Virus that Destroyed My USB Flashdisk? or RAW Format?

Few questions:

Is your computer fine and it is just your flash drive that causes the problem? Your computer just locks up when you insert the flash drive?

Have you retried all of this booting into "safe mode"?

GA for a very plausible answer.

Some sticks have an LED which lights on accesses.....he should use it. eg. Not remove till the LED stops blinking.

Or use the USB removal tool in XP for example......about Vista and 7 I cannot say.

I have made the same error and it caused errors that displayed the wrong character set.....this appears to have happened here.

If it really was a virus, then Kaspersky is a good AV software as it asks always if it should check up on any USB storage device that is plugged in....before any viruses can even start up!!!

You can also search for a 'virus' that resides in some Eastern labs and for instance reprogramms a 2GB stick to show and feel as 16GB, 32GB or more, and allows it to be sold as such. As long you store data within the real capacity all's fine. Over that it just overwrites data from disk start, rendering everything Gibberish, even if Windows disc checks show drive is OK.(!) Been there myself. Anyway even if this is not your case there are utilities that can recover some data but don't be too optimistic, specially if you have often wrote and deleted files in the stick and have increased file fragmentation. S.M.

The problem is the bad guys put a program on the flash-disk that lies about it's capacity. I suggest you should only buy flash discs from a reputable source. If the price looks too good to be true, the disc is probably a dud and as Simplemind pointed out, your computer tries to use the reported capacity with disastrous results.

There is a program available which loads the disc with data and then verifies its capacity called H2testw.exe and is available here, http://www.heise.de/software/ you may have to convert the text to English from Dutch, but the program has an English button and is very simple to use.

Tony

The software has to be translated from German to English

If you looked farther than the end of your nose, you would see that there is both an English and a German help text file.....

Also, if you had tried to install it, the first screen is this:-

Just check the English box. Can you not see it?

DUUUUHHHHHHH

Andy, I replied on the aspect that the software was in Dutch

I know the difference quite well.

You wrote "

Andy, I replied on the aspect that the software was in Dutch

I know the difference quite well."

Then please explain why the help file is also in English or German and you have an English language install option.......but no Dutch....

Perhaps you could explain that the maybe the programmer "thought in Dutch" when writing the program....or something.......whatever...

I do not need the program, so I do not want to install it further than I did.....so perhaps I am missing something.

By the way, your first/previous post mentioned "German", your second mentions "Dutch", where are you going with this?

The first page of the program has an "English or Deutsch" option. I did not see "Dutch" mentioned myself.......

Your post(s) is(are) strange and does not appear to agree with the facts, but I am willing to read a proper and full explanation or apology! You pick!

Just take a look in the comment where I commented on

Thats the result of NOT quoting from the previous poster. Which is why I try and remember always to do that, not that I am perfect on that score either, but I am getting better! (You may have noticed that on my last posts to you!!)

Actually, on rethinking, you should have not commented at all, I read it and just ignored what was just a spelling mistake that also made another valid language, that would have in this particular example, would have been better.....or posted the "offending" line as well.....

As it was, your post came over strangely as a result.......

Have a great week anyway.......

A good start is to boot your PC with a live Linux disk

When you plug in the USB stick it will pop up.

Eventual viruses on it will not activate itself due the different operating system.

It might show immediately that something asks to start.

Most Linux distributions have several options to analyse the USB memory structure and format it the way you want.

You can do a memory check while formatting, to ensure the full capacity, but I'm not sure that standard software will find that a "small" stick is sold as a big.

Recuperating the data on it is tricky as you need to be sure that you don't recuperate the virus.

You wrote .."I never believed that computer viruses can damage hardware,"

The gamers world was hit with a subtle little virus a while back that disabled the heat sensors that shut down your system automatically if the internal temperature gets too high. Something you would never notice while running your rig. Many video cards and other sensitive hardware devices were fried by this malicious virus.

Tell that to the Iranians who were hit by Stuxnet....

LOL!!!

I just spent 5 minutes reading childish ranting.

It is unimportant whether the language is Dutch or German, but more important English is available. I offered my contribution to help with the original problem and others who have had the same problem, I thought this was a serious forum not face-book.

Tony

You're answer has two sides:

GA: for the fact that we loose time is stupid discussions

BA: come over here and explain that it is unimportant which language it is as long as English is available. We have for more than a year no government anymore on a language based discussion and civil wars have been started for less. People have been judged wrongly due the fact that the accused didn't understand what he was charged for.

The Anglican world has to respect that the majority is not understanding them.