I have an older USB drive that should be around 16 GB, but every computer reports only about 120 MB of usable space. The label identifies it only as "VendorCo ProductCode," which doesn't provide much useful information. I've tried wiping it from the command line, creating and deleting partitions, and formatting it as FAT, FAT32, and exFAT, but the available capacity never changes. Could this be a partition issue, or is the drive defective or counterfeit?
2 Answers
This is probably a counterfeit-capacity drive. Some cheap giveaway or bulk USB drives are programmed to claim they have 16 GB, even though the hardware inside contains only a small amount of flash storage—in this case, likely around 120 MB. Partitioning and reformatting won’t restore capacity that isn’t physically present. A controller-identification tool may reveal the actual chip, but the specialized low-level tools needed to reprogram it are risky and specific to each controller. I’d treat it as a 120 MB drive at most, and avoid storing anything important on it.
It could theoretically have been a hidden partition, but since you already removed all partitions and tried several filesystems, that explanation doesn’t fit. A genuine 16 GB drive should still report close to that capacity after being wiped. At this point, replacing it is the practical option—small USB drives are inexpensive, and this one may not be trustworthy even if you managed to make it report a larger size.
That’s what I ended up doing. I bought a new one rather than risk relying on a drive that only appears to have 120 MB.
Thanks for explaining it. I decided it wasn’t worth spending more time trying to repair it, so I replaced it with a new USB drive.