Well, I went to fix someones computer, they had SP1 installed so I installed my flash drive and it was never found by the computer. I came home and installed it into my computer with SP3 and no luck, no located in computer management at all. It seems my drive is toast.... Anyone care to help?
You know the details, what's google suggest - http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html#before?
One of the lads across the road at ACF was discussing/argueing about his flash drive sticks - don't know that it will help your case. http://groups.google.com/group/alt.comp.freeware/browse_thread/thread/8b4858496921d88f?hl=en#
I think the computer I stuck my flash drive in messed up my drive. I mean that computer didn't even recognize that drive and it never powered on. And when I get back to my computer at home, same result. I will have to RMA this flash drive.
They do die..due to many different things... His PC may have had a faulty motherboard, zapped it. Are you always careful about "powering it down" properly with the safely remove hardware GUI in the systray...before yanking it out? To you travel with it in your pocket, possible sources of static? Visually check inside of it...look for pocket lint or something clogging it up, sometimes you get junk inside of that little rectangular interface that prevents the contacts from properly...contacting.
None of his usb ports on his computer worked, his modem also didn't work, the whole motherboard needed to go. I inserted my drive into his computer, that's the last of my drive. Wow, I need to return this drive.
Unless it's a big flash drive (16gig or more), those things are so cheap that the cost of a new one at a local shop might be comparable to or less than shipping and handling to return the dead one.
A wealth of troubleshooting for USB drives info on here, plus many useful utilities: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbtrouble_e.html also check his other pages: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/english.html
Anecdote: These things are pretty robust. Mine went through the wash yesterday. Let it dry out. Working fine!