Reviews & Tech stuff & Windows Vista Walter on 19 Dec 2006 12:02 am
SanDisk 2GB Titanium USB drive on Windows Vista
I picked up a couple of the SanDisk Cruzer 2GB U3 Titanium USB drives today because I found them for $50 each after an instant rebate at Costco. I’ve been needing to upgrade from my old 512 MB drive for some time anyway. The drive itself is beautiful - a brushed silver look with a thumb slide to extend the drive, so no more caps to lose.
Getting it installed on Windows Vista (RTM) was a little tricky, though. For those that don’t know, U3 is a system added onto these drives that lets you install applications (such as email and Web browser) on the drive and then run them from any computer you plug it into - in essence, carrying around your important apps with you. Sounds pretty cool in concept. The drives are formatted in two partitions - one a small partition that Windows sees as a CD-ROM drive and a larger partition that Windows sees as a USB drive.
Unfortunately, Windows Vista does not recognize U3 and cannot install the drivers for the smaller partition. You also cannot remove U3 without first having the drive recognized by Windows. So, I took it over to my Windows XP machine. On Windows XP, the drivers installed just fine. After playing with U3 a bit, I decided there were a few reasons I just didn’t care to have it:
- No Vista support yet.
- It loads up on any machine you insert the drive onto and putting it on a friend’s or coworker’s machine can make them (rightly) feel a little nervous about the extra menus that pop up.
- While the technology is cool, I just really didn’t have the need for it.
Getting rid of it proved tricky, though. You can’t just reformat or repartition the drive. You have to use an uninstall program. The U3 interface has an uninstall feature built in, but it didn’t work for me. When I tried to use it, it just told me there was no drive connected. I downloaded the uninstall program from SanDisk, but it turned out to be the same program and also could not recognize the drive to do the uninstall. Of course, the drive was there and working just fine. The only program that couldn’t see it was the uninstaller.
Seems a lot of people have similar problems getting rid of the U3 software, though, because U3 has created a U3 Uninstall Web site that lets you remove U3 from any drive that has it installed. After telling the site a couple of times that I was really, really sure I didn’t want their amazingly useful software, it finally let me reformat the drive to work as a simple USB drive. One catch, though. Once you remove U3 from your drive, you cannot reinstall it.
When I plugged the drive back in on the Vista machine, Vista recognized it right away.
Now, what I like about the drive itself (and that’s pretty much everything but the U3 software):
- It looks great, as I mentioned.
- It has a retractable key.
- It’s extremely strong - rated to withstand 2,000 lbs of pressure.
- It is blazingly fast.
I plan to use one of them to test out Vista’s new ReadyBoost feature, so when I get around to that, I’ll be sure to post a review of how it does.
on 05 Jul 2007 at 5:21 pm 1.David said …
i know you wrote this article a long time ago but i just got the sandisk 2gb titanium usb drive. I am running windows vista. Some reason the usb is not being read. You said the usb is partitioned into 2 drives. One small and one large. Vista does not pick up any of the 2 drives. I did a device manager look up and i see that windows does recongize a USB mass storage device connected but it not working correctly. If i understand correctly you were able to just use the storage device on vista but not the U3. was this because you remove the u3 and vista finally pick up as a usb storage device? I am so confused and any help would be greatly appreciated thanks!
on 05 Jul 2007 at 5:48 pm 2.David said …
well just a quick update..i finally was able to get on a XP computer and remove the u3. i went back to my vista computer and plug in the usb device and again windows vista does not recongize the device plugged in. this has become a frustrating piece of work. if you have any ideas or tips on solving this please email me back thanks
on 28 Jul 2007 at 7:27 am 3.Robbie - Liverpool UK said …
Does anyone know if ‘Sandisc’ will eventually have these drivers ready for Vista in the near future?
I own the Titanium 2G USB drive and want to use it with Vista but as yet i cant.
What is taking them so long??
I emailed Sandisc, but have never even had a reply from them.
please bear in mind im not tech’ clued up!
also -
are there pen/Flash USB drives that WILL work with Vista???!!
if anyone can help me i would really appreciate them sending me an email -
Thankyou
Robbie.
robbieisace1@yahoo.co.uk
on 03 Aug 2007 at 9:12 am 4.Bob Escher said …
I have the 4 gig model and I also have vista ultimate. Vista recognizes the drives just fine. What it doesn’t recognize is the U3 software. They told me in the beginning of May that the new version would be vista compatible and that it would be ready in July. It’s Aug and I still don’t haven’t the firmware upgrade. I do love the software on the u3 and that is why I want to keep it
Bob E
on 03 Aug 2007 at 2:10 pm 5.Walter said …
Almost all USB drives will work with Vista. It’s not the Sandisk drive itself that has trouble. It’s the U3 software that comes with it. In the original post, I have a link for removing that software and reformatting the drive to a single partition that works fine in Vista.
It looks now like U3 may have an update that works with Vista. Check out this page:
http://www.u3.com/support/default.aspx
Personally, I find U3 just not very useful. But I’m glad they are working on the Vista problem.
on 24 Aug 2007 at 11:55 am 6.Lasse Jensen said …
Did you guys ever get vista to run with U3 support?
Have you tried/seen theese pages?
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/shop/partners/sandisk.mspx -> Doesn’t this page say that u3 is supported by vista?
http://www.u3.com/support/default.aspx#CQ4 ————”4. Does U3 support Vista? Windows 98? Mac?
The U3 Launchpad supports the following operating systems:
Windows Vista (you need to have U3 Launchpad version 1.4 or higher. If you do not have version 1.4 of the U3 Launchpad click here to learn how to check for updates to the U3 Launchpad.”
Please mail me when you’ve tried this out as i’ve just ordered a Sandisk Titanium 4gb!!
-Lasse Jensen
on 29 Aug 2007 at 6:28 am 7.Rene Thomhave said …
As I see it, the Sandisk 2GB Titanium requires a specific firmware version in order to work with Windows Vista and in my experience it is not possible to update the firmware. So, if you have firmware version 2.2.0 there is nothing you can do. Can this be right??
- René Thomhave
on 29 Aug 2007 at 12:08 pm 8.Walter said …
I’ve tried out their update for U3 to run on Vista and it seems to work fine. I still don’t like the software enough to bother with it, but at least it works.
On the Firmware, Rene, I don’t think it’s an issue. The USB stick itself works just fine with Vista and always has. It’s only the U3 software they included on the stick that did not work until the 1.4 update.
on 30 Aug 2007 at 4:10 am 9.Jason said …
nope. tried everything - nothing works for me. i’m about to set fire/throw away in disgust. have done the un-install/reformat thing - vista still will not let it install (windows cannot find the specified file). rubbish.
on 07 Sep 2007 at 8:23 pm 10.Steve said …
Well, in my case, Vista sees the drive and asks if I want to run launchu3.exe. I tell it I want to run the program, but of course it doesn’t. The drive then opens up as if it were one partition and when I click launchu3, it just blinks and does nothing. I’ve got 1.4, the version supposedly compatible with vista installed, so am wondering if maybe, at least where u3 is concerned, it’s a combination of launchpad version and firmware?
on 13 Sep 2007 at 2:13 pm 11.TMC said …
Here is what Sandisk answered me
“As of now, Cruzers with U3 is not guaranteed to work on Windows Vista computer. However, Windows Vista is compatible with Cruzers with U3 Launchpad version 1.4.0.2 and higher. All Cruzers with device version 2.17, 2.18, 2.19 and 2.20 will not be Vista compatible even with the new U3 Launchpad. Cruzers with device version 2.15, 2.16 and 2.21 will be able to upgrade to Vista compatibility. Currently, a solution for the Cruzers with incompatible device versions is under development but it will not likely be ready until the third quarter of this year.”
on 30 Dec 2007 at 4:39 pm 12.SHO said …
Just to update this I’ve had a 4 gig Cruzer with firmware version 2.20 for a while and had the same issue where the U3 Launchpad worked in XP but not Vista.
I recently updated to U3 Launchpad Version 1.6.1.1 and the U3 now works in both XP and Vista.
http://u3.sandisk.com/download/apps/LPInstaller.exe
on 31 May 2008 at 10:10 am 13.Bob said …
My 2 GB ScanDisk is totally unusable because it is impossible to remove the “amazing” U3 drive. I have tried several uninstallers including the one provided by ScanDisk. None will remove it.
I PLAN TO AVOID ALL SCANDISK PRODUCTS IN THE FUTURE BECAUSE OF THIS.