Solved Changing External HDD letter made it 'read-only'

[Gaz1701]

OK first of all, for some reason - a few days ago - the drive letter of my External HDD had changed from I:\ to J:\ without me realising this. The only way I found out this had even happened [just found out today] was while I was wondering why MusicBee couldn't find any of my music on my External HDD - since the file structure had stayed the same, but the drive letter was different.

Of course, first of all I'd like to find out how this could happen without me realising it (I never touched any settings of the external HHD)?

And secondly, after following the instructions - using the regedit version (because it was grayed out normally) here: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/82994-drive-letter-add-change-remove-windows-7-a.html - I was able to get my music back in my playlist, but now I can't create any new folders in my external HDD. Could you help me please?

Many thanks,
~Gareth

 

[Brink]

Hello Gareth,

You might see if using OPTION THREE in the tutorial below to take ownership of the drive and set it's permissions to "Allow" your account "Full control" of the drive may allow you to be able to afterwards. Be sure that you check the Replace owner on subcontainers and objects box as well.

Take Ownership of file - Vista Forums

Hope this helps,
Shawn

 

[Sir George]

OK first of all, for some reason - a few days ago - the drive letter of my External HDD had changed from I:\ to J:\ without me realising this. The only way I found out this had even happened [just found out today] was while I was wondering why MusicBee couldn't find any of my music on my External HDD - since the file structure had stayed the same, but the drive letter was different.

Of course, first of all I'd like to find out how this could happen without me realising it (I never touched any settings of the external HHD)?

And secondly, after following the instructions - using the regedit version (because it was grayed out normally) here: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/82994-drive-letter-add-change-remove-windows-7-a.html - I was able to get my music back in my playlist, but now I can't create any new folders in my external HDD. Could you help me please?

Many thanks,
~Gareth

To answer the first question. If you turned off or disconnected the external drive and during that period inserted any other external media requiring drive letter assignment, the first available alpha character would be assigned. Then when you activated the external drive it would select the next available drive letter; in your example it would go from "I" to "J". It is generally advisable to use an alpha character that occurs later in the alphabet to avoid this type of an issue; such as V or W.

Second question has already been addressed in a prior post.

 

[Gaz1701]

The External HDD doesn't have a 'Security' tab in its properties, but the "Take Ownership" reg file did it just fine - so thanks so much the both of you!

 

[Brink]

That's great news Gareth.