Drive Letter Not Sticking

Jul 26, 2013
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I'm using three Western Digital Greens at the moment, two WDC WD20EARX-00PASB0s and one WDC WD20EARS-00MVWB0. I have no issues with the EARXs, but my EARS is un-assigning its drive letter after every reboot. Any ideas what might be causing this, and any possible fix?
 

mikeymikec

Lifer
May 19, 2011
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Have you manually specified a drive letter for the one whose drive letter isn't staying put?
 
Jul 26, 2013
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Yeah, still doesn't work. I've deleted the drive, done quick and full formats, deleted and reinstalled its driver...

Nothing
 

mikeymikec

Lifer
May 19, 2011
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11,420
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If you give another drive a drive letter manually, does that stick?

I wonder if the drive's signature is somehow a problem. Can it be upgraded to a 'dynamic disk' in Disk Management (backups first, good plan) or given perhaps a GPT partition layout?
 
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Jul 26, 2013
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I can't shrink the volume, it says an unexpected error occurs and to check the System Event Log. I can't seem to find the associated event log in Event Viewer though.

Windows is also unable to run a Disk Check, and even when a drive letter is assigned it doesn't show up on Disk Defragmenter. When attempting to apply security permissions, it says access is denied.
 

mikeymikec

Lifer
May 19, 2011
18,659
11,420
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Try with the disk attached to another machine? A disk that fails a disk check is a tad worrying.

Can you run a disk check on other disks connected to this system? (chkdsk is a read-only one, chkdsk /f isn't a full check and shouldn't take long, ie. about 10 minutes, chkdsk /f /v /r is a full one).

I'm wondering whether something is getting in the way, perhaps security software or malware.
 

jkauff

Senior member
Oct 4, 2012
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Are you sure your SATA connection is good? Might try a different cable and a different socket.
 

Mushkins

Golden Member
Feb 11, 2013
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Create a dummy user and try it under that user. Could be a login script with your main account set to assign/unassign drive letters, or just a corrupt user profile.
 

mikeymikec

Lifer
May 19, 2011
18,659
11,420
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Anything in the event log around the time that you connect the disk?

Start > Run > eventvwr

Windows Logs > System log
 

jkauff

Senior member
Oct 4, 2012
583
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I've swapped the sata cable with my dvd drive, it still didn't stick.

Why would that affect just one drive? o.o
Each drive has its own SATA port and cable. I thought you might have a connection problem with the cable or the port. You're not trying to run multiple SATA drives off a single port, are you?
 

Smoblikat

Diamond Member
Nov 19, 2011
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No no, sorry, I meant that second one for Mushkins. Sorry, was a little tired when I wrote that

Download HDtune, it has a free trial and will test every aspect of the drive. I think you can put some stuff in the registry to assign it a letter, or even create a .bat file to start on bootup to automatically assign it a letter.
 
Jul 26, 2013
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@Mikeymikec - I couldn't find the system event log for anything that might relate to it at all.

@Smoblikat - How would I go about doing the registry/ .bat stuff? I'll test it with HDtune in a moment.
 
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