Explorer.exe 'there is no disk in drive'

Scottyboy99 · 18 Nov 2011

Does anyone else get this?

Basically I'll boot up my machine (alienware m17rx3) and then open ‘My Computer’. Then I’ll insert a USB stick or a dvd. Everything happens normally. However with ‘My Computer’ still open I will right click the USB stick and click eject & a message will always pop up. Most commonly ‘Explorer.exe – No disk’ ‘There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive\Device\Harddisk1\DR1’. The box gives options to cancel, continue & re-try. If I click cancel the box will re-appear. Basically I have to click through it about 5 or 6 times before it eventually disappears. After that all is fine and dandy.

If I eject using the icon in the system tray I don't get the same problem. Likewise with a DVD, if I use the button on the top right of the laptop to eject the dvd the error message doesn't happen. It's only when ejecting using right click, eject on the drive within 'my computer'.

It’s also odd because it only does it once. Subsequent ejections of a dvd or USB stick are then fine. Until the next boot anyway. I have managed to stop / suppress the error by changing the errormode in the registry to 2. However it’s not a real fix. As far as I can see there are no side effects, everything works absolutely fine but it does concern me. I have trawled google til I’m blue in the face with no joy. The common issue being that the USB stick has been assigned the C: letter and to change it in disk management but that doesn’t apply to me as it always gets assigned as E: whilst my DVD drive is D: Is it possibly some kind of other issue? It’s not a major issue, more a minor irritation but I would like to try and fix it and maybe see if others have ever seen the same?

Thanks
Wayne

Scottyboy99 · 18 Nov 2011

Just an update. My main hard drive is c:, the bluray is d: & any USB Sticks I plug in get assigned as E: also if I push a memory card into the internal memory card reader then that will get assigned as E:

Therefore the common Microsoft solution about conflicting drive letter with c: and re-assigning does not appear to be relevant here. Also just to re-iterate it only happens when I eject under 'my computer' and only happens once. Same thing happens when ejecting a DVD. I have roxio creator installed on my system which could be relevant but I highly doubt it as this problem never used to occur and I have had Roxio on the laptop pre-installed by Alienware/dell from the start.

Any ideas?

Scottyboy99 · 19 Nov 2011

Addendum: I do also have a kodak wifi printer installed which does also have a card reader. Maybe this is relevant although the card reader on the printer is assigned as a network location and not a drive letter. Plus the printer is hardly ever turned on. I am also baffled as to why I get the same no disk please insert a disk into drive d: message when ejecting a DVD via 'my computer - right click the drive and eject'.

Basically whatever gets ejected whether it be the optical drive or a USB drive a no disk in drive message pertaining to whatever was inserted will come up. But it only does it once & it only happens if I eject under 'my computer, right click the drive and select eject'. Weird huh?

I do use the errormode regedit to suppress the message. But it's not ideal as this method could easily suppress more sinister system messages that I may need to be seeing.

Please help!

Thanks, Wayne

Peregrine · 19 Nov 2011

Maybe it's an issue with the context menu (the right click menu) and some other program is causing a conflict. I once had a backup program that added a "backup now" item to the right click context menu in Windows Explorer. It worked fine. However, if I right clicked on Computer and selected "manage" to go to disk management nothing would happen. Once I removed the backup program the proper functionality returned to the right click context menu.

Do you have any programs that have added an item to that right click context menu?

Scottyboy99 · 20 Nov 2011

Thanks for the response. Only options relating to winRAR and scan with malware bytes have been added to the context menu since I got the laptop. Unfortunately I don't think they are relevant as the problem never existed months ago when both were installed.

Scottyboy99 · 21 Nov 2011

Has anyone got any other ideas?

Thanks,
Wayne

Scottyboy99 · 21 Nov 2011

Ok I am totally out of ideas. Tonight I have disabled all start items and performed a clean boot disabling all non Microsoft services but still the problem persists. Just for the sake of it I changed the drive letter on the USB drive from E: to F: but made no difference. So I really don't know what to do. I am inclined to blame Microsoft updates now as not a lot has changed on the machine in past months other than installing these. I don't know how long the quirk has existed as normally I eject USB drives via the taskbar and not in 'my computer', but I only noticed it happen a few weeks back. Likewise I normally used to eject a DVD via the eject button on the actual drive. Like I mentioned previously the error message does not pop up if I eject these ways. It only happens under 'my computer' right click on the drive and selecting eject. And bizarrely it only happens once! Subsequent ejections are fine.

I would be so so grateful if someone can assist.

Thanks,
Wayne

Scottyboy99 · 30 Nov 2011

Can anyone help?

Many thanks,
Wayne

**cluberti** · 30 Nov 2011

I guess the question to start is, does this happen on a fresh Windows 7 installation with nothing else installed/added? You could always test boot to VHD with another Windows 7 install to test somewhat quickly.

fseal · 30 Nov 2011

It could be some sort of issue with the USB ports or driver for those ports. Maybe try updaing USB/motherboard drivers but if that doesn't work...

Er, does it really need fixing that bad?

You've gone through an extrordinary amount of work to fix something that isn't causing any real problems. I mean small problems deserve small solutions but at some point, the problem is much smaller than the amount of work and hacking your doing to fix it and possibly causing other, more severe, problems in the future.