Hello, I have been using Protectorion for a while, also on an 32GB USB stick. It has worked very well until last night. There are three folders with short videos of different persons on the stick, and yesterday I opened the safe as I always do and clicked on one of three folders to “Export Folder unencrypted”. The screen soon turned white and on the very top I was told Protectorion was "Not responding". I waited but no change, and later I could not even close it down, and had to shut down the computer with Task Master. I restarted the computer, connected the USB stick again, and immediately a small window pop-up opened up telling me, that windows cannot read the removable stick, it needs to be formatted. Without me doing anything this pop-up repeated itself once a second, without stopping. I always had to turn off the computer. (Trying to format or even trying to wipe the stick later was also not possible, no access at all is possible) I tried the USB stick on another computer, same thing. So, I downloaded Rufus, tried to format with it, failed, got this log: Rufus version 1.2.0.183 Found drive 'USB Device' 1 device found. Cylinders: 3824, TracksPerCylinder: 255, SectorsPerTrack: 63, BytesPerSector: 512 Partition type: MBR, NB Partitions: 0 Caution: Opened \\.\PHYSICALDRIVE2 drive for write access read_sectors: Read error - [0x00000015] The device is not ready. StartSector:0, nSectors:0, SectorSize:1 Drive does not have an x86 master boot record read_sectors: Read error - [0x00000057] The parameter is incorrect. StartSector:0, nSectors:0, SectorSize:1 Volume does not have an x86 partition boot record read_sectors: Read error - [0x00000015] The device is not ready. StartSector:0, nSectors:0, SectorSize:1 unable to zero MBR Found drive 'USB Device' 1 device found. Cylinders: 3824, TracksPerCylinder: 255, SectorsPerTrack: 63, BytesPerSector: 512 Partition type: MBR, NB Partitions: 0 0 devices found. Is there any way to format this USB stick? I mean ANY WAY... I know far to little to be able to make sense of the log... Any way to safe this thing? With or without the content? Thanks PS. I of course tried to go through computer>Manage>storage>disk management, the drive is in the list, but "0 Media". Everything feeezes(!) until I simply pull the usb stick out....
@ThomasMann: It sounds like the stick might have gone defective(i.e. the controller on the USB stick). Can you open it on another machine? Another thing to do is to check if the USB driver has been updated on your computer. That might cause problems. Also, I see no mention of OS or hardware in your original post. That info would be very helpful. Good luck.
As I wrote, I did try another machine, same manic result. The pop up appears about every one tenth of a second(!), only way to stop it, is to pull it. I use Win 7 Ulti... and another Usb stick of the same kind works still fine. The protectorion must be stuck somewhere, and so there is no access from outside. Also tried the Harddiscdrive Lowlevelformat software, never gets beyond 128bytes.
The memory cells on any usb or SSD drive do have a limited amount of life, Looks like you have met that expectation. Luckily they are very cheap today, you can get a new 32gb for $10. at Newegg
It sounds like that program made a mess of the USB stick. It's best to speak to someone from their tech support staff. I wouldn't just give up on it until I spoke to them and got a straight answer.
Though your chances of success are slim, you lose nothing to try: Computer Management > Device Manager > Disk drives > right-click: Properties > Driver: See what it says about the driver and try to update it. Also on the right-click, instead of Properties try to (scan for hardware changes and) uninstall. If you do manage to uninstall it, you may be able to start from scratch. Provided of course the drive is in working order. EDIT: You don't mention it, so have you tried the obvious fully uninstalling Protectorion? It may release its hold. (if necessary, you can reinstall it later). Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes? (Juvenal) But who is to protect from the protectors?
im doing a recovery for a goof on a tablet and all tools ive tried i found active @ boot disk 10.1 has active@ undelete with advanced algorithm selected is finding the files i need via usb cable from drive letter of internal storage of tablet..
This uses killdisc, which I have tried. I guess I am lucky, it is only a $10 part, but I am surprised that there is no software around that can can recognise that this is 32GB USB stick, but cannot get access. Shows you how little I know about computers...
Thanks for trying, but none of this helps. Most of the tools recognize the disc, but none of them can access it, and do something about it. I do have copies of most of those videos, so I just buy a new stick What p..... me off is that Protectorion cannot be bother to answer. When asked a question like this, not a solution, a simple answer would do Another software place no one should pay any money to!