I have a big collection of teaching resources that my wife needs on a USB stick, but we've run into some major issues. The USB initially displayed a message saying the files could be viewed but not saved, prompting a reformat. I copied the files to my computer and reformatted the USB to exFAT, but now I keep getting a write-protection error when trying to copy the files back. I've noticed that if I reset the USB connection, Windows prompts me to scan and fix it, and copying works for a bit, but the error returns quickly. The only way I can copy files without hitting the write-protection issue is to do so one at a time, which isn't feasible given the number of files. I also tried using robocopy, but that didn't help either. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
2 Answers
It sounds like your USB stick might have a controller failure or firmware issue causing that write protection error. Have you tried looking for specific recovery tools from the manufacturer, like SanDisk or Transcend? They sometimes offer software designed to fix these types of problems. If that doesn't work, there are general data recovery tools available online that you could check out too.
Have you thought about zipping up all the files before copying them? Sometimes that can help with these types of write issues, especially if there are a lot of files and directories involved.
I'll try this in the morning. Just so you know, I couldn’t sleep and tried this tonight, but the USB seems to be completely bricked now. Windows can’t repair it anymore, and so far, I've lost two USB sticks. I'm currently uploading everything to a cloud service, and that seems to be working for now, but I know my wife would prefer having a USB stick.
I'll take a look at this tomorrow, thank you. Just to mention, this is the second USB stick we've tried. The first one got completely bricked after a similar error and we switched to this one. A colleague was able to transfer the files to this stick, but now we're in the same boat again. I've even tried using different computers to help with copying.