Problem with USB thumb drive

[josta]

Hi everyone,
I LOVE my new mbp . I am happily transfering all my files from my pc to my new computer. However, I've noticed that everytime I put my U3 thumbdrive onto my mbp the mbp decides I've stuck in an untitled CD. The drive shows up as unnamed drive as well. I've had no problems transfering my data, however, everytime I eject the thumb drive, the drive ejects, but the icon for the blank cd doesn't (I have 6 on my desktop now). I tried moving the cd icons to the trash can, but nothing happens. I was going to install some software for my camera but the disc drive must actually think its full because it doesn't want to take a cd. Weird, eh?
Anyone have any suggestions? I can call apple in the morning, so I'm not too worried about it, but I thought I would try here first

 

[ozontheroad]

Hi everyone,
I LOVE my new mbp . I am happily transfering all my files from my pc to my new computer. However, I've noticed that everytime I put my U3 thumbdrive onto my mbp the mbp decides I've stuck in an untitled CD. The drive shows up as unnamed drive as well. I've had no problems transfering my data, however, everytime I eject the thumb drive, the drive ejects, but the icon for the blank cd doesn't (I have 6 on my desktop now). I tried moving the cd icons to the trash can, but nothing happens. I was going to install some software for my camera but the disc drive must actually think its full because it doesn't want to take a cd. Weird, eh?
Anyone have any suggestions? I can call apple in the morning, so I'm not too worried about it, but I thought I would try here first

have you tried ejecting them from Disk Utility ?

 

[josta]

have you tried ejecting them from Disk Utility ?

No. I am not sure I know how to do that. I opened up the disk utility but all it shows is the harddrive and that parent (fujitsu).

 

[ozontheroad]

No. I am not sure I know how to do that. I opened up the disk utility but all it shows is the harddrive and that parent (fujitsu).

there's an eject option at the top of the window, however if the phantom disks are not showing up there then you can't use it.

have you restarted ?

 

[josta]

have you restarted ?

Coming from the pc world that was one of the first things I tried However, I can't seem to get the computer to shut down or restart. It gets to the window where it start the 2 minute countdown, but then after 2 minutes (or if I just hit the restart or shut down button) nothing happens. I realize this is probably basic stuff, but its pretty different from my old setup.

 

[ozontheroad]

Coming from the pc world that was one of the first things I tried However, I can't seem to get the computer to shut down or restart. It gets to the window where it start the 2 minute countdown, but then after 2 minutes (or if I just hit the restart or shut down button) nothing happens. I realize this is probably basic stuff, but its pretty different from my old setup.

ok... let me get this right...

at this time you are unable to shut down or restart your computer hand have a bunch of rogue cd icons on your desktop... right ?

if this is the case the you should do a forced shut down by holding the power button for about 5 seconds.

now restart, i would recommend inserting the install disk and start from it to check the startup hard drive with the Disk Utility (i recommend this because of the forced shut down)

then restart normally and see if the rogue disks are still there.

 

[thewhitehart]

The solution to your problem requires an unfortunate compromise. U3 thumb drives aren't compatible with mac; that is, the thumb drive is, but the U3 software is not. You'd have to delete the U3 software - I think their website explains how. Then you use Disk Utility in OS X (Applications -> Utilities -> Disk Utility) to format the thumb drive to FAT 32 which can be read by both Windows and Mac. Alternatively, you can just format it mac os x extended if you want to only use it on macs.

U3 software is cool, so sorry you'd lose it if you want full compatibility with mac

 

[josta]

Problem solved

I walked through a restart with an apple tech this morning. We did the restart you guys suggested and booted it to restart to the original parameters. His guess was that when I was trying to make my mac and pc talk to each other to transfer files that I messed up some parameters that was preventing it from shutting down or restarting. weird.
Got the untitled disc problem fixed as well. Thanks for your help everyone. Bummer that I have to lose the cool software with the U3 drive to continue to lose it. Not that it really matters since its just a thumb drive. I'll take a look at the U3 website to see how to reformat it as per your instructions.
Thanks!