I ordered a bunch of 1GB usb drives from a semi-shady Chinese company. Most of them work just fine, but a couple of them won't let me format them because they are "write-protected." There is no write protection switch on the device. I have exhaustively tried the following:
- Windows format: "The disk is write protected"
- HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool: "Device media is write-protected"
- Changing registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\StorageDevicePolicies to 0
- diskpart clear attributes readonly
- diskpart clean: "Diskpart has encountered an error: The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error. See the System Event Log for more information." (The System Event Log only contains the error: The IO operation at logical block address 0 for Disk 1 was retried.)
- HDD Low Level Format Tool: "Format Error occurred at offset 985,595,904: 1117 – Device I/O error" and hundreds of similar errors
- Sacrificing a lamb to the USB gods
- Starting in safe mode with command prompt and running format, diskpart, and chkdsk
So do all these I/O device errors mean that these USB drives are just totally screwed? Is there any way to get more information about the problem?
Best Answer
My answer to this question is similar to the answer I had given for this question Flipping the Removable Media bit -- alternatives to BootIt?
To summarize
You can try using Mass Production tools to reprogram the microcontroller in your USB Flash Drive. However this procedure varies for all USB Flash Drives. Most Mass Production tools are used to repair USB Flash Drives or to add or remove CDFS Partition; Some of these MP Tools can also be used to add/remove write protection.
The general procedure to reprogram your USB Flash Drive to add/remove write protection is as follows:
Download and Run Chipgenius and find out the VID and PID of your USB Drive. http://agnipulse.com/2010/03/chipgenius-and-usbdeview-usb-information-tools/
Go to http://flashboot.ru/iflash.html and enter the VID and PID of your USB Drive.Check if there are any MassProduction tools available and download them. Then you will have to figure how to use it.
Check this for detailed guide on how to do this.(In this guide the MPtool is being used to repair a fake USB Drive) http://agnipulse.com/2010/04/how-i-fixed-a-fake-64gb-usb-drive/
Warning - The procedure varies for different USB Flash Drives and you may end up with irreparable USB Flash Drive.
Note:
I have successfully used MPTools on Transcend Jetflash USB Drives for various purposes such as flipping the removable bit or adding a cdfs partition. The MPtool for JetFlash USB Drives is called AlcorMptool and this MpTool has the option to flip the removable bit. Another reason why I feel comfortable to use JetFlash USB Drives is because it can be fixed easily if something goes wrong.
http://agnipulse.com/2010/04/jetflash-online-recovery-repair-your-transcend-usb-drives-for-free/