When I connect my 128 MB Shintaro Flash Drive into the computer it automatically commences transferring files using Windows Explorer. Once the transfer has finished, the computer restarts. I have tried using other USB ports on the computer, but the same behaviour occurs. I also tried a different flash drive with the same results. However, the flash drives work fine on a different computer. How can I stop the files from automatically being transferred and the computer restarting?

When first reading your question it seemed very similar to the problems being experienced by Vic S. in the previous question, where AutoPlay is causing some program to launch and transfer files. However, why the computer restarts is a mystery since this obviously is not desirable, and is unlikely to be intended behaviour. As the problem only occurs on the one computer when trying multiple USB drives and does not occur on other computers when using the same USB drive, we will consider this a problem with the computer rather than the USB drive itself. So, we will investigate the AutoPlay function as a potential cause of this problem. As a starting point, it is possible that AutoPlay is not actually executing any program, but is crashing when scanning the USB drive. When you initially insert the USB drive into the computer AutoPlay scans the drive to recognise the type of content on the drive and then makes suggestions for suitable applications which can be used to open the found content. This scanning looks very similar to files being transferred to the computer, so this may give the impression that files are being copied although they are not. So, next time the window appears which looks like copying files, have a closer look at the window to see whether it is titled “AutoPlay” and is scanning the files very quickly. If this is the case, then it seems that the files are just being scanned but not copied. However, why the computer is restarting is still not certain. At least in the interim, a possible way to work around the problem is to disable AutoPlay on the thumb drive. This will stop the AutoPlay firing, and prevent it from scanning the drive (which may be triggering the crashes). To do this, download the TweakUI power toy from: www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/powertoys/xppowertoys.mspx . Once you have installed TweakUI on your computer, open TweakUI and go to “My Computer” > “AutoPlay”. Click “Drives” and untick the drives on which you wish to disable AutoPlay.

However, should the problem occur after the AutoPlay scan has completed, this indicates that the AutoPlay program which is firing could be causing the problem. So, we need to configure AutoPlay not to launch this problem on startup. This could be tricky, as you need to connect the USB drive to the computer, but when you connect the drive it restarts the computer. That said, there are two ways around this issue. First, if you have no need for AutoPlay at all this can be disabled through TweakUI using the instructions above. However, if you want to leave AutoPlay enabled (but just wish to disable the problematic program from auto launching) then after you connect the USB drive to the computer and the scan commences, quickly click the “Cancel” button in the AutoPlay scan window. This should abort the scan and hopefully also stop the computer from rebooting. Then to disable AutoPlay, open My Computer or Windows Explorer and right-click on the USB drive then select “Properties”. In the window that appears, select the “AutoPlay” tab. Go through each of the content types and select “Prompt me each time to choose an action”. Once you are done, click OK to close and exit. Now, no applications should load automatically when the USB drive is connected but instead it should prompt you to select which program you wish to launch.