iTunes 10 Conflict with SanDisk Cruzer

I have iTunes 10.7, iOS 6.1, fresh install of Win 8 Pro, HP Multimedia PC with plenty of disk space and memory. There appears to be a conflict between SanDisk Cruzers and the iOS operating system/iTunes 10.7. My iPhone 4 was plugged into a USB port. When I plugged in my SanDisk Cruzer, the Cruzer light began to falsh and the PC began communicating with it. At the same time, the iPhone 4 gave a "chirp," and its initial screen with the battery level came on. Following this, I used my SanDisk Cruzer and used the safe hardware removal process to eject it. After this, my PC did not recognize my iPhone 4, and I received messages from the PC that the iPhone 4 had malfunctioned. Since that time, I have been unable to backup my iphone 4. I now realize that this was the root of my previous problem that I started a discussion about: "Why Can't I Backup My iPhone after Installing iTunes 10.7." No one had a good answer for that. So I formatted my hard drive, installed a fresh copy of Win 8 Pro, and reinstalled all the Apple software. This worked - everything functioned normally until I plugged in my SanDisk Cruzer last night. This is one for the Apple boys to figure out!