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USB Flash Drive's

Midnight_Caller
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Registered: ‎15-04-2007

USB Flash Drive's

Hi All
From my forum here
On some USB Flash Drive's thay come preloaded with software on them what you may not want, here I will try and help you to get it off your USB Flash Drive.
Cruzer Micro comes with SanDisk
It is called U3 to Uninstall U3 from your flash drive
Most U3 smart drives come with an uninstall utility that converts the U3 smart drive into a regular USB flash drive. This utility can be accessed from the U3 Launchpad.  Open the U3 Launchpad and click on Settings, then select U3 Launchpad Settings and click on the Uninstall tab.  Some devices have a link to the Uninstall utility under Help and Support.
If you can not find the uninstall utility on your U3 smart drive you can download it from the following locations:
SanDisk Devices - Launchpad Removal Tool
SanDisk Devices - Launchpad Removal Tool - From The Internet Archive Wayback Machine


For most other USB Flash Drive's all you need to do is format it and that will get rid of the junk, but you can not do it that way with a SanDisk USB Flash Drive.
38 REPLIES 38
VileReynard
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

What's U3 (in the context of flash drives)?

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

Midnight_Caller
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Posts: 4,167
Thanks: 15
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Registered: ‎15-04-2007

Re: USB Flash Drive's

Have a look at this it explains what u3 is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U3
pierre_pierre
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

Quote
The U3 technology has reached end of life. SanDisk began phasing out support for U3 Technology in late 2009." [2]

why are we worrying now?
Steve
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

Im not sure why we are worrying Pierre_Pierre, If you have a device that uses this then what's to worry about?
If life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
VileReynard
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

Yet another failed attempt by Microsoft to seize control of the hardware then.  Grin

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

Midnight_Caller
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Posts: 4,167
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Registered: ‎15-04-2007

Re: USB Flash Drive's

Quote from: pierre_pierre
why are we worrying now?

W.H. Smith's still sell USB Flash Drive's with it on them, and Boots, that is just 2 shops that still sell USB Flash Drive's with u3 on them.
But who sed that you should worry?  I did not.
shutter
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

Just bought one of these....
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270714813176
it had some stuff on it.... I just "erased" it... and it works ok... no re-format or nuffingk
orbrey
Plusnet Alumni (retired)
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Registered: ‎18-07-2007

Re: USB Flash Drive's

IIRC if it's a U3 disk it's partitioned into a U3 partition at the start of the disk with all the secure/boot stuff on it, and the main storage partition after that.
VileReynard
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

So all you need to do is repartition it?

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

Midnight_Caller
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

No just use Launchpad Removal Tool and it's gone.
7up
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

Quote from: Matt
IIRC if it's a U3 disk it's partitioned into a U3 partition at the start of the disk with all the secure/boot stuff on it, and the main storage partition after that.

I had a thread on here recently about U3 drives and their usefulness and people slated it instead. You can read that thread here.
Basically a U3 drive is an emulated hub, CDRom and usb thumb drive. It has an autorun.inf and cannot be written to (well it can but thats unofficial and took me a few days of trial and error to put my custom ISOs onto mine). When plugged into the system it will (if CDR autorun is enabled) autoplay the emulated CD on the device. This emulated CD is useful as it allows you to automatically install software onto a users machine if you're a hardware vendor.
The rest of the device can still be used for storage as normal. The initial U3 concept was that you could take your applications with you and have the U3 drive launch a special U3 launcher similar to the start menu where you could simply plug it in, and select the program you wanted from a menu that would automatically popup. Most people didn't realise the potential for this and just saw U3 as an invasion of a USB drive. Needless to say they saw it as being a pain when it was technologically unique in that its one of the few usb devices that can hold its own drivers onboard. A fine example of this is Gary with this post. Instead of purchasing a U3 drive he thinks he's purchased a USB drive and that some arrogrant idiot dumped invading software on it. In fact he's actually bought himself a drive which has automatic backup abilities but I'll bet he never thought about that as a useful feature. Instead he's decided that it's a bad thing despite the package clearly sporting the U3 logo all because he doesn't actually understand it. Instead he should of just bought a USB thumbdrive and saved himself the agro. Moral of the story here is to do your research and try to understand something before slagging it off. What Gary doesn't realise is that years of research went into U3 but because he doesn't understand the idea he trashes it instead because anything he doesn't understand is just bad  Roll_eyes
To see just how useful U3 actually is, click here and read shutters positive reply on how his new dongle set itself up automatically. You literally plug it in and it installs the drivers to your computer automatically from its U3 drive. It's hardware installation for dummies. It also allows you to use the device on a Windows machine that doesn't come with the drivers already.
It's claimed U3 is dead but Huawei are keeping it very well alive with their dongles and data cards.
I need a new signature... i'm bored of the old one!
VileReynard
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

So it's a boot virus (possibly).

"In The Beginning Was The Word, And The Word Was Aardvark."

Midnight_Caller
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

@okrzynska, You are talking a load of rubbish.
7up
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Re: USB Flash Drive's

Quote from: A
So it's a boot virus (possibly).

No. It's just has autorun ability like a CD-Rom.
I need a new signature... i'm bored of the old one!