USB drive not being recognized

Jeremy Myers7 said:I grabbed one of those USB adapters to check an SD card from my phone, but my laptop isn't even seeing it. It’s just some generic unbranded micro SD reader... any ideas on how to fix this?

1. You don't need to go overboard with the bold text. We get what you're saying if you just type normally.
2. Just toss it in the trash and stop buying junk online for pennies.

Or, if you picked it up from a local shop, just take it back to the vendor for a full refund, obviously.

I picked up some cheap 128GB Chinese USB drive on eBay for ten bucks.
At least, that’s what the properties tab claims. I moved about 20GB of stuff from my PC over to the drive, but now I’m running into a weird issue. Some files—specifically movies in .mp4 or .avi formats—play just fine, but others show up as totally empty folders. I’m testing this on a Samsung TV. What gives? I mean, I get that this drive is probably total garbage, but it should either work or it shouldn't. It plays some files and ignores others.

I tried formatting the drive using Windows XP, but it’s only giving me the option for exFAT.

If I were to force it into FAT32, I wouldn't be able to put anything larger than 4GB on there, but I guess my question is: how much capacity would I actually have left? Would it still show as 128GB, or would it be less?

Also, would switching to FAT32 even fix this problem with the invisible files?
Some files look fine on my computer, but they just appear as empty folders on the TV. Maybe the TV doesn't support exFAT?

Can anyone give me some advice, besides just telling me to stop buying cheap Chinese junk? 🙂
Thanks.

Morgan Brown6 said:I picked up a $10 128GB Chinese USB drive on eBay.
At least, that's what the properties say. I moved about 20GB over from my PC, but here's the catch: some files (like .mp4 or .avi movies) play just fine, while others show up as empty folders. I'm testing this on my Samsung TV. What gives? I know it's probably cheap junk, but it should either work or it shouldn't. This is playing favorites with my files.

I tried formatting it on Windows XP, but it's only giving me the exFAT option.

If I format it to FAT32, I won't be able to put any files larger than 4GB on there, but I'm wondering—what would the actual capacity be then? (Would it still claim to be 128GB or would it show less?)

And would switching to FAT32 actually fix these "invisible" files?
Some files look fine on the computer, but they show up as empty folders on the TV. Maybe the TV doesn't support exFAT?

Can anyone give me some advice, besides telling me to stop buying cheap Chinese garbage?🙂
Thanks.

My advice (besides not buying $5 sticks that claim to hold the entire internet) is to just stop using that thing entirely.

You might also want to check out this thread:
http://www.forum.com/showthread.php?t=865560

The title mentions Xvid, but it's not really about the codec; it's about those same cheap sticks where you try to cram all your downloads onto something that cost five bucks.

And yeah, regarding what I bolded... that 128GB drive of yours doesn't have 128GB right now, and it's never going to have it, no matter how many times you format it.

Morgan Brown6 said:Picked up a 128GB Chinese USB drive on eBay for $10.
At least, that's what the properties say. I moved about 20GB from my PC to the stick. The issue is that it plays some files (MP4 or AVI movies) just fine, but other files show up as empty folders. I'm testing the stick on a Samsung TV. What's the deal? I get this is probably cheap junk, but it should either work or it shouldn't. Some files play, others don't.

Tried formatting it on Windows XP, but it only gives me the exFAT option.

If I formatted it to FAT32, I wouldn't be able to put files larger than 4GB on there, but I'm wondering—how much capacity would it actually have? (Still 128GB, or less?)

And would formatting to FAT32 fix these invisible files?
Some files show up on the computer, but on the TV they look like empty folders. Maybe the TV doesn't support exFAT?

Can anyone give me advice, besides "don't buy cheap Chinese crap" anymore? 🙂
Thanks.

Even eBay put out a warning about not buying those weird sticks claiming to be 120GB for pennies.
They hack the firmware to report 120GB, but they're really just 16GB sticks.

Well, I suppose it wouldn't be the worst thing if we ended up with at least 16GB at the end of the day. First, I'll have to verify how much actual storage space is really there—you know how these things go—and then I’ll just format it to FAT32.