This USB device can perform faster if you connect it to a ..

After installing Windows XP SP3 RC1 my system wouldn't boot. In safe mode I
ran the uninstaller for the service pack but it aborted. I had to restore my
hard drive from a backup.

After that, my external USB drive starts working properly, but after some
time I see the message "This USB device can perform faster if you connect it
to a Hi-Speed USB 2.0 port".

In Device Manager the drive is flagged with a message saying the device
driver can't be loaded because another copy is in memory. The drive letter
disappears.
When I look at the device list by connection I see that the drive is moved
to a different USB port - non-USB 2.0, but originally it was connected to an
enhanced USB port.

It looks as if the OS has deliberately switched the drive to a different
port running at a lower speed and then told me it could run faster. If I
unpug the drive and plug it in again or restart it works fine for a while
until this happens again.

None of this makes sense and this had been working fine for a long time
before this abortive update to SP3.

I would appreciate any advice on how to fix this.

My system is an HP Pavilion with AMD dual core X2 4200+, SP2, 2GB Ram.
The USB drive is an HP Media drive that loads into the front bay slot. Priot
to this I had no trouble with the drive. I use it for nighty backups. When
this problem occurs an error is logged in the system events listed as 'ftdisk
- The system failed to flush data to the transaction log. Corruption may
occur.' I ran chkdsk after that and so far there have been no errors.

arachnaut wrote:
> After installing Windows XP SP3 RC1 my system wouldn't boot. In safe mode I
> ran the uninstaller for the service pack but it aborted. I had to restore my
> hard drive from a backup.
>
> After that, my external USB drive starts working properly, but after some
> time I see the message "This USB device can perform faster if you connect it
> to a Hi-Speed USB 2.0 port".
>
> In Device Manager the drive is flagged with a message saying the device
> driver can't be loaded because another copy is in memory. The drive letter
> disappears.
> When I look at the device list by connection I see that the drive is moved
> to a different USB port - non-USB 2.0, but originally it was connected to an
> enhanced USB port.
>
> It looks as if the OS has deliberately switched the drive to a different
> port running at a lower speed and then told me it could run faster. If I
> unpug the drive and plug it in again or restart it works fine for a while
> until this happens again.
>
> None of this makes sense and this had been working fine for a long time
> before this abortive update to SP3.
>
> I would appreciate any advice on how to fix this.
>
> My system is an HP Pavilion with AMD dual core X2 4200+, SP2, 2GB Ram.
> The USB drive is an HP Media drive that loads into the front bay slot. Priot
> to this I had no trouble with the drive. I use it for nighty backups. When
> this problem occurs an error is logged in the system events listed as 'ftdisk
> - The system failed to flush data to the transaction log. Corruption may
> occur.' I ran chkdsk after that and so far there have been no errors.
>
>

This is what comes of installing a *beta* service pack on a production
machine and why you shouldn't do it. That said, try reinstalling your
motherboard drivers (chipset). Get them from HP's website for your
specific model machine. While you are at HP's site, if there are other
drivers that might pertain to USB, download/install them too.

If reinstalling the drivers doesn't help, then back up your data and
restore your computer to factory condition. If you want to do beta
testing and don't have a second testbed computer, buy an external hard
drive and imaging software such as Acronis True Image and get into the
habit of imaging your system often.


Malke
--
Elephant Boy Computers
www.elephantboycomputers.com
"Don't Panic!"
MS-MVP Windows - Shell/User