Connected USB device is not detected in Windows

Important This hotfix is only applicable to Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012. However, the rest of the information in this article is applicable to Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2012.

Symptoms

Consider the following scenario:

You have a USB hub connected to a computer that is running Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 8, or Windows Server 2012.

You have a USB device connected to a USB port on the hub.

You safely remove the USB device from the USB port.

You reconnect the same USB device or a different USB device to the same USB port on the hub.

In this scenario, the computer does not detect the USB device.

Note This issue affects USB 2.0 hubs and USB 2.0 components in USB 3.0 hubs.

Cause

This issue occurs because the USB port is disabled after you safely remove the device from the port.

Resolution

To resolve this issue, install the Windows RT, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2012 update rollup 2845533, or install the hotfix that is described in this article.

Additionally, you must set the registry key thatis described in the «Registry information» section to enable this update rollup or hotfix.

Update information

For more information about how to obtain this update rollup package, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

2845533 Windows RT, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2012 update rollup: June 2013

Hotfix information

A supported hotfix is available from Microsoft. However, this hotfix is intended to correct only the problem that is described in this article. Apply this hotfix only to systems that are experiencing this specific problem.

If the hotfix is available for download, there is a «Hotfix Download Available» section at the top of this Knowledge Base article. If this section does not appear, submit a request to Microsoft Customer Service and Support to obtain the hotfix.

Note If additional issues occur or if any troubleshooting is required, you might have to create a separate service request. The usual support costs will apply to additional support questions and issues that do not qualify for this specific hotfix. For a complete list of Microsoft Customer Service and Support telephone numbers or to create a separate service request, visit the following Microsoft website:

Contact Microsoft Support Note The «Hotfix Download Available» form displays the languages for which the hotfix is available. If you do not see your language, it is because a hotfix is not available for that language.

Prerequisites

To apply this hotfix, you must be running Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012.

Registry information

Important This section, method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

322756 How to back up and restore the registry in Windows
Important You must apply the following registry changes to resolve this issue in Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 8, or Windows Server 2012.

Note In Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012, you must create the registry key before you restart the computer (after you have applied this hotfix).

To enable the update for a specific device, follow these steps:

Swipe in from the right edge of the screen, and then tap Search. Or, if you are using a mouse, point to the lower-right corner of the screen, and then click Search.

In the search box, type regedit, and then tap or click regedit.

If you are prompted to enter an administrator password, type the password. If you are prompted to provide confirmation, provide confirmation.

Locate and then tap or click the following registry subkey:

On the Edit menu, point to New, and then tap or click Key.

Type a name for the new key by using the following format:
vvvvpppprrrr
Notes

«vvvv» represents a 4-digit hexadecimal number that identifies the vendor ID of the device.

«pppp» represents a 4-digit hexadecimal number that identifies the product ID of the device.

«rrrr» represents a 4-digit binary coded decimal number that contains the revision number of the device.

On the Edit menu, point to New, and then tap or click DWORD (32-bit) Value.

Press and hold or right-click DisableOnSoftRemove, and then tap or click Modify.

In the Value data box, type 0, and then tap or click OK.

Exit Registry Editor.

To enable the update for all the USB devices that are enumerated on the computer, follow these steps:

Swipe in from the right edge of the screen, and then tap Search. Or, if you are using a mouse, point to the lower-right corner of the screen, and then click Search.

In the search box, type regedit, and then tap or click regedit.

If you are prompted to enter an administrator password, type the password. If you are prompted to provide confirmation, provide confirmation.

Locate and then tap or click the following registry subkey:

On the Edit menu, point to New, and then tap or click Key.

On the Edit menu, point to New, and then tap or click DWORD (32-bit) Value.

Press and hold or right-click DisableOnSoftRemove, and then tap or click Modify.

In the Value data box, type 0, and then tap or click OK.

Exit Registry Editor.

Note When the value of the DisableOnSoftRemove registry entry is set to 0, the system does nothing when a USB device is removed. When the value of the DisableOnSoftRemove registry entry is set to 1, the system disables the port from which a USB device is removed.

Restart requirement

You must restart the computer after you apply this hotfix and/or the registry change.

Hotfix replacement information

This hotfix does not replace a previously released hotfix.

The global version of this hotfix installs files that have the attributes that are listed in the following tables. The dates and the times for these files are listed in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). The dates and the times for these files on your local computer are displayed in your local time together with your current daylight saving time (DST) bias. Additionally, the dates and the times may change when you perform certain operations on the files.

Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 file information notes Important Windows 8 hotfixes and Windows Server 2012 hotfixes are included in the same packages. However, only «Windows 8» is listed on the Hotfix Request page. To request the hotfix package that applies to one or both operating systems, select the hotfix that is listed under «Windows 8» on the page. Always refer to the «Applies To» section in articles to determine the actual operating system that each hotfix applies to.

The files that apply to a specific product, milestone (RTM, SP n), and service branch (LDR, GDR) can be identified by examining the file version numbers as shown in the following table:

Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012

The MANIFEST files (.manifest) and the MUM files (.mum) that are installed for each environment are listed separately in the «Additional file information for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012» section. MUM and MANIFEST files, and the associated security catalog (.cat) files, are extremely important to maintain the state of the updated components. The security catalog files, for which the attributes are not listed, are signed with a Microsoft digital signature.

For all supported x86-based versions of Windows 8

Windows 10 Not Detecting USB (Fixed with 5 Ways)

When your Windows 10 computer cannot detect USB drive, you can refer to this article and see how to solve USB not showing up in Windows 10 issue.

By AOMEI / Last Updated August 29, 2019

Overview of Windows 10 not detecting USB drive

USB device is widely used in our daily work. It can be used to store and transfer data between different devices. It can also be used as bootable media. I guess most of us may meet this situation: Windows 10 cannot detect USB drive. This issue could be caused by different reasons, such as broken hard drive, out-dated drives, dead USB ports, etc.

When you meet this issue, just calm down and have some trouble shootings. You can first try a different USB port or cable to see if it can be recognized. If not, you can try the following methods.

Method 1. Turn off Fast Startup

Sometimes, Fast Startup feature can cause the issue: your USB drive may not be recognized by Windows 10. Therefore, you can turn off Fast Startup can see if the problem can be fixed.

1. Open Control Panel go to Hardware and Sound -> Power Options.

2. When Power Option opens, click on Choose what the power button does.

3. Click Change settings that are currently unavailable.

4. Find Fast-Startup option and disable it. Then save your changes and restart your PC.

Method 2. Make sure the drive is enabled

If the drive is disabled, it won’t show up in Windows. Follow below steps to check and see if the drive is disabled, enable it if necessary.

1. Go to Device Manager by pressing Windows Key + X and choose Device Manager from the list.

2. Expand category Disk drives. Under this category, if there is an icon with an arrow pointing down over the drive name, the drive is disabled. To enable it, double-click on the drive name and click on Enable Device button.

3. Click Next button, and then click Finish button.

Method 3. Update your driver

The out-dated driver may also be the reason that causes Windows 10 not recognized USB drive. Therefore, you can update your driver.

Open Device Manager, click on Device Manager and see if there is yellow exclamation point beside any of the listed hardware. Right-click on the device that has a yellow exclamation point beside it, and then clicks «Properties.» under the «General» tab, click on «Troubleshoot» and follow the instructions to solve it.

Method 4. Uninstall hidden devices from Device Manager

Sometimes, USB drive not showing up in Windows 10 might be hidden in Device Manager, so let’s see how to uninstall hidden devices from Device Manager.

1. Open the command prompt, type the following command and press Enter after each line in order to run it:

2. Then Device Manager should start. Click View and choose Show hidden devices.

3. Now you need to expand all sections and delete all grayed out entries.

4. After you’ve done that, restart your PC and reconnect your USB hard drive.

Method 5. Use free disk manager to manage the USB drive

If your USB drive is not partitioned, initialized or assigned letter, it will not be detected by Windows. Therefore you should partition it and assign drive letter.

AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard is a professional yet free disk partition software which is designed for Windows 10/8/7. It has many particle features to manage your disk. You can partition disk, assign the drive letter, format the hard drive, convert NTFS to FAT32,etc.

To initialize USB drive

1. Download AOMEI Partition Assistant and open it. Locate the USB drive and right click it. Select Initialize Disk.

2. Select to initialize disk to MBR or GPT style.

3. Click Apply at the toolbar to confirm the operations.

To partition USB drive

If the drive is unpartitioned, it is actually full of unallocated space. You can try to create a new partition on it.

1. Located on the USB drive, right-click it and select Create Partition.

2. Select the partition size, assign the drive letter and File System, and then click OK.

3. Click Apply to commit the pending operations.

To assign drive letter

1. Right-click the USB drive and select Change Drive Letter.

2. Select a drive letter for the drive

3. Click Apply to submit the task.

If the USB drive is still cannot be detected in Windows 10 after initialization, assigning drive letter, creating partition, you can consider formatting it.

To format USB

1. Right-click the partition and select Format Partition.

2. You can enter partition label, choose NTFS or FAT32 file system and change cluster size in the pop-up window.

3. Click Apply to save the change.

Tips: The Format Partition feature can also help to remove write protection from USB drive.

To make a summary, you can have altogether 5 methods to fix Windows 10 not detecting USB issue. Find the one that works for your situation.

How to Fix USB Device Not Recognized in Windows

The fix that worked for us, plus a few others you can try

Are you getting a “USB device not recognized” error whenever you plug in a USB mouse, keyboard, camera, or other device? I can’t live without USB ports and currently have 5 ports on my computer so that I can connect my mouse, keyboard, camera, phone, and printer to it all at once!

For those of you with even more USB gadgets, you probably have connected a USB hub to one of your USB ports so that can you connect even more devices. Most of the time this works great, but occasionally your computer might stop recognizing USB devices. The odd thing about this error is that the ports are working just fine, as I was able to still charge my cell phone without a problem, but couldn’t get my camera recognized using the same port.

After spending a lot of time and trying a bunch of different ways to fix the problem, only one solution ended up working for me. I’ll mention that solution first, but will also mention the other possible solutions, as the first solution may not fix the problem for everyone.

Also, check out our YouTube video if your USB drive is not showing up on your Windows computer.

Method 1 – Unplug Computer

So how did I finally fix the problem? Well, if you are lucky, it’s a super simple solution! Try this method first and if it works, you’ll have saved a lot of time.

Simply unplug your computer from the power supply. Yes that is it! Note that this does not mean just turning off your computer using the power button because most modern computers don’t actually turn off completely and the motherboard will still get power. This is useful sometimes if you want to remotely wake up a computer, etc.

The motherboard is where all of hardware of the computer connects to, including the USB ports. Sometimes the motherboard needs to be “rebooted” because things can go wrong, i.e. all or some USB ports suddenly stop working. The small microprocessor on the motherboard will reload the drivers and your USB ports should hopefully be recognizing devices again.

So first turn off your computer using the Shut Down option in Windows or pressing the power button and then UNPLUG the PC from the wall outlet. Let it sit for several minutes and then plug it back in.

Method 2 – Update Device Driver

If Windows is not able to recognize the device, you may also see in Device Manager that the device shows up as an “Unknown Device”. You can get to Device Manager by clicking on Start and typing in devmgmt.msc or by going to Control Panel and clicking on Device Manager.

In that case, you should right-click on Unknown Device, click on Properties, then the Driver tab and then click Update Driver.

If this doesn’t work, you can also try to download the driver for your device from the manufacturer’s website. If the USB device is just a flash drive, then it’s probably not a driver issue. However, if you are installing a USB printer, drawing pad, etc, then it might be worth downloading the driver for that specific device.

Method 3 – Restart & Disconnect USB Devices

The next thing you can try is to disconnect all USB devices and then restart the machine. once you have restarted, try to connect the USB device that was causing the problem.

If that particular USB port doesn’t recognize it, try another one. If the device is recognized by a different USB port, there could be a hardware problem with one of the USB ports. If no USB port recognizes the device, then keep reading because it’s probably something else.

Method 4 – USB Root Hub

Another thing you can try is to open Device Manager, expand USB Serial Bus Controllers, right-click on USB Root Hub and then click on Properties.

Click on the Power Management tab and uncheck the Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power box. If you have more than one USB Root Hub listed, you need to repeat these steps for each one.

Click OK and then restart your computer. Try to reconnect the USB device and see if it is recognized. If not, go back to the power management tab for each one and check the box again. If it does recognize the device, then leave them unchecked.

Method 5 – Connect Directly to PC

A friend of mine ran into this issue and the cause ended up being his USB hub. He only had three USB ports on his computer, so he bought a hub where he could connect an additional 8 USB devices.

I guess this proved too much for his computer and it just started sporadically not recognizing various devices. After removing the hub and connecting the device directly to the computer, it worked just fine.

We haven’t really been able to find any other solution to this problem other than reducing the number of items connected to the hub. Actually, one other solution worked, but it meant having to buy a new USB hub with more power.

If you are having this problem with Windows 8 or Windows 8.1, then you might be in luck. Microsoft has released a fix for Windows 8 not detecting USB devices properly. Make sure to install this hotfix if running Windows 8.

Method 6 – USB Troubleshooter

If nothing has worked so far, you can download the Windows USB Troubleshooter Fixit tool. It’s a free tool that works with Windows XP, Vista and 7.

You can either have the troubleshooter fix the problems for you or select the fixes yourself. I would just let it fix them for you since the choices can sometimes be confusing and technical for the novice user.

Method 7 – Update Generic USB Hub

If you are getting the Unknown Device error in Device Manager, you can also try one other thing. Open Device Manager and then expand Universal Serial Bus Controllers.

You should see at least one item called Generic USB Hub. On some computers, you might see two, three or more of these. Right-click on the first one and choose Update Driver Software.

When the update dialog pops up, choose Browse my computer for driver software.

Then click on Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer at the bottom.

From the list, select Generic USB Hub. Normally, there won’t be anything else listed except for that one choice. Click Next and then click Close once it finishes installing it.

At this point, the Device Manager screen should refresh and either the unknown device will still be there or it may now be recognized. If it’s still showing as not recognized, then you repeat the process for each Generic USB Hub listed.

Method 8 – Uninstall USB Devices

As a last resort, you can also try uninstalling all USB devices from your system and then restarting. I mention this last because even though Windows is supposed to automatically recognize the USB controllers, hubs and devices automatically, it can sometimes fail and you’ll end up with no USB ports working.

I had a computer with 6 USB ports and only one port would not work properly. I uninstalled everything under USB Serial Bus Controllers in Device Manager and restarted. Instead of re-detecting everything, I was left with no USB port working, so be careful when using this method.

Go to Device Manager and start uninstalling each item from under USB Serial Bus Controllers. Before you start with anything that is already working, uninstall the items with exclamation points or that are listed as Unknown Device.

Method 9 – Uninstall Hidden Devices

By default, Device Manager doesn’t show all devices that have been installed to the system. It basically only shows the ones that are currently connected. However, if you installed a USB printer earlier and now no longer use it, it will still be installed, but won’t show up in Device Manager.

Certain hidden or ghost USB devices can cause conflicts with current USB devices and therefore lead to this error. You can view hidden devices in Device Manager by first opening a command prompt and then typing the following two commands:

Once Device Manager loads, you need to click on View and then click on Show Hidden Devices.

Now you want to expand Imaging Devices, Universal Serial Bus Controllers and Unknown Devices. If you see anything listed there that is greyed out or that says unknown device, go ahead and right-click on them and choose Uninstall. Hopefully, removing the older devices will allow the newer devices to work properly.

Other Possible Solutions

If nothing has worked until this point, it’s pretty safe to say there could be a problem with the actual hardware. The best thing to do is to connect the device to another computer and see if it works or not. If not, then it’s definitely an issue with the device.

Possible Solution #1 – The other possible solutions are to try a different USB cable, if you have one lying around. If not, just buy a new cheap USB cable from Amazon: A to B, A to Micro B, A to Mini B, or A to A. This is a fairly rare problem, but I have seen it occur a few times over my many years doing technical support.

Possible Solution # 2 – Another possible solution is to take the device, connect it to another machine and if it does recognize the device properly, to then eject it properly from that computer before reconnecting it to the original computer. I’ve seen this problem occur with several flash drives that were unplugged without ejecting properly. After connecting them to another computer and ejecting them properly from there, they suddenly started to show up on the original computer that was not recognizing them.

Possible Solution #3 – A few people have had luck getting rid of this problem by updating the BIOS. I’ve already written an article about whether it’s a good idea or not to update the BIOS, but in this case, it might be worth a try. You can also go into the BIOS and disable USB, restart the computer and then enable USB again. The only thing you need to make sure is that you have a PS2 port on your computer, otherwise you won’t be able to do anything once you disable USB in the BIOS if your keyboard and mouse are connected via USB.

Hopefully, one of the many solutions above will solve your USB problem. If not, post a comment and I’ll try to help. Enjoy!

Founder of Online Tech Tips and managing editor. He began blogging in 2007 and quit his job in 2010 to blog full-time. He has over 15 years of industry experience in IT and holds several technical certifications. Read Aseem’s Full Bio