Years ago I had a Compaq 4000 computer with a 1 gigabyte capacity–on the hard drive. Windows 98 Plus. When I substituted a Dell laptop for the Compaq console, I got a neighbor who works on computers to remove the hard drive and fit it into a separate housing specifically designed for such a thing; I bought it at Fry’s.
Now I have a new Dell Inspiron 570 Desktop computer, Windows 7. When I hooked the Compaq hard drive, in its housing, up to the Dell computer, I found that the Computer display box (which shows when I highlight the “Computer” selection on the Start popup menu) shows* five drives* in the same level as the DVD/CD drive, under the name of “Removable Disk.” This persists even though I have completely disconnected the old hard-drive (in its new housing) physically from the new computer.
How do I remove the device from the new computer as far as the record that makes the display is concerned?
Do you have a card reader hooked up to your computer, or a built-in one?
A built-in one might look something like this. It’s not an uncommon feature in computers anymore.
A card reader will report a “Removable Disk” for every slot it has. It’s possible to have 5 slots on a card reader, for 5 different types of cards.
I just plugged in an external drive in a case to my Windows 7 machine, and it does not display “on the same level” as the CD/DVD drives. It displays with the other hard drives.
It’s a card reader. Go to Control Panel, Folder Options, View tab. Check ‘Don’t show hidden files, folders, or drives’ and ‘Hide empty drives in the Computer folder’.
Hey, thanks! It worked! :)
Nice. I hope this works on Vista also. This has been bugging me for years. When I put in a USB drive, I’ve got six “Removable Disk” options, and no indication which one is the one I want.