Solutions to Solve “USB Device Not Recognized” – Rene.E Laboratory Support Center

2024-07-31 John Weaver Senior Program Developer

Summary

USB devices refer to any devices connect to computer via USB ports. Like USB flash drive or remove disk. Usually, computer can recognize the USB device which works well after connecting. However, sometimes we may receive the notification that USB device not recognized or the device is not showing up because the USB device you connected could be failed. As a result, we can not use the USB device. Here, possible reasons and related solutions will be provided for this problem.

Possible Reasons Lead to USB Device Not Recognized

1. The USB device is disabled in Windows. For example, we can disable the USB devices via registry editor. Beside, if the USB devices is disable with software like Renee USB Block, it is necessary to ask the administrator for password. 2. The USB device is disabled by BIOS. If you disable USB devices in BIOS setting, you will receive notification of “USB device not recognized” after connecting the USB devices to computer. 3. USB device fails to work. If the USB devices is damaged, same problem happens. 4.Not sufficient power supply. This problem happens frequently if you connect external hard disk. For example, you connect the USB disk to the USB ports on the front of the tower. And the power supplied by the front USB ports can not reach the requirement of the external disk. Besides, not qualified power adapter could also lead to power insufficient. 5. The driver software is not compatible with the USB device. The computer may fail to install the latest driver software of the USB flash drive. As a result, computer will not recognize the USB device.

Solutions to Solve Computer Can Not Recognized or Access the USB Device

Solution 1: Check the Connector of the USB Device and the USB Device

1. Check the connection between the USB device and the computer . Please reconnect it if the connection is not correct.

2. If the problem is caused by the insufficient power supply, please connect the USB devices to USB 3.0 which is in blue. If same problem happens, please connect the device to another computer to check whether it works well.

3. If you connect the USB device still fails to be recognized after connected to another computer, it could be the problem of the USB device .

Please click here to get more about how to fix the USB device if it is a USB flash drive.

Solution 2: Update USB Driver Software

Step 1: Press Win + R to launch Run. Enter “ devmgmt.msc ” in the pop-up window to launch “Device Manager”.

Step 2: Click “ Universal Serial Bus Controllers ” and select the not recognized USB device . Then please right-click the device and select “ Update Driver Software ” in the menu.

You can also right-click the USB devices and select “ Uninstall ” in the menu. Then please restart the computer and it will reinstall the driver software of the USB device to solve this problem.

Solution 3: Enable USB Hub

Step 1: Press Win + R to launch Run. Enter “ devmgmt.msc ” in the pop-up window to launch “Device Manager”.

Step 2: Click “ Universal Serial Bus Controllers ” and find “ USB Root Hub “. Then please right-click and select “ Disable ” in the menu one by one. Then enable them again.

Solution 4: Change the USB Settings in BIOS

Step 1: Restart your computer and get access to BIOS settings . Note: We can get into BIOS settings by pressing F2 or DEL. If it is not work, please refer to your computer manual.

Step 2: Find settings related to USB in Advanced tab in BIOS. Then please try to find items like USB Configuration or Device Configuration .

Step 3: Change the settings of all USB ports to be “ Enable ”. Press F10 to save the settings and restart computer.

Solution 5: Modify the Registry Editor

Step 1: Press Win + R to launch Run. Enter “regedit” and press enter to get access to Registry Editor.

Step 2: Find USBSTOR item via the following path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\USBSTOR Click “USBSTOR” and find the “ Start ” and check the value of “ Start ”. If it is 4 , please double click “Start” and set it to be 3 . After finishing all the steps above, please connect the USB device to computer again.

Besides, software like Renee USB Block can help users to restrict the connection of USB devices. Only authorized USB disk can be read or written. If the problem “USB device not recognized” is caused by such kind of software, please ask the administrator to solve this problem.