Hi, i have used Syskey on Floppy for years on customer Laptops. In
january this year a customer wanted to use syskey (on XP) without a
floppy. I have used USBDLM for mounting the USB devices to the drive
letter A.
USBDLM: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbdlm_e.html
I configured, that a usb-drive with a specific name should always be
mounted to A, all others from G to J.
So you can make a backup to another usb-stick, change the name to force
the mount to A and use it in case of a broken or lost device.
My concern is:
if a usb-device is attached before a user is logged on to the machine
and this specific device was not plugged in bevore on this machine,
would it mount properly?
This problem occured a few days ago:
We used Pretec iDisk Diamond sticks. They are very small and handy. We
also used the type with 128MB, mainly for preventing to use the device
for other purposes as the logon process.
Now we had following issues:
The customer told me that he cannot log on to his laptop. The displayed
message tells "syskey not found on drive A. Please insert disk"
(Translation from german XP). I told him to use his backup-Stick (which
was created on the same machine a few weeks ago) and he was able to
logon. For investigation purposes i told him to plug in the "primary
stick". When he plugged it windows reacted like it was a
"new-and-never-bevore-plugged-in-device".
Messages with installing drivers and "device can now be used" appeared.
The next reboot, the "primary stick" worked again without problems...so far.
Any ideas what happened here?
On Apr 3, 2:07*pm, DONE-IT <m...@done-it.at> wrote:
> Hi, i have used Syskey on Floppy for years on customer Laptops. In
> january this year a customer wanted to use syskey (on XP) without a
> floppy. I have used USBDLM for mounting the USB devices to the drive
> letter A.
> USBDLM:http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbdlm_e.html
> I configured, that a usb-drive with a specific name should always be
> mounted to A, all others from G to J.
> So you can make a backup to another usb-stick, change the name to force
> the mount to A and use it in case of a broken or lost device.
> My concern is:
> if a usb-device is attached before a user is logged on to the machine
> and this specific device was not plugged in bevore on this machine,
> would it mount properly?
> This problem occured a few days ago:
> We used Pretec iDisk Diamond sticks. They are very small and handy. We
> also used the type with 128MB, mainly for preventing to use the device
> for other purposes as the logon process.
> Now we had following issues:
> The customer told me that he cannot log on to his laptop. The displayed
> message tells "syskey not found on drive A. Please insert disk"
> (Translation from german XP). I told him to use his backup-Stick (which
> was created on the same machine a few weeks ago) and he was able to
> logon. For investigation purposes i told him to plug in the "primary
> stick". When he plugged it windows reacted like it was a
> "new-and-never-bevore-plugged-in-device".
> Messages with installing drivers and "device can now be used" appeared.
> The next reboot, the "primary stick" worked again without problems...so far.
> Any ideas what happened here?
Hello,
Don't know if this will help, but ...
Windows Device Manager keeps track (a record) of all USB devices that
have been attached to the computer. This information on each USB
device is stored in the registry and is displayed in Device Manager.
Even if you plug in two identical brand, type and size of USB devices,
a separate record is kept of each, so that Windows doesn't have to go
any further to display a device that has already been connected at
least once. Each individual device has to be plugged in, recognized
and drivers assigned. Of course, if something was done to the system
that removed a particular device's "recognition" entry, then Windows
will simply create a new one when it identifies it and locates its
driver.
Open Device Manager (Start => Run => devmgmt.msc).
Go to View and check 'Show Hidden Devices'.
Scroll down to 'USB Serial Bus Controllers'.
Look at all the 'USB Mass Storage Device' entries.
There will be separate entries, even for the same brand and type of
device.
As a test plug in two "identical" devices.
Attached devices will show in Bold type.
Double-click on each bolded (attached) device in turn.
The 'Location' will tell you what kind of device this is (often shows
the brand name).
Although they look the same, click the Details tab. Note the different
PID number for each.
I think therefore, that you would want each USB device to be attached
at least once to the particular computer, and you would not want to do
anything that would remove the particular device's "record".
You could run a test by attaching a device; note which 'USB Mass
Storage Device' entry is bolded; remove the device; right-click and
'Uninstall' it; restart the computer (to make sure); re-attach it; and
see if Windows re-installs it.
I don't think the same rationale would apply to a floppy disk, as they
all use the same driver, and each individual floppy disk is not
recorded.
On Apr 3, 1:07*pm, DONE-IT <m...@done-it.at> wrote:
> Hi, i have used Syskey on Floppy for years on customer Laptops. In
> january this year a customer wanted to use syskey (on XP) without a
> floppy. I have used USBDLM for mounting the USB devices to the drive
> letter A.
> USBDLM:http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbdlm_e.html
> I configured, that a usb-drive with a specific name should always be
> mounted to A, all others from G to J.
> So you can make a backup to another usb-stick, change the name to force
> the mount to A and use it in case of a broken or lost device.
> My concern is:
> if a usb-device is attached before a user is logged on to the machine
> and this specific device was not plugged in bevore on this machine,
> would it mount properly?
> This problem occured a few days ago:
> We used Pretec iDisk Diamond sticks. They are very small and handy. We
> also used the type with 128MB, mainly for preventing to use the device
> for other purposes as the logon process.
> Now we had following issues:
> The customer told me that he cannot log on to his laptop. The displayed
> message tells "syskey not found on drive A. Please insert disk"
> (Translation from german XP). I told him to use his backup-Stick (which
> was created on the same machine a few weeks ago) and he was able to
> logon. For investigation purposes i told him to plug in the "primary
> stick". When he plugged it windows reacted like it was a
> "new-and-never-bevore-plugged-in-device".
> Messages with installing drivers and "device can now be used" appeared.
> The next reboot, the "primary stick" worked again without problems...so far.
> Any ideas what happened here?
You need know that the USB devices will be "re-enumerated" each time
the device is inserted into different USB ports.
Syskey on USB drive 
Linear Mode
