windows drive F: doesnt exist.

surveys

Windows has inserted a drive F: on my PC which does not exist. I have the usual C: and E: (external backup) G: (DVD drive) but windows has inserted an F: drive which I do not have ? :mad: In addition, when I insert a USB (disgo) windows allocates it as H: When I use this Disgo, which is not too often, strange things happen. The whole system becomes sluggish and does not operate properly, and if the disgo is left in whilst rebooting windows locks up completely. It also causes internet problems in that lots of web pages won't load (some do) and the 2nd PC on the router has no internet access. !
Anyway, back to the F: problem. Why would windows allocate a drive I do not have. ? I have checked partitions. All ok. Looked at properties, device manager, (which does not show the F: drive) and done dozens of things to try to find the problem but nothing succeeds. !
Would appreciate an answer, if anybody has one. ?

8T8

Add anything like a card reader recently ?

Or did you install any software that came with the USB drive ?

mukki

device manager well show up the drives, but not the drive letter associated to their partitions

did you go into "disk management*", that should show you what drive letter is on what hardware.


also did you install daemon tool or poweriso lately


* right click on my computer and click manage

surveys

mukki wrote:

device manager well show up the drives, but not the drive letter associated to their partitions

did you go into "disk management*", that should show you what drive letter is on what hardware.


also did you install daemon tool or poweriso lately


* right click on my computer and click manage

Thanks Guys. I had no idea that there even existed that menu 'computer management'. ! Why doesn't windows list all these things. ?
Anyway, it showed quite correctly that I have C: E: G: (DVD) No mention of F: ! I have not installed anything such as Daemon, Poweriso, or card readers. The only thing I installed on was Mandriva Linux. ! That was the usual Linux nightmare. ! Installed but no mouse available etc.etc. Reinstalled but the same problem so I tried to uninstall. ! Haha, what a nightmare. ! I ended up with NO bootable computer at all. ! Linux kept insisting I had a LILO and should boot Linux. Windows just refused to load at all. I ended up using the windows install disk to 'recover' and went through lots of proceedures (bootcfg etc) and ended up with 5 drives on the boot menu. !! :mad: At least I eventually got rid of Linux (never again will I ever try it) but now I have to select one of the 5 boot options to load windows. !
Any advice. ? Thanks again for the help. What would we ever do without Boards. ? :eek:

_Kaiser_

Depending on the recovery/Windows disc, I'd advise just going through Windows setup and delete all drives it finds, befor then creating a new C: (and if required partition) on the internal hard disk.

Make sure any external drives, USB keys, card readers etc are unplugged before you start. That should sort it.

mukki

Kaiser2000 wrote:

Depending on the recovery/Windows disc, I'd advise just going through Windows setup and delete all drives it finds, befor then creating a new C: (and if required partition) on the internal hard disk.

Make sure any external drives, USB keys, card readers etc are unplugged before you start. That should sort it.

:eek:

back up first, your going to loose everything

surveys

Kaiser2000 wrote:

Depending on the recovery/Windows disc, I'd advise just going through Windows setup and delete all drives it finds, befor then creating a new C: (and if required partition) on the internal hard disk.

Make sure any external drives, USB keys, card readers etc are unplugged before you start. That should sort it.

Thanks. Can't do that. ! I must keep my C: drive intact. I need things on it which cannot be replaced. Its no good backing up, reinstalling windows then trying to restore all the backup data from C: in my experience that never works properly., There are things on C: such as Bank codes, and password images that would be destroyed and would require completely new registration processes to reinstate. So, C: has to remain as is.
There must be some other way to remove a fictitious drive letter that is not even recorded in the Windows Disk management system .?
Maybe I will have to go to the MS web site and look it up, but thats so slow and painstaking and might never come up with the answer. ! :mad:

surveys

I seem to have found the answer. It would appear to be down to that 'disgo' USB storage device after all. Apparantly I was removing it without using the windows 'remove USB hardware' option, and just pulling it out of the USB port. This seemed to cause windows to assign a new drive letter to it when I put it back in to use again because the original drive letter F: was still 'occupied' so it assigned a new one H:. !! Seems like I was being a bit 'dim'. :mad:
Thanks to you all anyway. !