Partitioning of a USB Flash Drive under Win XP Pro SP2

  • Thread starter Thread starter Netman
  • Start date Start date
N

Netman

I have 3 different brands of USB Flash Drives, Lexar, PNY, and SanDisk , each is
512MB in size and has a USB 2 interface.

My dilemma is that Win XP Logical Disc Manager does not let me assign a letter
to any second partition on any of these flash drives, it does see the second
partition, when I try to format the second partition or assign a letter, it
says the partition is not enabled, suggests a system restart, but regardless of
how many times I restart, the outcome does not change. I have tried using NTFS,
FAT FAT16 FAT32 system, but the outcome is the same.

This appears to be a limitation of Win XP but nobody appears to know anything
about it, I saw this problem posted in another forum, but there was no solution
or explanation by anyone. I need 2 partitions on these drives to add security
software that can encrypt/decrypt the second partiton that would hold the data.

Could someone kindly enlighten me on this issue.

Thanks

Matt
 
Why is it not possible to partition a USB Flash Stick?
http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic18736.html

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

:

| I have 3 different brands of USB Flash Drives, Lexar, PNY, and SanDisk , each is
| 512MB in size and has a USB 2 interface.
|
| My dilemma is that Win XP Logical Disc Manager does not let me assign a letter
| to any second partition on any of these flash drives, it does see the second
| partition, when I try to format the second partition or assign a letter, it
| says the partition is not enabled, suggests a system restart, but regardless of
| how many times I restart, the outcome does not change. I have tried using NTFS,
| FAT FAT16 FAT32 system, but the outcome is the same.
|
| This appears to be a limitation of Win XP but nobody appears to know anything
| about it, I saw this problem posted in another forum, but there was no solution
| or explanation by anyone. I need 2 partitions on these drives to add security
| software that can encrypt/decrypt the second partiton that would hold the data.
|
| Could someone kindly enlighten me on this issue.
|
| Thanks
|
| Matt
 
On Sat, 28 Jan 2006 23:24:08 -0600, "Carey Frisch [MVP]"

|Why is it not possible to partition a USB Flash Stick?
|http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic18736.html
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Frisch:

I had seen this post before posting my message, I have exactly the same problem,
the solution suggested in response to that post does NOT work, been there, done
that.

I am looking for a solution that works and/or an explanation for these
observations.

Matt
 
Sun said:
On Sat, 28 Jan 2006 23:24:08 -0600, "Carey Frisch [MVP]"

|Why is it not possible to partition a USB Flash Stick?
|http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic18736.html
Click to expand...
I had seen this post before posting my message, I have exactly the same problem,
the solution suggested in response to that post does NOT work, been there, done
that.
Click to expand...

What do you mean by "does not work"? I'm sure if you think about it
you'll realize that's not a very useful observation if you actually
want to get assistance. What happened, specifically? What was the
exact text of any error message?
 
Mr. Brown:

The solution somebody suggested in response to the post to which Carey Frisch
provided a link is that a utility from HP website that is meant to make a USB
Flash drive bootable might work for creating a second partition on such a drive.
I downloaded and installed this utility BEFORE my original post to this NG, and
this is what I found:

This particular utility does NOT have the ability to partition. It is designed
only to format an existing partition, it does not see a partition that has not
been assigned a letter by Windows and interestingly it could not even format a
partition on my USB drive that it could see, it returned an error message saying
'the media is write protected' which was incorrect, because it was not and
Windows formatted that partition without any issue.

I hope now you can understand what I meant by 'does not work', it simply meant
it could not do what I wanted to do, I was trying to skip unnecessary detail. If
you are really interested in trying to see what I am talking about, just try to
put two partitions on a USB Flash drive and experience first hand what I am
saying, it is not a difficult or time consuming experiment to conduct.

I am by the way is not doing it for fun, I have explained the reason for trying
to do it in my original post and one day when the public at large that is using
such drives wakes up to reality, they all would want do it.

Back to square one now, does any one know why the Windows Logical Disc Manager
behaves in this manner, and is there a way around it ?

Matt
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



|Sun, 29 Jan 2006 10:18:24 -0500 from Netman <[email protected]>:
|> On Sat, 28 Jan 2006 23:24:08 -0600, "Carey Frisch [MVP]"
|>
|> |Why is it not possible to partition a USB Flash Stick?
|> |http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic18736.html
|
|> I had seen this post before posting my message, I have exactly the same
problem,
|> the solution suggested in response to that post does NOT work, been there,
done
|> that.
|
|What do you mean by "does not work"? I'm sure if you think about it
|you'll realize that's not a very useful observation if you actually
|want to get assistance. What happened, specifically? What was the
|exact text of any error message?
 
Thanks Mr. Marvin:

All software that is made available by the Flash Drive makers is brand specific
and in the case of Lexar, is even model specific.

I am hoping to find one solution for ALL makes that I have.

Matt
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



On Mon, 30 Jan 2006 08:28:47 -0800, "StarvinMarvin"

|We have a Lexar 512MB flash drive. The model is called Jump Drive Secure. It
|comes with partitioning and encryption software that creates both a "public"
|and a secure partition. Try this software for every flash drive if you have
|it, or contact Lexar for more information.
|Try this link to download partitioning software for a flash drive:
|http://www.lexar.com/drivers/#software
|or:
|http://www.imation.com/products/flash_devices/downloads.html
|
|"Netman" wrote:
|
|> I have 3 different brands of USB Flash Drives, Lexar, PNY, and SanDisk , each
is
|> 512MB in size and has a USB 2 interface.
|>
|> My dilemma is that Win XP Logical Disc Manager does not let me assign a
letter
|> to any second partition on any of these flash drives, it does see the second
|> partition, when I try to format the second partition or assign a letter, it
|> says the partition is not enabled, suggests a system restart, but regardless
of
|> how many times I restart, the outcome does not change. I have tried using
NTFS,
|> FAT FAT16 FAT32 system, but the outcome is the same.
|>
|> This appears to be a limitation of Win XP but nobody appears to know anything
|> about it, I saw this problem posted in another forum, but there was no
solution
|> or explanation by anyone. I need 2 partitions on these drives to add security
|> software that can encrypt/decrypt the second partiton that would hold the
data.
|>
|> Could someone kindly enlighten me on this issue.
|>
|> Thanks
|>
|> Matt
|>
 
Back
Top