Flash Drive not recognized

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Flash Drive not recognized

I have a FAT32 formatted flash drive that has been working properly until recently. When plugged in, it does not show up on the desktop, and is briefly displayed under Disk Utilities (the drive and drive name flashes, then disappears continuously every 5 seconds about).

However, the drive is recognized on a Windows Machine, but I cannot use it there, as most of the files on it are Apple oriented. Is this a sign the drive is about to go? Does it need to be reformatted in OS Extended Journal? I have not tried it on another Mac, but will do so.

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.5), Generic, Micro Center brand flash drive, 4GB

Posted on Dec 15, 2010 2:30 AM

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Answer 1

Dec 16, 2010 10:01 AM in response to adomas

Have you tried a different USB port? Anything else connected to the USB ports?

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Answer 2

Limnos

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Dec 16, 2010 10:05 AM in response to adomas

Which USB port? If a keyboard, Mac keyboards do not supply sufficient power for flash drives (unless the newer keyboards are different).

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Answer 3

adomas Author

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Dec 16, 2010 2:46 PM in response to adomas

I have tried using it both ports on the unit, through an external keyboard port and through a hub with no luck. It's a cheap Micro Center brand drive, anyways. I was able to get my files off of it and on to a CD from a Windows machine. I'll probably just go buy a new one.

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Answer 4

Limnos

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Dec 16, 2010 2:53 PM in response to adomas

external keyboard port

Possibly underpowered, as suggested before.

hub

Unpowered hub? May need powered.

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Answer 5

HumblePi

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Dec 17, 2010 8:39 PM in response to adomas

If this occurred after the 10.6.5 update, you might find this thread useful:

http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=12571286

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Answer 6

adomas Author

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Dec 18, 2010 1:06 AM in response to Limnos

USB hub is powered

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Answer 7

adomas Author

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Dec 18, 2010 1:11 AM in response to HumblePi

This sounds about right, but I was using the drive up until last week (December 11, 2010). I updated before then; I cannot really remember the exact date, though.

I have another flash drive that is OS X Extended Journal formatted, which works fine. I also run other USB components, too, such as an external hard drive, printer, keyboard, mouse & ilok w/o any problems. It's isolated to this one flash drive. Really strange.

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Answer 8

adomas Author

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Jan 29, 2011 3:08 AM in response to adomas

who knows... drive gone bad... i don't know anymore

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