# Solved: USB FlashDrive GEneric Driver needed



## GeekGawd (Apr 9, 2003)

Hey All,
Here is my problem. 
I had a 64MB Flash drive (USB) given to me. It was a Hitachi USB drive (pen drive/thumbdrive/flash drive - whatever).
There were no drivers whatsoever with it. It was a gift.
I gave it to a friend to use. She has Windows 98. 
So, no drivers, didnt recognise the USB drive.

Now, I have been trying to find some drivers that will make the darn thing work. Couldnt find specific drivers. So I searched for generic drivers for USB Mass Storage Devices for Win98, on the net.
came up with some files like usbstor.sys. Didnt seem to work at all.

Even took off the usbstor.sys, usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf files from an XP machine and tried working it. They seemed to load alright on a windows 98 machine i have here. But the drive never shows up in Windows Explorer.
Did different things, reinstalled. removed, restarted, etc.

Nothing workd. I read somewhere about a pdr file that needs to go in an IO folder too. Not tried that yet. Too tired right now to try something new.

I would like to know if any of you guys have any generic drivers that has already been tried and tested to load a flash drive.

Thing is, my friend is in germany. And I aint. 
Tomorrow, i plan to try hooking the USB drive (another HItachi which was given to my colleague too) and see what XP detects it as and then try to search for those OEM drivers. (Fingers crossed)

Till then, any inputs will be greatly appreciated. 
(I have even searched the threads before posting this. DIdnt come across anything relevant or did not get a solution. So if there is something already out there, do direct me there.)
Thanks.


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## Old Rich (Jan 17, 2003)

You have agood plan . . once you know who made it you should be able to find the drivers for win98


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## ~Candy~ (Jan 27, 2001)

Is it a USB 2.0 device per chance?


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## xavier57 (Oct 23, 2002)

Make sure that you have Win 98 Second Edition. It won't work with the earlier version.


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## ~Candy~ (Jan 27, 2001)

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/263218/EN-US/

Sure it will.


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## xavier57 (Oct 23, 2002)

I have seen four different flash drives, have purchased two, and they all say that they work on Win 98SE, ME, 2000, and XP. They don't mention Win 98. Maybe there is a way to fix that.


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## ~Candy~ (Jan 27, 2001)

GeekGawd, can you get a model number for it? I can't even find it on Hitachi's website.


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

W98 is problematic for USB storage, and W98SE introduced a number of improvements in USB handling. You may be out of luck on those drivers...


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## GeekGawd (Apr 9, 2003)

Hey,
Thank ye all for the help. Sorry for not replying. forgot about the long weekend and I do not have a computer at home.

Xavier - Will check which version of Win98 my friend has.

AcaCandy - I have not checked if it is USB 2.0. But since the device is new and was given at an IT fair - 2 weeks ago - i would assume it to be 2.0.

And yea, Hitachi has nothing on the site. Am afraid, it is just one of them freebie items. They expect you to have WinXP (and god forbid if you have Linux!)
If nothing works, I think I might even try and email the guy we spoke to at the Hitachi Stand. Hopefully he might be able get something.. but thats my last option.

About the MS link, AcaCandy, there is one more - on USB Mass Storage & Win98 also. A sample driver or something of the sort. Could not understand much..plus it didnt work. May have done something wrong.

Here it is, 
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q257751

will be trying a slew of trial and errors again today. 
But first. will try with the extra Hitachi drive. Hope that works.

Will post again today.


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## GeekGawd (Apr 9, 2003)

Hello all,
Got some good news. I got the flash drive to work!

I came across this link while i was trying to search for the drivers
UnOfficial Win98 Service Pack

There, Alper Coskun , has given a link to generic drivers, since he found these to work better than the ones he wrote.
(God bless his soul)
Well. I went ahead and downloaded nusb20e.exe from http://rapidshare.de/files-en/516500/nusb20e.exe.html

_(this link is not a direct link to an exe download. plus, it aint a virus)_

Used this on a 98 SE machine. Installed. Restarted. Plugged the USB drive in. The OS detected the drive and loaded the necessary files. Voila. It was working! 

Extra Information:
1) When i plugged the flashdrive into my computer (WinXP Pro SP1), this morning, it detected the device as "USB-DISK FREEDIK-LWFORMAT USB Device"
Was not able to find anything on this on the Net. Such a wierd name! Heh!

2) I somewhat understood how things work with Win98 and these flashdrives.
Seems from the Microsoft UMSS link I posted earlier - there are three files which are needed for USB mass storage devices to work in this OS.
An INF file, a SYS file and a PDR file. The PDR file has to work as some sort of a mediator for the I/O Subsystem.

I also found the following link in which the forum user mentioned the same thing,
http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=31920 - *Gape* is the guy offering the link to the driver site.

The latest driver file on this site is "ustorage_2.94_tweaked_1.0.zip".
I have *not* tried these out since the first lot solved my issue.

He goes on to say, 
"All drivers of Windows 9x are in the \Windows\Inf. Extract it somewhere. Copy INF file into \Windows\Inf, SYS file into \Windows\System32\Drivers, PDR file into \Windows\System\Iosubsys.
To remove these drivers, delete these files."

Hope all this was useful to you guys too.  (Boy, do I feel accomplished now.)

Thanks you guys for all your help!


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## ~Candy~ (Jan 27, 2001)

One of the reasons I asked about USB 2.0 is that I had a similar problem with a case enclosure on a 98 machine. Had to pretty much do like you did, dig til the end of the earth to find a driver that would work.

Thanks for the update. You can mark the thread solved.


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## GeekGawd (Apr 9, 2003)

Aah, ok. 
I realised something after I found and installed the driver pack from RapidShare..while installing it warned me that it will work on Windows 98 SE - English version.
And I needed the drivers to work on an OS in Germany! Jeez! I mailed it anyways. Lets see what happens. She has not replied yet...so I am hoping it didnt crash her machine or anything. Thats its working and she is so happy that she has forgotten to thank me. 
Otherwise I will never be invited to Berlin again.


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

I'll make it solved for you.


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## casperg1977 (Apr 6, 2005)

I have tried it on two devices: a Sony PSP and a HP digital camera. I have installed the drivers and the INF file, and rebooted, but I am still having problems. 

When I inserted the PSP via USB, it came up as a "PSP Type A" as new hardware and made it as a UStorage device. I may be doing something wrong here. Same thing happened with the HP camera. Of course, I could go do well with the HP camera by installing HP's drivers, but Sony ain't doing a thing to help W98 users. I have checked Sony.com US.PlayStation.com and SonyStyle.com to check for equivalent, but all I'm getting is nowhere. I don't have a USB "pen drive" nor do I have the need for one, all I just want to do is transfer my music to my new PSP without having to go through the trouble of installing XP. 

Help!


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## GeekGawd (Apr 9, 2003)

Hello casper,
The PSP is too new for the drivers to work. The drivers for Windows 98 are mainly for storage devices only. The drivers look for the PID, VID, and one more ID (identification code).
I would assume that data transfers will require proprietory software. example, Apple reuires iTunes to transfer songs.
Creative Jukebox requires its own software which creates a virtual drive.
you can create a little partition install XP.. load your music and the PSP there...


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## casperg1977 (Apr 6, 2005)

Thx 4 the help, btw. I just found a CD of ME lying around my eternally scrambled (read: cluttered) house. Will that help?

After all, my PC's bios does not support XP, nor do I feel like making another partition without having to run fdisk (which i heard that you have to start from scratch... i have no other s/w), and since I live on a tight budget, I cannot afford to purchase XP without "sacrificing" a few bills.

so, my only course of action before having to save up and go to the store and buy it (I once ran XP on my PC, it worked, but some features of my PC didn't, and I just ran it for its "trial" to see if I would actually get it), so I HOPE that ME works.

If not, can u direct me to some sites that would have some 3rd party drivers for 98SE for the PSP? Right now, I'm dead broke and I can't wait. Also, the PSP was my early b-day gift (29 April) and I want to use it without having to transfer my music files to the downstairs PC, which runs XP, via my network and do it from there.

Thanks,

CasperG1977

--------

_"Windows User By Choice, Mac User By Heart"_


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