Resolved Cannot find removable disc drive

I am using Windows 7 Home on Dell Inspiron 530 computer. The computer had several "removable disc" drives for SD cards and other sized card reading. Most of the time, All I do is put my SD card into it's slot, and a file opens showing the photo icons. But for a while now, nothing happens at all.

When I right click on "computer" it no longer shows any of the removable drives either. Somehow, I managed to find the drive some other way, so I put a short-cut to the drive, on my desktop, so when I put in my SD card, I used the shortcut to open the drive folder, and I could upload my photos that way.

I just installed some Windows updates, and after rebooting, my "shortcut" is no longer working, and my SD drive is no longer to be found.

Any suggestions? It's driving me nuts!

 

Some things that you can try.

Open your device manager and uninstall your Sd standard compliant sd host controller. Reboot your machine.

From an elevated command prompt run a system file checker and checkdisk, one at a time of course.

First open elevated command and type sfc /scannow hit enter, allow completion.

Then from elevated command run chkdsk /r hit enter, you will see this volume is in use schedule checkdisk on next system restart type y hit enter. Then reboot your machine.

Also some usb drivers may give conflict.

• Download drivecleanup.zip to your desktop.
• Unzip it on your desktop.
• CLICK HERE to see if you are running 32-bit or 64-bit for Windows.
• Once the determination has been made, open either the 32-bit or 64-bit folder.
• Remove all usb plugs from your machine, except your printer, mouse and keyboard.
  
• Right Click the .exe inside of the folder, then run as administrator.
• A command prompt window will open, telling you what has been removed upon completion.
• Reboot your machine after.

You might also check to see if there is an update for your chipset driver, you can go here to check.

Click me to check for chipset driver. Also update the sd card driver if one is listed, even if it is not an update go ahead and install.

 

Thank you Malnutrition, for your suggestions. I believe now, my problem goes deeper than an easy fix.

I had not checked with Dell, and they have a downloadable diagnostics program for hardware problems now. So I downloaded it, and ran it, and it came back that there are serious problems with my hard drive. Also, they could not detect the card reader drive either.

My computer is almost 10 years old, and originally came with Windows Vista Home Premium. About 2 years back, I installed Windows 7 Home Premium, and ever since I have had problems using my SD card reader. No doubt my computer is no longer receiving driver updates for those removable drives, and that is why they are not being recognize, or working.

It's time to buy a new computer..............And I can't stand the though of using Windows 8

 

You can still find HP and Dell desktops and laptops with window 7 Home Premium and Professional 32 and 64bit

 

Hello Ell Jay 50,

I am hoping that is so, because that is what I plan to do.

 

You could check Costco or BJ's Costco

 

Nice link, also walmart has some nice used computers.

If you just use the internet to surf/social media and play a youtube video here and there might I suggest this machine.

Click Me!!


Since you are using windows 7 I would suggest no less than 4 gigs of RAM.