copy operations to show a full list here as text. The only other option was to get involved with a *.evtx event file which I don't think is what you need to see.

For information I found that it would find the Directory tree but the moment I tried to open one of the Folders there it gets stuck. I tried running in Safe Mode with Networking, and also with the Anti Virus not protecting files or system and still it only recognizes the Drive letter and folders but refuses to open individual folders in the tree.

I can post up the log if you would be kind enough to tell me how to capture the bit you need to see and I'll do my best to add it here for you.
Thanks muchly for your help.
ps The Flash Drive is called a Con Teck. I hope it isn't unfriendly to windows and turns out to be a "Con Trick"
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Plado

 

[Plado]

Can you try looking in event viewer (just type that in to your start menu) and see if there are any additional crash details at the time you try to access the drive?

Does Explorer crash when you're browsing the drive or is it at a specific point?

More information here. I tried to run the Event Viewer and re-access the Flash Drive as you suggested but again it got stuck. This time windows explorer started to search the drive when I clicked on one folder in the tree. The usual infuriating green fuel gauge started to progress at glacial speed from left to right so I left it alone and went to do a workout.
Came back 20 minutes later and the search was still supposedly in progress but it was stuck about 50% of the way through the red X at the right hand end. When I tried to abort the search windows got hung and I tried to end task, no luck. Tried end explorer.exe and then the Windows got hung up and I had to get out by illegal shutdown using the On/Off button.

Coming back in to windows normally started I removed the Flash Drive and cursed Windows 7 for being so much a downgrade on the functions of XP.

So I'm back at square one and in your hands. I think just guessing, it's a corruption of the file system on the Flash Drive which doesn't give a Mac laptop any problem but specifically is toxic to windows. But I don't know, I'm not an expert. Over to you!
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Plado

 

[yodap]

What type of music files are they? Mp4?
Do you have I-tunes installed on W7?

 

[Plado]

On the flash memory I have .mp3 .flac only -
Yes I do have iTunes on my Windows 7 but I have stopped the account but not uninstalled it.
I could uninstall it completely it would be no real loss.

I haven't changed the flash memory from FAT32 to NTFS because the Audio devices I want to play the music on will only recognize USB flash memory or attached players if the file systems are FAT32.

I'm interested to know if you have some reason why iTunes might be the culprit on this.
It certainly doesn't make sense when I have already wiped the Flash memory and formatted it as well as put the files back on it, and even scanned and repaired to no avail, so the lack of reading it from Windows 7 is still there. Also strange that it reads perfectly on the Macbook which also has iTunes installed.

Thanks for your help - I look forward to more info.
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Plado

 

[yodap]

I wasn't looking to blame i-tunes for your problem, just thinking maybe the format couldn't be read by windows.
Having said that, I'm not a lover of i-tunes on windows systems because it's bloated and runs too many processes in the background.
A while ago when SP1 was released there was a problem some were having with usb drivers and was screwing up the ports or some such thing.

http://forums.mydigitallife.info/th...USB-Driver-Bug-(what-it-is-and-how-to-fix-it)

Can you use other usb devices?

 

[Plado]

Sorry for the delay in the reply - it's the time difference between USA and UK.

Yes I can use other USB devices I have the following all working and reading/writing properly:-
Buffalo external 300gb Hard Drive
Data Traveler 8gb flash
byteStor 8gb flash
2GO 2gb flash
Various SD Cards from cameras working in the multi-size slot on HP tower.
Sony Bloggie camera direct USB connection

Just have the current problem with the 32gb Con Teck one.

Your comments re: iTunes are interesting, and could be very important.
I'd have nothing to lose if I uninstalled the iTunes. So I will try that this morning. I can easily save any tracks I've paid for in the past and place them onto external storage and then remove iTunes completely. Then I'll try a reboot and have another go at the Con Teck drive.
It's worth a shot, as I'd like to get to the bottom of what's causing this inconvenience.
Thanks for your attention.
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Plado

 

[Plado]

Can you use other usb devices?[/QUOTE]

Latest update: No change.
I Uninstalled iTunes then rebooted
Tried to access the USB drive F:\ and it showed all the folders as usual. Then the moment I tried to open one folder in the series (Choral) showing in the list
.Spotlight-V100
.Trashes
Choral
Classical
FlacFiles
Jazz All
Vocal
The windows 7 search system kicked in and the green progress bar indicated it was Searching or Indexing the F: drive.

I waited and when I came back 15 minutes later it was still stuck like it always did with the green bar half way through the red X and the green circle spinning. I tried to End Task and again it refused to stop.
Eventually I got an error message from Windows as follows:-
Description:
A problem caused this program to stop interacting with Windows.

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: AppHangB1
Application Name: explorer.exe
Application Version: 6.1.7601.17567
Application Timestamp: 4d672ee4
Hang Signature: 02c1
Hang Type: 0
OS Version: 6.1.7601.2.1.0.768.3
Locale ID: 2057
Additional Hang Signature 1: 02c19601a5e84edd7a4251b6e231b3f9
Additional Hang Signature 2: 2d05
Additional Hang Signature 3: 2d05a908763367e3bfc0f672523e039b
Additional Hang Signature 4: 02c1
Additional Hang Signature 5: 02c19601a5e84edd7a4251b6e231b3f9
Additional Hang Signature 6: 2d05
Additional Hang Signature 7: 2d05a908763367e3bfc0f672523e039b
=====================================================
I really don't know how to interpret that but at a guess I'd say there's something going wrong with Windows Search facility when it is trying to access this particular USB flash drive. It can't be because the drive is too big, because it has no problem accessing searching and retrieving from the 300gb Buffalo on a USB 2 input plug.

Again I'm stuck now. I had to force a shutdown and reboot and while it was re starting I removed the F:\ flash memory card.
Spotlight-V100 I think is a file put there by the MACbook which as I said earlier has no problem accessing this drive or playing any files on it.
Does that give anyone any ideas?
Thanks
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Plado

 

[Ian]

You could try preventing Search Indexing on your USB drive and see if that helps - there are some instructions on this page (which should be similar for Windows 7).

Fingers crossed!

 

[yodap]

I'm having trouble finding any info on Con Teck drives. Is the spelling correct?

 

[Plado]

Nice try but sadly no go.

Indexing Options on Windows 7 are located by typing that phrase into search when in Control Panel.
The Show all locations that are indexed didn't show anything more than the C drive and Internet Explorer Cache (which I don't use) so I unticked that one. Nothing in the list showing my F:\ allocated drive for the USB flash memory. So I plugged the USB Con Teck stick into USB socket and I was hoping that windows would show the drive in the list of locations that are set to Index automatically. It didn't show up and when I tried to access the F:\ drive this time the whole window went ghosted out and the F:\ drive showed no folders present at all.

So worrying that possibly something may have wiped the F:\ drive I went and tested in on the Macbook. No problem all folders and files present and tested one file and it plays perfectly.

I reckon this is one of two things, either 1. The Con Teck flash is a badly made piece of pig-poo, or 2. Windows Explorer is doing another of it's notorious bug-ridden quirky malfunctions proving how the designers and software writers shouldn't have changed anything from XP systems because there was nothing much wrong with it then, but rather too much wrong with it now.

I'm still no closer to a solution sadly.
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Plado

 

[Plado]

Another update: I'm just running a test on the USB drive in question using a program mentioned here in another thread, called H2testW. It says it's testing all the space not taken up by existing folders and will take approximately 2½ hrs. So presumably that will tell me if the Con Teck is bogus or faked disc capacity.

I'll post back here what it finds and hope someone can come up with a new idea on this.
I suppose the last resort will be to copy back all the files to my Buffalo drive and go and buy an authentic better quality flash drive if this one is a bit of a dodo.

 

[Plado]

>I'll post back here what it finds and hope someone can come up with a new idea on this.
>I suppose the last resort will be to copy back all the files to my Buffalo drive and go and buy >an authentic better quality flash drive if this one is a bit of a dodo.[/QUOTE]


Well I lost patience with the program because it was going to take about 20 hours to complete so I guess the drive is OK as it did find a lot of space to test write to. I aborted after 2 hours.

I too found nothing in a search on Con Teck so I think there's a very good chance it's a fake and probably will let me down. It wasn't expensive, but I think I'll wait until I've tried it in my new Marantz CD player and see how it behaves and maybe if it's a pile of rubbish I'll ditch it and buy a proper one
Thanks for all for help. You tried hard. Difficult job really.
I'll close this question now.
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Plado

 

[Plado]

Just temporarily re-opening this discussion as I have some further news that puts a slightly different light on this problem.

I just tried plugging the Con Teck 32gb flash memory into my old Windows XP Home SP2 PC which I keep as a backup spare computer. XP had no problem whatever opening the file system and finding the files therein. It also plays any of the files with ease.
This leads me to think it's not the Flash Memory that is at fault at all, it has to be Windows 7 and it's temperamental exasperating Windows Explorer function that has decided to have an asthma attack. I have no idea how to fix that. Probably the best fix is to dump windows 7 and go back to using an old copy of XP.

Anyone got any views on this?
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Plado

 

[Ian]

I've got a feeling that it could be some sort of plugin causing this - as I've seen something similar when Explorer chokes when trying to generate thumbnails for video files.

Which application are the .mp3 and .flac files associated with?

 

[Plado]

I've got a feeling that it could be some sort of plugin causing this - as I've seen something similar when Explorer chokes when trying to generate thumbnails for video files.

Which application are the .mp3 and .flac files associated with?

Ah thank you for this Ian. I do appreciate your giving this some attention and a view for me.
All the mp3 and .flac and a few .wav files have been associated with VLC Media player, you know, the one that plays anything you throw at it? In the past my Windows 7 did associate them with Winamp but I got tired of the way it works so switched the VLC.

You could have a very strong case on what you have suggested.
One more thing I should just report. I tried doing a sfc /scannow but actually using sfc /verifyonly to make sure there were no corrupt files messing up my W Explorer. It found no system problems at all.

Another thing I just tried with the offending Flash Drive was I tried to drag and drop a 3.5mb Mp3 file from my C:\ drive to the F:\ flash drive and it started the transfer process but absolutely not data was flowing. The green progress fuel gauge stuck about 1/3 of the way across and was obviously stalling. I tried same operation on an 8mb flash drive and the same file transferred in about 5 seconds flat no problems at all.
Does that tell you anything I wonder?
Thanks again for your interest in this.
--
Plado

 

[Ian]

I'm all out of ideas on this one unfortunately. If you've got a larger spare USB drive, I'd try copying the same files to it and see if the problem still exists (to see if it's a problem with the drive).

If I think of anything, I'll post back .

 

[Plado]

Thank you Ian.
I have some good news for you (well for me really but I expect you'll be interested in this)
I have solved the problem.

I had a suspicion that a setting was wrong in the functions of Auto Play, simply because this particular USB flash drive kept searching instead of opening when I plugged it in and clicked on F:\Mass Storage. So I went into START: Control Panel: Auto Play and reset all the devices to Default and then went through one by one and set each device so that most things will open with the software I require to handle DVD CD Canon Camera etc etc and when I got to Portable Device, I set it to Open with Windows Explorer.

I don't know why I chose that. It had been set to "Ask me every time" but I don't remember ever setting any of that dialogue box since I've had this Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit system.

So I saved settings and went back to desktop, plugged in my Con Teck flash and I was able immediately to get back into the folders and open several files one by one .flac .mp3 .wav in different folders and nothing got hung up at all.

I suspect that this is the Microsoft Office Syndrome where you start using it from new and all the flashy fussy trivial and over crowded functions are set to "On" by default and you spend the first 6 months using the program just working out how to turn off all the annoyances that won't stop pestering you (pardon the rant!). This is one of digital life's serious frustrations. A better way would be to supply the software with all the gimmicks switched off and then instruct the user in what functions he or she might find handy, where to find them, how to try them and how to switch them off again if they are not to the user's liking.

Oh well. At least I have marked this thread as solved and hopefully someone will find this final bit of information useful. With windows 7 you have to do a lot of customizing to avoid a book-load of mysteries when things don't work the way you expect them from past Windows Systems experience.

By the way, the Flash Card appears to be quite legit and has a full space of 32 Gb and 6gb are used up with my files and 27gb still free - now that I can actually look at it in detail! Job done. I'm happy.

May I thank all those who tried diligently to solve this for me. It's not easy to troubleshoot anyone's computer if you haven't got "live" access to it and all the negotiations are second hand in print.
My hearty thanks
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Plado