Microsoft KB Archive Search

Notice: This website is an unofficial Microsoft Knowledge Base (hereinafter KB) archive and is intended to provide a reliable access to deleted content from Microsoft KB. All KB articles are owned by Microsoft Corporation. Read full disclaimer for more details.

  1. Home
  2. A connected USB storage device does not appear when you click the "Safely Remove Hardware" icon in the notification area in Windows Vista

A connected USB storage device does not appear when you click the "Safely Remove Hardware" icon in the notification area in Windows Vista

View products that this article applies to.

Symptoms

After you connect a USB storage device such as a flash drive to a computer that is running Windows Vista, the device does not appear when you click the Safely Remove Hardware icon in the notification area. Therefore, you cannot prepare Windows Vista for the removal of the USB device.

Note If you connect the USB device to a computer that is running Microsoft Windows XP, the device appears when you click the Safely Remove Hardware icon in the notification area.

↑ Back to the top

Cause

You may experience this problem if the following conditions are true:
  • The USB device contains an embedded USB hub.
  • The embedded USB hub detects a device that is connected to the USB hub as being a non-removable device.
This problem occurs because of the way in which Windows Vista handles devices that are connected to an embedded USB hub. If the Hub Descriptor component in an embedded USB hub reports downstream devices as non-removable, the Windows Vista hub driver propagates the non-removable characteristics of these devices to the operating system. The Safely Remove Hardware program in Windows Vista does not display devices which are non-removable. This behavior occurs because Windows Vista determines that you cannot remove a non-removable device.

In the scenario that is described in this article, Windows Vista determines that the embedded USB can be removed. However, Windows Vista determines that the downstream storage device or devices that are connected to the embedded USB hub cannot be removed.

↑ Back to the top

Workaround

To work around this problem, shut down the computer before you remove the USB device.

↑ Back to the top

Keywords: kbusb, kbpending, kbbug, kbexpertisebeginner, kbhardware, kbentirenet, kbtshoot, kbprb, kb

↑ Back to the top

Article Info
Article ID : 927826
Revision : 3
Created on : 4/17/2018
Published on : 4/19/2018
Exists online : False
Views : 346