SOLVED selective drive letters not showing

[brian_c]

Hi, i have an odd issue I cannot fathom. When adding a drive (USB/virtual/etc.) certain drive letters will show and certain ones won't. For instance, H, I, J, M, N, O, R, S all do not show in the computer directory but all the rest will. the drives show in disk manager but will not show anywhere else so if I want to use them, I need to open them through disk manager.
My machine has no malware/virus/spyware infection, W7 x64 reinstalled recently, BIOS up to date, all drivers up to date, no problems showing in device manager, view is set to show all drives. Have done much googling on this but to no avail.
I'd really prefer not to reinstall W7 or restore from a backup and was wondering if anyone else has this issue and knows of a fix or reg setting that would sort this out.
I've worked in IT for many years and never seen this so I'm not a newbie but it's just such an odd one i can't figure it out. I've checked in the registry and nothing is amiss, it just started happening out of the blue. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Attached is a screenshot of current drive layout and lettering. In disk mangement I can change the letters no problem and they are all accepted but the drive just won't show with specific letters.

 

[TrainableMan]

What happens in disk manager (diskmgmt.msc) when you right-click on the unassigned disk? Isn't there an option to assign them a drive letter?

 

[davehc]

If you have mapped your network drives and then installed new Removable Storage devices, the drive that relates to this device will not, by default, appear in Windows Explorer
Same problem, if you add a physical hard drive or CD ROM to the system after "mapping" a network drive
When a new removable device is added, the Manager cannot see the mapped network drive and assigns the next available drive letter to the removable device, and so assigns a different drive letter for the Removable Device
Try, under Disk Management, in the list of drives in the right pane, right-clicking the Removable Device(s) and then click Change Drive Letter and Paths.
Click Change, and specify a drive letter for the Removable Device, choosing one that is NOT assigned to the mapped network drives.
5. Click OK, and then click OK again.

 

[brian_c]

Hi Guys, thanks for the response. All letters are available in disk manager and I can select or change any drive and it's letter, it's just that they won't show in explorer and it is only the letters I have listed. As far as the mapped network drives go, I have removed these and tried reassigning letters without them and still get the same thing. In disk manager the right click option gives me all available letters and allows me to assign any letter to any drive without a problem, it just won't show in explorer.

 

[TrainableMan]

When you say they aren't showing, it's not just that you turned them off in windows explorer is it?

There are some tools that allow you to block certain drive letters, for instance with group policy editor, any chance you have done something like that?

 

[brian_c]

Thanks Trainable, been down all these roads mate, I'm MS certified in W7 adminstration so I think I've covered all the bases, that's why it bugs me so......
I'll upload some pics of what happens.

 

[brian_c]

The .doc in this file illustrates the problem for all aforementioned letters. I've just used 'H' in the pics.

 

[TrainableMan]

I still think it's something in your registry set to hide certain letters and they just need turned back on. I use Tune-up Utilities and it makes it quite easy to hide drives but all Tune-Up does is tweak a registry setting somewhere.

 

[brian_c]

Funily enough, I was running TU Utilities 2012. Uninstalled it, removed all traces of it from the reigstry, still same problem seen. Going to go for the backup restore from a specific time before I think it went wrong, seems only viable option at this point.....

 

[brian_c]

F**kin computers, hate them man, f**ckin hate them!!...........mac's included...........

 

[TrainableMan]

If TuneUp hid the drive letters then it wouldn't be like it takes credit for it in the registry. It is not like a sub field under a TuneUp entry so it wouldn't just be removed when TuneUp is uninstalled. It is a field called NoDrives located at
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
and/or
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
(Source)

But it is a single entry for all 26 drive letters. Probably the easiest thing I would try is to simply reinstall TuneUp since you already have it and then check those hide drive settings.


BTW, You might like this Marvin the Martin Wav file ...
View attachment TzPuters.zip
"Oh drat these computers, they're so naughty and so complex. I could pinch them."

 

[TrainableMan]

Actually I was thinking about it and you shouldn't need to reinstall TuneUp. I went to simply check my settings as I allow all drives and you should be able to set it to do that.

Under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer I do not have any NoDrives entry so if you do, simply delete it.

Then under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer NoDrives is Reg_Binary and is set to "00 00 00 00".

So see if yours are different in regedit.

Note: Current User settings are reloaded every time you logon so changing that may not stay once you reboot. For now just check to see what they are set to and report back. you can try setting it to 00 00 00 00 but then reboot and see if it sticks.

 

[davehc]

I don't have the path(s) suggested by TM, but sub paths can vary according to circumstances. However, my own path to your problem, would be:

KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\folder\Hidden\SHOWALL

Then, If you have it. Double Click CheckedValue and enter 1 in the text box.
If the CheckedValue is not there, right click in the empty space and create a new DWORD value and name it as CheckedValue and Apply the "1" as above.

If you now close the regedit, you may be able to see the folders.

 

[brian_c]

Hi guys, done the TU Utilities reinstall, no problems found with hiding of letters. Checked the reg settings suggested and did have an odd number under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer NoDrives. Have reset this to 0 and still getting the same issue, in fact I think it's getting worse now with even less letters showing up in explorer. Uninstalled tuneup, reset reg value to 0 and rebooted. the value holds at 0.
davehc, checked on your suggestion too and the registry setting was as it should be. deleted and re-created it to no avail, thanks anyway.
Thanks for all the suggestions but it looks as if I'll need to perform an OSRI and start from scratch again.

 

[brian_c]

****SORTED****.........so the story goes......opened Virtual PC for first time in a while, got a compatibility error. installed Virtual Box and there appears a drive marked 'H' in explorer....EUREKA MOMENT!!. uninstalled all virtual software (VPC, VirtualBox, Daemon Tools lite), cleaned out all traces I could find from the machine of these programs, rebooted.
My network drives were now marked with a big red 'X' so got rid of them (again).
installed http://www.slysoft.com/en/virtual-clonedrive.html for a virtual device, checking I could still change letters at each step, reinstalled VirtalBox, remapped the network drives and explorer was displaying as it should and I could choose any letter I wanted to show....DVD drive 'H' and virtual drive 'I'........

 

[brian_c]

Thanks for all the suggestions. Found the cure purely by accident but isn't that always the way of it? Thanks for thr Marvin link....had a wee tiiter at that. Cheers all.

 

[TrainableMan]

Glad you got it worked out.

I would say that if issues pop up again, make sure the NoDrives entry under
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
is Reg_Binary, not DWORD. If it isn't Reg_Binary then delete & readd it as binary with value 0.

 

[brian_c]

Just another weird follow on from this............after sorting the drives problem out, I couldn't connect the xbox to the pc any more . after hunting around for a while I found the MC extender service disabled and the checkbox unticked for the firewall exclusion and all was working ok before all the uninstalling and cleaning to sort the previous problem.

Re-enabled the service, rebooted and all could be connected again......probably just cleaned the reg just a little too much!

As I say, just another weird happening but all good now so off for a :beer:

 

[johnnyco12]

If you are trying to change a drive letter and the letter you want to change it to does not show up in disk management, then do the following:

Scroll down the list to see if the letter you want to change to is assigned to a removable drive, if so right click on that drive choose change drive letter, pick another letter to assign to that drive, then click yes, the letter will now change. Go back to the drive you want to change follow the instructions for changing the drive letter and you should find the letter you are looking for in the drop down list . Choose the letter you want and follow the instructions and your drive should be changed.