How does MM distinguish between USB thumb drives

[jll1234]

I have 5 USB thumb drives that I use with my car stereo, 3 show up in MM as devices with the name I have assigned them via windows properties. The other two are cross linked some how, they both show up with the same name, even though the drives themselves have different names in their properties and show up correctly in windows. The drives are from different manufacturers (Transcend and AData) and different sizes (8G and 32G).

[nohitter151]

Generally via the USB ID number, but it depends on which plugin you use to access the device.

[jll1234]

Any idea how I would get MM to treat the two USB drives as different devices then? They do show up with their correct names under 'My Computer'

[nohitter151]

Any idea how I would get MM to treat the two USB drives as different devices then? They do show up with their correct names under 'My Computer'

Are you accessing it via WMDM or usb mass plugin?

[jll1234]

I am not sure what you are asking

[jttx]

I found this topic after searching because I had the same problem. I had 4 new USB drives and MM was confusing 3 of them. Not sure how I got into this state as each had a unique drive label/name. If MM truly uses the USB ID, then confusion like this should not occur.

I may have found a solution - I plugged all 4 drives into the PC at the same time, and re-named the duplicates with unique names. A brief test after doing this indicates the problem appears fixed. I am concerned, however, that this happened in the first place.

I have a large # of USB drives for use in my car due to a bad USB design by Mazda. Basically, everything works better with smaller, 8GB sticks and fewer # of songs (<2000).

Can someone shed some light on how the unique USB ID could get confused and misidentify a USB stick? And offer a clean-up/solutions? Thanks in advance for any info.