How To Repair a USB Flash Drive
Read about fixing USB drive errors, and about VID and PID values of USB devices. Most people who work with their computer more or less regularly are sure to have a flash drive (and even several of them). Sometimes a flash drive can become faulty, for example after a failed formatting or due to some errors.
Quite often the file system comes to be recognized as RAW, the flash drive cannot be formatted or even accesses… What can be done if that is your problem?
This manual for repairing a flash drive is intended to deal with all sorts of USB drive issues except cases of mechanical damage. The drive manufacturer does not matter, in fact, be it Kingston, Silicon Power, Transced, Data Traveler, A-Data etc. All actions to be taken are given step by step.
- Getting To Know Flash Drive Parameters (Manufacturer, Controller Model, Memory Size)
- How Do I Find VID and PID?
- Choosing The Necessary Utility to Repair The Drive (Low-level Formatting)
- Questions and answers
- Comments
Getting To Know Flash Drive Parameters (Manufacturer, Controller Model, Memory Size)
It may seem very easy to know the flash drive parameters, especially when the manufacturer and memory size are specified on the drive case. The matter is that USB drives, even belonging to one model range and made by one manufacturer can have different controllers. Hence, a simple conclusion – in order to repair a flash drive you need to know exactly the controller model so that you can select the right fixing utility.
To determine the controller model there are special digital and letter values set by parameters of VID and PID.
- VID – vendor ID (manufacturer identifier);
- PID – Product ID (product identifier, i.e. identifier of a particular model);
These will be different for various controllers!
If you are not going to waste your USB drive, do not use utilities which are designed for VID/PID other than yours. Very often, a wrongly chosen utility can “kill” your flash drive.
How Do I Find VID and PID?
You can find VID and PID with the help of special utilities, but it can be done without them as well. First of all, go to Device Manager.
In Device Manager, a flash drive is usually recognized as a USB Flash Disk, so you need to right-click on the device and go to its properties.
In “Details” tab select “Parent” parameter to see VID/PID. In our case they are as follows: VID: 0204, PID: 6025.
Choosing The Necessary Utility to Repair The Drive (Low-level Formatting)
Knowing VID and PID we need to find a special utility suitable to restore our flash drive. It is better to use a search engine, Google or Yandex (a sample query: Silicon Power VID 0204 PID 6025).
Before launching such utilities we recommend disconnecting all other flash drives from USB ports (so that the utility cannot format another disk by mistake).
After treatment by such utilities (designed for low-level formatting) a problem-ridden flash drive should work properly again, recognized quickly and correctly by your PC.
Certainly, this repair manual is not the simplest one (you can’t do everything by clicking one or two buttons) but it can be applied in many cases to almost all flash drive types manufacturers.
Yet before you start low-level formatting you should understand it means erasing all user information without a chance to restore it. That is, the part of the drive where data is contained will be cleaned completely. Standard Windows formatting does not do that but only applies quick formatting which is basically remarking your drive.
So if you used your flash drive to store some important data before the problems began, and now you need the data to be recovered, it is possible but only before you start low-level formatting. This operation requires special data recovery software. The best choice to suit your needs will be Hetman Partition Recovery.
This is the ubiquitous USB recovery method. I would rather recommend the other software that would be able to do everything without extra mouse movements . To start the program you need special soft: "Recovery Toolbox for Flash". With it programm usually identifies all devices ( this is no problem ). After formatting the flash drive to boot the registry, and only later to recover the data. It is much easier to use the most standard "Windows tools". Thx! With regards.
I have just read this Article with great attention. According to me experience I can't remember any situation, when I had a problem with my flash USB drive besides of physical damage. But I found a useful information for me here. I am Linux's user. And I didn't know about special vendor's utilities to restore USB drives on low level and that, I have to use them depending on my flash USB drive's manufacturer. It was interesting for me.
How can preventative measures be taken to avoid issues with USB flash drives in the future?
Can a USB flash drive be repaired if it is physically damaged?
Yes, in some cases, a USB flash drive can be repaired if it is physically damaged. Depending on the extent of the damage, a professional repair service may be able to replace the internal components and restore the drive to working order.
What are some signs that a USB flash drive may be beyond repair?
How can a command prompt be used to repair a USB flash drive?
Unfortunately, a command prompt cannot be used to repair a USB flash drive. The best way to repair a USB flash drive is to use a data recovery software program such as Recuva or EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard. These programs can scan the drive for lost or corrupted files and attempt to recover them.
Can formatting a USB flash drive be a solution to repair it? Why or why not?
No, formatting a USB flash drive cannot be a solution to repair it. Formatting a USB flash drive will erase all the data stored on it, and it will not fix any physical or hardware issues that may be causing the USB flash drive to malfunction. In some cases, formatting a USB flash drive can make the issue worse.
Read how to repair a USB flash drive. If you do have any questions, don't hesitate to contact our technical support service - we will be happy to help you.