Solved Phantom drive

[markaz]

Vista Home Premium

Just recently had to repair the MBR. Used UltraISO to create a recovery disc for USB. Following the repair the Removeable Disk [K:] used during the repair is no longer recognozed by Windows until a thumb drive is inserted into the USB slot and a new CD Drive [L:] was created, a phantom drive if you will.
Would like some advice on getting the removable disk [K:] back and deleting the phantom drive [L:].
Thank you in advance for any information.

-Mark

 

[ilikefree]

Right click on computer,manage,disc management,and show us a snip of what is there please.

 

[markaz]

 

[ilikefree]

Should be able to right click on the empty drives and delete. Don't delete the CD/ROM

 

[markaz]

Should be able to right click on the empty drives and delete. Don't delete the CD/ROM

Thus the reason why I posted. When in My Computer OR in Disk Management the option to delete is not given when a drive is right clicked. Here a snip from My computer when the 'phantom' drive is right clicked:

 

[richc46]

Never heard of this before, but before you remove the thumb, do you check for the notice ok to remove hardware; by the notification area by the clock. If you dont have it go to search, type notification, and tick it.

 

[markaz]

Yes, I always remove a thumb after it has been stopped via the notification.

So a CD Drive drive that doesn't physically exist can't be removed? Although benign, this will drive me nuts until it's gone.

Thanks for the responses. As always, greatly appreciated.

 

[richc46]

Let me be honest, never heard of such a thing. But why not try ccleaner, its made for that sort of thing.
of if recent
A system restore.

 

[markaz]

SysRestore lost all restore points prior to the creation of the drive during that mess I had with the MBR.

That sucks that you've never run across this. If you ever come up with anything, even on an experimental basis, let me know.

Meant to ask, why wouldn't this drive show up in Disk Management?

 

[richc46]

Try the ccleaner; even it if does not work, its good to run it once a week.
Something is screwed up, something has to be cleaned out so the correct information can be displayed.

 

[markaz]

Just did. No effect other than cleaning up 4+GB of garbage.

 

[richc46]

Well run it once a week, that garbage can slow your computer.

 

[richc46]

Im saying "Bingo", but very low for now
http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/114767-drive-letter-add-change-remove.html

 

[markaz]

First, a question. Do the drive letters that you seen Disk Management correspond to the drive letters you would see in My Computer? I'm saying yes, and as such, because Drive (L) doesn't show in Disk Management not sure how I can assign/change or remove the drive.

Update to this post:

This is a snip taken from SIW. First that I've seen that Drive [L:] appears to be an ISO drive created by UltraISO when an iso of the repair disk was made on the USB device.

 

[whs]

One possibility is that those are virtual drives (VHDs) that were created by some program (e.g. the Office 2010 installer does that) - and since they were not mounted (attached), you cannot see them in Disk Management.

Usually they should disappear upon reboot, but appartently they don't. Have a look into Properties whether you can find a path. Then you can attach them via Disk Management > Action button. Then you can open them like any drive and see what they are.

 

[markaz]

Properties for [L:] shown nothing for a path. I updated my last post to show what SIW identified for Logical Disks. It does appear that the drive was created by UltraISO when I made the the recovery disk on USB because of the device name \ISOCdRom0.

 

[ilikefree]

Do you have Revo Uninstaller? If so go to tools,junk folders,scan,delete.
Have you tried removing the driver for USB devices from Device Manager,then restart the computer and reinstall the USB drivers

 

[ilikefree]

Can you go to start, type cmd, right click and run as administrator
Type net user administrator /active:yes
Restart the computer and use the administrator account you just opened and then see if you can delete the USB drives
When you have finished return to cmd and put no after active:/
Restart again

You could also try removing Ultra ISO with Revo and you will get the option to remove the drives then.

 

[markaz]

You could also try removing Ultra ISO with Revo and you will get the option to remove the drives then.

Drive [L:] is gone. It was the last of your suggestions that did the trick. Thank you very much.

Unfortunately, this problem was minor compared to one that just started. If you know anything about SidebySide configuration, other than the need to reinstall Vista, let me know. I'll be starting that thread momentarily.

Again, thank.

-Mark