Reinstalled Windows and USB drives not visible & Plug and Play not working

I had a very poorly running system and did a "factory install' to a new, larger hard disk in my laptop (Thinkpad T43). Ran all the updates and reinstalled all my software. It is running BUT . . .

1. My USB 500GB drive is not visible or accessible unless I use Disk Manager to open it.

2. Nothing gets installed automatically. I have to go to Device Manager and install the drivers.

I read about Tweakui - and all the drives are checked and the active ones do not have a question mark. Active drives are C (internal primary disk), D (second disk in the system), W (network disk for backup). I disabled adproxy.exe for Photoshop Elements using MSCONfIG.

In Disk Manager there is no letter assigned. So, I assigned E and later tried P. The files are accessible through the OPEN function of Disk Manager but not with Explorer or My Computer.

Any thoughts on the USB disk visibility issue or why nothing gets drivers installed when connected to the system?

Brad

 

When you "run" the updates from IBM, it only decompresses the drivers into a folder (usually C:\Drivers), you then need to navigate to the folder and run the installer Setup.exe.

Did you get the Intel chipset updates? They should get the Plug and Play and USB functioning correctly. If you still seem to have problems, restart the system several times and you could try uninstalling the Plug and Play (under System Devices) and USB controllers.

If there is no problem with other USB devices, it may only be that a drive letter cannot be allocated to USB drives. Try disconnecting to that network (W: ) drive and see if a drive letter can be allocated to the USB drive (again, restart the system several times).

Matt

 

Matt,

I think I have the latest Intel Chipset - but, where do I go to check this?

There is no uninstall option for Plug and Play under System Devices. Only an update drivers - which I have done. The Plug and play issue seems to be for any new device on the system.

I tried a long list of steps posted by Keith "FirstKnight" on Microsoft's TechNet forum. even that did not fix my problem. The USB drive does not get a letter (whether the network drives are attached or not). And once I force assign a letter to the USB drive I can open it in Disk Manager but it does not appear in My Computer.

And I tried a Microsoft patch to remove registry entries that antivirus software do not let be deleted in the SP3 install. Still no success.

 

I just happen to use a T43 for work

When you run the chipset download from IBM/Lenovo it puts the files into the folder C:\Drivers\Win\INTELINF. You need to go to that folder and run the installation file (infinst_autol.exe), it is dated 2004. It won't hurt if you have already run it. The original driver supplied when the system was new is in another folder and dated 2002. You will find the dates of the drivers in their Properties. Look in the hardware listings labelled with a brand name, like Intel.

Do you have Service Pack 3? My system is SP2, Windows Updates are controlled where I work. Oh, I see this

You may want to consider uninstalling SP3. I think I would, just get any Windows Updates, that's what happens at the companies where I have worked and when I think of updating to a new Service Pack. You will be forced to get SP3 when things won't work without it. At that stage, you should try getting a chipset driver update from the Intel website (IBM/Lenovo won't supply an newer drivers for that model and those drivers are dated for SP2 (2004). If you seem to need any other updated drivers, you will need to find them at the website of the hardware manufacturer, for example, getting the graphics drivers at the ATI website. You could try getting updated chipset drivers from the Intel website, I don't know how they would work.

You're right, I haven't seen that before. Still, that is probably controlled by the chipset drivers.

It sounds like you have researched well, if you are running SP3 on SP1 dated drivers, that might be the cause.

Matt

 

Matt,

Thanks for the reply. I do think your comments are on the right track here. I had done the chipset update from C:\Drivers\Win\INTELINF - and just did it again. No change.

So, I figured I would uninstall the SP3 update. NOPE. There is no uninstall option off on the right in Add/Remove Programs as I have seen on other systems before. I may be at the point where I have to save all my data - again - and blow away this 320GB drive and start all over again. Not too sure what to do differently as I do want the ability to do Rescue and Recovery from Lenovo. I still have my old 160GB system intact to work from. I did not want to clone that system to the new 320GB drive since it had so many problems. I figured starting fresh with a "factory install" would be better.

If I have to do that approach, I can not do it this week as I have the grandsons here in Maine with me for the week for their Spring Break. Next week in NC I could tackle this. Is this my only alternative at this point? how would you suggest getting a fresh, clean ThinkPad install on the new drive?

Brad

 

How to remove Windows XP Service Pack 3 from your computer

You would need to clone the hidden "IBM Preload" drive from the original HDD Edit: Just clone the whole HDD, because the partitions need to be set the same way, then run the Factory reimage. To boot to the image, tap the Access IBM key or the F9 key during startup.

If you can get access to a Windows XP (SP2) CD, you could run a repair reinstallation of Windows (go through setup until you get to the section where it says "Repair the current installation of Windows "). It would ask for the Product Key which should be on a label on the base of the laptop - check if it is XP Pro. That would reinstall the system files and drivers.

Matt

 

Here's a more recent version of the chipset drivers
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-58627
and if you look like reimaging, try those for the 915 model from Intel.

 

Matt,

Thanks for posting those links.

I am back and running on my old very slow hard disk system. The new drive was too bad to work off. I made a BIG mistake after my last post. At the top of these forum pages is an ad for a product called "Reimage ". It sounded good - might be an easier way of letting the tool figure this out.

So, I downloaded the tool and it found all sorts of problems. To fix them you have to buy the product. $60 later I ran the fix routines. 3 hours later it finished and the system rebooted. I was toast!

1. The desktop was changed including my customizations - not a big deal
2. My Documents directory was pointing to an empty directory. I was able to put it back to where it was supposed to be and my data files were still there. Not a big deal.
3. I had no network connections. This was a big deal. The devices were defined in Device Manager but not showing up.
4. After a lot of uninstalling and trying several things I got the network connections back. But, they would not connect since they would not acquire an IP address. The TCP/IP line in the connection properties did not have a properties selection enabled and no Uninstall option. So, no IP address and no way of getting one.
5. In the install process the software asked for feedback. I gave it and they said it had been submitted. Bogus! There was no way it had been submitted since there was no network connection.
6. And the system was extremely slow.

So, I selected the Undo option to reverse whatever Reimage had done. That was quick. It gave me an unusable system. No network connections and basicly I was not put back to where I had a running system before I used Reimage. I was toast.

So, my mistake was to use the product. I have copied my data files back to my old smaller drive and am running. Next week I will try to build the new system again on the larger drive.

 

Not much fun. I don't use "Fix it" programs from experience back around 1996 and sussed out how to do it myself. When I did use them, I learnt to find out exactly what they wanted to do and if I wasn't sure, I would stop it from making those changes. It also taught me a lot about Windows. My advice, check carefully what such a program wants to do.

Because we need to fund the site, we need to advertise. I don't expect the advertiser would want their product to be destructive, so talk to them. They may need you to check every instruction before carrying out repairs. "Run the program and click OK" would be nice, but as I said, I check exactly what changes they want to make, the ones I have come across offer you every possible option, it up to you to trim down those that would not be applicable.

I put those down to a learning experience. If you don't think the program is suitable for you, talk to them about it.

There are many threads in this forum about "slow ", you should investigate them.

Matt

 

Matt, your advice is very sound. Since I was already struggling with the new system - and knew I could go back to the old one - I figured it was worth a shot. In my case, it did not work. So, I will be asking for my money back. It would be nice to have the ability to review which changes are to be made and select which ones you want done. That would be a good feature which this program does not have that I saw.

 

Matt,

I think an approach would be

1. Copy complete image to an extra drive

2. Restore the image to the new 320GB drive (this would give me the hidden IBM partition).

3. Use a Windows XP Pro CD to do the repair (I think I have one of those in NC)

4. then run updates.

I just need to find a disk big enough to create the image copy of my 120GB system drive.

 

Sounds like it would work.

The repair is a "possible ", don't be disappointed if it fails...be happy if it works.

Make sure you have a backup of the important data, in case you end up with two non-working drives.

Matt

 

Matt,

This is why I only do these things off to a new hard disk. My old system is a fall back plan and it also has all my data. With my last attempt I just copied new and changed files from the new system, that was not working out well, back to my old drive and have continued to run off that as I work on Plan B.

Plus, I have all my data backed up to 2 different Network Access Storage (NAS) units - 1 in each house. And those NAS systems are RAID5. Buffalo 2TB Terastations. Backup is critical!