Can't hot swap USB devices

[zulubanshee]

I can't hot swap USB devices. The are recognized when I restart, though.

Vista Home Premium 64 bit
AMD Phonom 9500 quad core processor 2.2GHz

[truenorth]

What type of USB devices are we talking about here? How are you removing them?truenorth

[zulubanshee]

I only have a limited number of ports, so i have to periodically unplug my headset to use, say, a thumb drive. I try to eject the components by clicking the icon in the task bar at the bottom right, or whatever it's called  but the only thing ever in there is Mass Storage Unit. I have no idea what that is.

[truenorth]

A mass storage unit is a very general term which can apply to flash drives/usb connected floppy drives/even optical drives connected by usb connection can be so denoted as well as card readers. However most often when such a depiction is stated it also names the device IE: Cruzer storage device (for a Cruzer brand flash drive). However given that you should be visibly able to know what if anything is plugged into a USB port at any time what it is referencing should be apparent (unless there are multiple devices). However again whatever they are should be specifically stated such as a wireless dongle or whatever.The icon you are refering to is the "safely remove" icon and must be used before removing a usb device. If this is not done in the case of flash drives it may cause loss of data and/or rendering the device unusable for the future. The aspect of limited usb ports can be overcome in a variety of ways.If the card slots exist as available you can add a PCI card (or other) that will provide additional USB ports on the rear of the computer (desktop) or a USB expander which is a device that plugs into an existing USB ports and provides multiples of what it is plugged into often 4. If memory serves me a single usb port can be expanded up to 128 additional ports. So there is really no need to be limited by a small number of existing computer USB ports. The cost of the expanders is negligible. You should try to find a powered one if you can as they are more efficient that non powered ones.If you cannot get the icon data to indicate that you can safely remove the device (this can happen) you should perform a normal shutdown of the computer and when achieved then remove the device.Hope this helps to advance your use and enjoyment of your computers.truenorth

[zulubanshee]

It's been a long time since I posted to this thread. In the meantime, the resolution I found was that I updated the chipset driver. So now the device appears in the list of usb connected devices--one problem taken care of. Now I am unable to eject the peripheral, but that is perhaps another problem for another thread.

[patio]

I use Safely Eject USB...a tiny little app that works better than the built in Windows one...

Here Ya Go...

[zulubanshee]

Actually the ejection problem seems to be solved as well. Cheers!