Can no longer save to memory stick

zoe

I have a memory stick, about one year old, which has been in the back of the PC all the time so not being moved around and damaged.

I've noticed that I can no longer save to the stick, although I can still open and use saved documents from the stick.

When I try to save it states "The directory or file cannot be created."

Any ideas why this might be? Thanks

trout

zoe wrote: »

I have a memory stick, about one year old, which has been in the back of the PC all the time so not being moved around and damaged.

I've noticed that I can no longer save to the stick, although I can still open and use saved documents from the stick.

When I try to save it states "The directory or file cannot be created."

Any ideas why this might be? Thanks

What capacity is the stick ? Have you checked for free space ?

ethernet

Flash memory has a limited number of read and write operations before it gives up. This might not be the problem but it does happen eventually.

zoe

Yeah, there's loads of space on it as I have very little on it.

I just back up a simple word document once a week, so at most it's only been saved on maybe 50 times, but there's definitely plenty of space on it.

Maybe it's just kicked the bucket...:(

trout

First thing is to make sure you have copies of the data on the stick.

Remove it from the back of the PC, check the contacts for dust or dirt, and then reseat it. Maybe in a different USB port, or PC ? Make sure the connection is solid.

Can you describe how & when the error comes about ?
Do you have any other USB devices that are acting up ?
Post back and let us know what OS you are using ... I'm guess Windows ... there may be some disk diagnostics you could run.

Flash drives can fail, and sometimes suffer general abuse from being ported about ... but they are also cheap as chips.

If you reseat the key, and it's still acting up ... maybe consider replacing it ?

zoe

trout wrote: »

Remove it from the back of the PC, check the contacts for dust or dirt, and then reseat it. Maybe in a different USB port, or PC ? Make sure the connection is solid.

Thanks trout, just done that but unfortunately hasn't worked.

trout wrote: »

Can you describe how & when the error comes about ?

When I try to save something the pc freezes in that window for a few seconds (in other open windows the pc is working normally) then after a few seconds the message states "The directory or file cannot be created."

It can open from the memory stick without any problem.

trout wrote: »

Do you have any other USB devices that are acting up ?

No, everything else is working fine.

trout wrote: »

Post back and let us know what OS you are using ... I'm guess Windows ... there may be some disk diagnostics you could run.

Yeah, it's windows XP.

trout wrote: »

Flash drives can fail, and sometimes suffer general abuse from being ported about ... but they are also cheap as chips.

If you reseat the key, and it's still acting up ... maybe consider replacing it ?

Yes, may have to do that...

trout

This is what MS support has to say ...

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windows2000serv/reskit/w2000Msgs/3748.mspx?mfr=true

When you say you back up a word doc ... is it the same file each time ?

What happens if you try and save a new file ... as in, one that does not already exist on the disk ?

gamer

try copying ,and deleting from dos mode, from dos prompt.i have a usb drive,i can only delete files in dos mode.

zoe

trout wrote: »

When you say you back up a word doc ... is it the same file each time ?

What happens if you try and save a new file ... as in, one that does not already exist on the disk ?

Good idea, hadn't thought about that.

I created a new file and tried to save that and it states "The directory or file cannot be created."

Kavkid

Try creating a new folder, and saving your stuffin that, I know it worked for me.

Overheal

Im surprised nobody has suggested this yet:

So you can read all the data on the stick? copy all of the data from the stick onto your desktop

In My Computer, right click the memory stick, and select Format.

Perform a Quick format and try to copy the files back from the desktop to the memory stick (Copy dont Cut for now..) if it fails, try formatting again, but do a full format: this will take considerably more time but may fix it.

trout

What he said. ^^ Makes good sense.

Although, if the disk format / fiile structure was fubared ... you'd expect read operations to fail as well

zoe

Thanks Overheal...! Got it sorted now!

Was doing as you suggested and was saving the files from the memory stick onto the PC and I've just noticed a flippin' big music file has been saved onto the stick! By my other half no doubt!

Sorry about that...:o Thanks very much for the help

Overheal

trout

So it was free disk space all along ? *kof* post 2 *kof*

All's well that end's well