DataTraveler Elite G2 USB 3.1 Gen 1 Flash Drive - Support

1. The DataTraveler could be conflicting with a pre-assigned drive letter. To resolve, do the following (Do not do this for a "Privacy" drive that assigns two drive letters):

1. Insert the DataTraveler and open "Control Panel". Then open "Administrative Tools".

2. Open Computer Management

3. Select “Disk Management” on the left window pane.

4. Locate the DataTraveler on the right window pane.

5. Right-click on the drive and select “Change Drive Letter and Paths.”

6. Click Change and select a new drive letter from the drop-down box. Then click OK.

2. The DataTraveler may be conflicting with pre-installed software. Disable all applications running in the background prior to installation of the Data Traveler.

3. Make sure Windows, any USB controller drivers and the system BIOS for you computer is up to date.

4. If you have a desktop computer, make sure the DataTraveler is inserted directly into one of the main USB ports on the back of the PC. Front ports, keyboard ports or USB Hubs may not supply sufficient power for the High Speed DataTraveler to function properly.

If none of the above apply, your USB DataTraveler drive may be defective. Please contact Kingston Technical Support for assistance. 

FAQ: KDT-012314-GEN-02

This is common for flash storage, whether internal SSD, Flash Card, or external USB storage, and is due in part to a variance in how flash memory vs spinning platter hard drive manufacturers calculate megabyte. Hard drive manufacturers calculate a megabyte (or 1,000x1,000 bytes) as 1,000KBs, whereas the binary calculation for flash-based storage is 1,024KBs.

Example: For a 1TB flash-based storage device, Windows will calculate it as having a capacity of 931.32GB. (1,000,000,000,000÷1,024÷1,024÷1,024=931.32GB).

Furthermore, Kingston reserves some of the listed capacity for formatting (e.g., File Allocation Table) and other functions such as firmware and/or controller-specific information, and thus some of the listed capacity is not available for data storage.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-06

Windows assigns new drives to the next available physical drive. It will sometimes take the same drive letter as a network drive for this reason. This is a common problem with removable storage devices.

To resolve this, go to Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk Management. Note the drives on the right windowpane. See if the Kingston (x) is recognized. (x) denotes the drive letter that Windows assigned for the DataTraveler.

If the DataTraveler is using the same drive letter as one of the other drives, right-click the Kingston Drive letter and click on "Change Drive letter and Paths".

On the next dialog box click on the "Change" button and assign a drive letter that is not currently being used.

Note: Do not manually change drive letters if you have a "Privacy" Data traveler that assigns two drive letters for the device.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-03

In Macs you first have to empty out the trash can in order to regain the space back. You may have to re-plug the drive back in after emptying out the trash.

Should this not work then a complete format of the device should be done. Please follow these instructions for formatting your Kingston device.

WARNING: Formatting will erase all your data so please make sure you have a copy before proceeding.

1. Go to Go > Applications > Utilities and Open Disk Utility.
2. Choose your drive from the left panel and then click Erase on the right.
3. Select a Volume Format.Choosing MS-DOS File System will allow the drive to work on the Mac and Windows operating systems. If used only in a Mac then select Mac OS Extended as the Volume Format.
4. Click Erase.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-04

Although it is possible to boot from the DataTraveler, it is not a feature Kingston supports.These drives are intended as storage devices.

FAQ: KTD-082913-GEN-27

Windows may not recognize the MacOS Extended or Standard file system. To resolve, format the drive in MacOS DOS so that it can be used in both environments.

WARNING: Formatting will erase all of the data on the DataTraveler. Back up your data before proceeding.

1. Insert the DataTraveler into the Mac OS X machine and wait for it to mount.
2. Click on the "GO" option on the menu bar.
3. Double-click on Utilities (If you do not see Utilities, double-click on Applications and then double-click on the Utilities folder.)
4. Double-click on the Disk Utility icon.
5. On the Disk Utility Dialog box, click once on the Kingston DataTraveler active partition. Note: There will be two listings for the DataTraveler, the first one is the active partition and the second is the volume label.
6. Click the erase tab located on the right side of the screen.
7. Using the Volume Format drop-down, select "MS-DOS File System" from the list.
8. Click Erase.

Be aware MacOS 10.6.5 will support full read and write access to exFAT formatted drives. So formatting the drive using exFAT file system may also resolve this problem. MacOS still has read only access to NTFS formatted drives.

Some devices (MP3 players, digital photo frames, etc) will not read NTFS or exFAT file systems.

Also Windows XP and Vista will require an update in order to access exFAT.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-07

After formatting the DataTraveler in Mac OS X, the following symptoms may apply:

• The drive is not readable in Windows XP.
• While trying to format the drive in Windows, only 2GB is formatted. Additionally, two partitions are created.
• After adding data files onto the drive via Mac, Windows cannot see the data.

This is most likely a result of using the GUID partition table, which is the default partition table for Intel-based Macs. The GUID partition table is only supported in Windows Vista. Windows 7 and Windows XP do not support this file system. To resolve, you must erase the drive via Mac OS X with the appropriate options selected. Follow the steps below to erase your drive properly with Mac OS X.

• Access Disk Utility
• Highlight the disk and select the "Partition" tab
• Set the volume scheme to "1 Partition"
• Change the format to "MS-DOS (FAT)"
• Click the "Options" button near the bottom of the screen and select the "Master Boot Record" partition table.
• Click Apply to save the changes and reformat the drive

After the format is complete, verify that the disk is now using MBR by looking at the "partition map scheme" in the lower right corner of the Disk Utility window. It should now display "Master Boot Record."

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-16

As Windows is unable to format a drive over 32GB with FAT32, the use of third-party software is required. Although we cannot assist in acquiring or using third-party software to format a drive as FAT32, there are a number of free applications that can be found via Google or Bing search.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-14

FAQ: KGF-022811-GEN-02

If you have data on the DataTraveler that is important to you, we strongly recommend that you use one of the two possible ways for data recovery (see below). Kingston does not offer data recovery services. For more information on our warranty policy please visit http://www.kingston.com/company/warranty.asp

1. Contact a company that specializes in data recovery services such as Driver Savers at www.drivesavers.com and Ontrack at www.ontrack.com just to name a couple or you can do a search on Google for data recovery.
2. Go to www.download.com and do a search for data recovery and download one of the many utilities for data recovery which are fairly simple to use. We suggest trying one of the free versions as they work just as well as the paid versions. However for the possibilities for this option to work, the computer must assign a drive letter to the device. Even so it's not a guarantee. If not then option #1 would be your best bet.

KDT-012611-GEN-25

FAQ: KDT-012611-GEN-25

ReadyBoost is a Windows feature having the ability to utilize USB flash storage space as disk caching to improve system performance. Unfortunately, DataTraveler USB drives do not support Windows ReadyBoost.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-11

This usually is caused by a program that re-partitions the drive to a smaller capacity it can use. Windows native format utility is usually not able to restore the capacity. We suggest you search online for a third party format utility.

FAQ: KTD-012711-GEN-26

This may be due to a power setting for your USB ports. Here are the steps to change this setting:

1. Click Start -> Control Panel.
2. Click Performance and Maintenance link.
3. Click System control panel link.
4. Click Hardware tab.
5. Click Device Manager button.
6. Click the + in front of Universal Serial Bus controllers to expand this hardware category.
7. Right-click the USB Root Hub and select Properties.
8. Click the Power Management tab and uncheck the box next to "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".
9. Repeat steps 7 and 8 for each additional USB Root Hub listed.
10. Reboot the computer.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-13

Windows may not recognize the MacOS Extended or Standard file system. To resolve, format the drive in MacOS DOS so that it can be used in both environments.

WARNING: Formatting will erase all of the data on the DataTraveler. Back up your data before proceeding.

1. Insert the DataTraveler into the Mac OS X machine and wait for it to mount.
2. Click on the "GO" option on the menu bar.
3. Double-click on Utilities (If you do not see Utilities, double-click on Applications and then double-click on the Utilities folder.)
4. Double-click on the Disk Utility icon.
5. On the Disk Utility Dialog box, click once on the Kingston DataTraveler active partition.
   Note: There will be two listings for the DataTraveler, the first one is the active partition and the second is the volume label.
6. Click the erase tab located on the right side of the screen.
7. Using the Volume Format drop-down, select "MS-DOS File System" from the list.
8. Click Erase.

Be aware MacOS 10.6.5 will support full read and write access to exFAT formatted drives. So formatting the drive using exFAT file system may also resolve this problem. MacOS still has read only access to NTFS formatted drives.

Some devices (MP3 players, digital photo frames, etc) will not read NTFS or exFAT file systems.

Also Windows XP and Vista will require an update in order to access exFAT.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-18

This is a problem related to copying directories (created with Finder) from and then back to a USB storage device configured with an MS-DOS/FAT file system. Until Apple releases an update addressing this issue, the following is a safe solution.

1. Launch Terminal via Applications > Utilities and type the following command, making sure to include a space at the end:
   
   dot_clean
2. Select the folder generating "Error code-36." Drag and drop the folder directly into the Terminal window.
3. The path to the folder in question should appear at the end of the Terminal command. For example, it may look like:
   
   dot_clean /Users/UserName/Desktop/Test_Folder
4. Press Enter/Return to run the command. It may appear as if nothing happened, however, you should now be able to transfer the folder to the USB storage device without error.
5. Repeat the process as needed for additional folders.

FAQ: KDT-010611-GEN-20