Is your pen drive write protected? We tell you how to solve it

Everyone has ever gone through the agonizing situation of inserting a USB stick to transfer some files, photos and songs when suddenly this Windows warning appears on the screen: "The disk is write protected.".

In these situations, with all the patience of the world, you remove the small device of the computer, without forgetting to deactivate it before in the Device Wizard of the system, you remove the manual block and insert it again in the PC. Everything is well now.

But, what do we do when Windows continues to give the warning? Or when your pendrive does not even have the manual lock and yet the message that is write protected appears? In that case, the USB may have become infected with a virus or script.

Unlock the "unsolvable"

We have prepared a tutorial to help you eliminate the write protection of your pendrive without major complications, so that you can finish passing those songs to your friend or those photos to your mother.

Step 1

Insert the device into the USB port on your computer and make sure it has been recognized correctly. A message in the lower right corner of the screen usually confirms this acknowledgment.

Step 2

Click the following link to download the batch add.bat file. Then run it. Once this is done, the key will be automatically added to the Registry Editor.

Step 3

Open the "Run" window in the "Start Menu" and enter the "regedit" command. Once this is done, the Windows Registry Editor will open. While browsing the folders, search for the following path: KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE> SYSTEM> CurrentControlSet> Control> StorageDevicePolicies.

Step 4

This is the most important step: Double-click the "WriteProtect" key in the Registry Editor, and in the window that appears, type "0" in the "Value data" field. Then press "OK". Close the editor and restart the computer. Insert the thumb drive again and check if the protection has been removed correctly.

Observations


It is important to remember that the above feature does not only work on pendrives. It can also be used to remove write protection from memory cards, iPods, MP3 players and other devices connected through the USB port.


If the method explained here does not work, there is a more drastic solution, which is to format the device completely.


Adaptation of an original article in Portuguese published in Tecmundo and an original article in Softsonic.

By Inarcesoft Writing

18/6/2017