Remove Write Protection From USB Pen Drive

This seems to be the problem of most of us these days and some of our readers who wanted to know the methods how they can remove the Write Protected error from their USB drives like Pen Drives and memory cards. In the Write Protected error, we can’t write or copy any data in our flash drives and even can’t format the drive.

There are many reasons that cause this problem, let’s see the solutions of the problem.


Solution 1:-

•    First of all try to locate a small switch (if any, that you may have not noticed) at some place on
     the drive or memory card reader. This is the prime reason for this error. If there is one, switch it
     to the other side to turn the protection off.

•    Yes I know this problem is also occurring these days without this switch but not to worry. Just
     download low-level format tools and run it to execute a “low-level format” on the drive. This
     software is quite handy and may take few attempts to actually remove the error.

After the low level format, you may need to “Partition the drive“. Don’t worry, partitioning a pen drive means allocating it its File System and Cluster Size that was lost after the Low Level Format.

For that:

    Step 1    : Run diskmgmt.msc in Run.
    Step 2    : In the disk management window, select the pen drive, right click on it and click on
                   Format.
    Step 3    : Now choose the File System and Allocation Unit Size and do not check the boxes.
    Step 4    : Click OK and the drive will be reusable after this.

•    The problem can also be caused by some virus activity so just get it scanned by some updated
     good anti virus which may solve your problem.

•    But if none of the methods listed above solves your problem then your pen drive might have gone
     corrupted, so just get it replaced.

Hope any of the methods listed above solves your problem.


Solution 2:-

Things to note before doing this:

•    As the trick will write protect your pen drive, you will not be able to transfer anymore data until
     you disable it again (works best if you only wish to copy or read something from the drive).

•    If you are not good at editing registry then backup.

•    You need Admin rights to work upon the Registry Editor.

Steps to make your drive Write Protected:

    Step 1    : Open Registry Editor by typing regedit in Run dialog.
    Step 2    : Navigate to the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\
    Step 3    : Find a sub key inside it named “StorageDevicePolicies”. If it does not exist there then
                   we  need   to make it. Right click on “Control” key -> New -> Key. Name it
                   “StorageDevicePolicies” without quotes.
    Step 4    : Now right click on this newly created key and then click New -> DWORD value and
                   name it as “WriteProtect”.
    Step 5    : Modify this key and give it a value “1” (if doesn’t work then number it value “0”).
    Step 6    : Click OK, and remember to restart the PC.

Now no more data can be transferred to the drive but to start using the drive again just give the “WriteProtect” key a value of 0 instead of 1 and restart the PC.

STEP COMPLETE.......!!!!!

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