Corrupt Jump Drive

[Colonel Angus]

I recently purchased a Lexar S50 JumpDrive & put some files on it. Edit: using Windows Vista 32-bit.

Every so often, I'd plug it in & it would constantly be working. I couldn't "safely remove" it. So I looked online & found a solution where I could just log off & log back on & then "safely remove" it. Fine.

A couple of days ago, I was in the middle of something & didn't want to log off, so I forcibly "ejected" it then was able to take it out.

Yesterday, I tried saving something, but when I opened the file, it said it was corrupted. None of the older files on the drive seem to be affected, only ones I tried to save after the fact.

So, my question is, am I going to be able to save the files on the drive? Could I just move them back to my computer, or will that smurf it up? I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to format the flash drive, which means I'd lose everything on it. But I'd rather not lose my stuff, if I don't have to.

Thanks in advance.

[CimminyCricket]

You can move the files, but it won't change their status as 'corrupt'. Windows 7 had an option to revert a file to its previous version and that might fix it, but I don't really think that it will. Otherwise, there are some utilities like this from Microsoft (http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/check-a-drive-for-errors) that might (might [might]) do the trick.

Hope for the best

[Spuuky]

Why not just move the files off the drive, format it, and move them back?

[Colonel Angus]

Actually, I've done that & it says that the drive is fine, which is kind of confusing. I've even ran a Malwarebytes scan on it & it comes out clean.

Edit: spuuky, that's what I was asking if I would be able to do. I wasn't sure if the older files were corrupt or just the new ones (which wouldn't open, so I deleted them).

[Vyk]

Whatever the files are, you can probably open them in something not so wonky. Like say it's a Word file that's saying it's corrupt. I'd almost bet you could open it in something like Open Office or something analogous to that. At least it didn't completely crash. But even then there's utilities that can pull files off and save them

Edit: Nevermind. I see that those files are actually gone now

[Shiny]

The drive can be reformatted by partition. I would look this up as it's too long to explain here and I am not familiar with your particular drive. If that doesn't work you should be able to just re-load them on there if you have the non-corrupted files else where.

For future reference: You should be able to ctrl +shift + esc (to bring up the 'Windows Task Manager') go to 'Appliations' and quit whatever program thinks the drive is using it. If that doesn't work you can go to 'Processes' in the same window and end whatever is causing the drive to not want to eject. Then you should be able to safely eject 59542. Or you might see a large green arrow icon that does the same thing essentially, but it will tell you what's causing the error, might be a specific program or might be "system".

[Colonel Angus]

that's the thing. I can have all my applications closed & still get that error. The only process I found that could be connected to it flashes on & off, so it's hard to end. I found online that it's a pretty common thing, yet no one can really explain why that happens.

I was wondering if something could be wrong w/ my usb ports, too. I know my game controller @ times doesn't connect properly.

[Vyk]

That logging off thing sounded like a good idea, unfortunately it probably still runs your session in the background waiting for you to log back in so it can resume. Alternatively you'd have to just shut down your machine. Perhaps sleeping would rectify it. Or maybe there's a way to tell Windows to end your session when you log-out so you don't have to shut down completely or anything. I've had similar issues with flash drives, but nothing super persistent. Though whatever file got corrupted, I would imagine its parent program or a related program is what was running in the background refusing to let it go. I think it could have only been corrupted by being open at the time, or half-assed in the process of saving still for whatever reason. Whenever my drives decided to be persistent about that, I just close everything that could be doing it and make sure their tasks are ended. I think there's a margin for Windows to error in this regard for whatever reason. I used to think it was just a fluke and would force it out myself from time to time. Your situation makes me question the truth in the presumption though. Weird stuff

[Shiny]

I was wondering if something could be wrong w/ my usb ports, too. I know my game controller @ times doesn't connect properly.
Not sure, but if it's connecting at all then that probably wouldn't be the issue. Have you tried re-installing your Windows software?

It seems to be a process/application issue, maybe something that has an auto open to it.

[Colonel Angus]

It does connect. I ended up formatting it, but haven't used it since. I'll have to give it another shot now that it's blanked.

I'll have to check about any auto-opens.