How to remove Floppy Drive icon from PC?

May be, I am too old, but I clearly remember, when 3.5” Floppy drives appeared on the market, replacing the old mild 5.25” Diskettes. I remember that at the beginning that was two types of the 3.5” diskettes – 0.7 MB and 1.4 MB. The latest were more expensive, and I was purchasing 0.7 MB and was drilling some holes to convert them into 1.4 MB. Good old time. How many of you are still use Floppy Disks?


It is not surprising that most of the modern computers do not came with Floppy Disk Drive, preinstalled on the machine at all. But still the Floppy icon as drive A: is visible in the configuration. I got request from one of the readers of this blog to explain how to remove it forever. My first reaction was to disable it in the BIOS. But do you really want to reboot your computer for that? I bet, some of the users even do not have a clue how to enter BIOS on their computers. (BTW, if you do need to enter BIOS for some reason, review my brief instruction with hot keys listed).

There are several ways to disable the Floppy Drive, which do not involve BIOS operations. Let’s take a look:

1. Registry

If you are comfortable with registry operation, there is a way to disable the Floppy Drive there.

• Start – Run – type regedit in the box.
• In the registry editor, navigate to the entry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
• Now right click in right side pane and create DWORD Value. Call the new registry value as "NoDrives". Double click on "NoDrives" to enter a Decimal value. This value depends on the drives you wish to hide, and is created by adding the numbers for each drive you wish to hide from the list below. Click OK once you have entered this number.

For example, to hide drive D you would enter a decimal value of 8. To hide both drives D and E, you would enter a decimal value of 24 (8+16).

Values for each drive per its letter:

A = 1
B = 2
C = 4
D = 8
E = 16
F = 32

• Therefore, if you want to hide just A: drive, you may enter 1. If you want to hide both A: and B: drives, you may enter value 3.

2. Device Manager

There are several ways to enter Device Manager on your computer:

1. Click Start > Run

• Type compmgmt.msc
• Choose Disk Management in the left column.

2. Click Start > Run

• Type devmgmt.msc
• Device Manager will be open.

3. Right click on my computer

• Select properties.
• In the hardware tab select 'Device Manager'.

In the Device Manager listing you’ll see an entry “Floppy disk drives”.
Go to its sub entry which is named as Floppy disk drive.
With right click choose Properties service menu.
Next, you can go to Driver tab and select the Disable button.
System will ask for confirmation, click Yes. Then Click OK.

You see, there are multiple opportunities and ways to perform relatively simple task – removing your unneeded Floppy from Windows Explorer. And now it is up to you, which one you choose.

How to Log In Properly to the Web Site: 15 General Recommendations

"Your Password or Username is Invalid. Please Try Again."

“Sorry, the member name and password you entered do not match. Please try again.”

“Invalid ID or password.”

I bet, you have seen these and other similar error messages multiple times. You try again and again, and the stupid server does not want to recognize you. How frustrating and depressing! In some cases, the problem is real, and is caused by the mess in the service database, or by the server being completely down. There is nothing you can do in this cases, but patiently wait until it will be up again. But, sometimes, the problem is on our side and its resolution is within our troubleshooting capabilities. Several recommendations for the case investigation are presented below:

1. Make sure that you are using the correct login information. If you have multiple online accounts, you might forget the correct one for this particular site. It is recommended to use password manager for logins preservation (as browser built-in, as third party like Roboform).
   
2. Verify that your CAPS LOCK key is OFF as, in most cases, login information is case sensitive. In many keyboards, there is the monitoring led, showing the status of the CAPS LOCK key. Please, put attention that the it is disabled.
   
3. Do not copy and paste your password or username into the text boxes again and again. Stop, and type it manually.
   
4. Retype your login information, carefully proofreading all the data inputted. The most common mistakes are related to use of the dot key instead of comma key, or neighboring letters accidental substitution on the keyboard.
   
5. Use your mouse cursor to move from one login field to another, instead of using the Tab key. This way, you can better control the proper information filling as per site requirements.
   
6. Avoid hitting the Submit or Log In buttons more than once with your mouse. While using keyboard, hit Enter key just once as well.
   
7. Wait patiently until your login is properly completed, before you do anything else on your computer. I know that the computer operator is usually multi-tasking. he will rush forward, with no particular patience to wait for the login completion. It is fine for you, when it is fine. But, in most cases, when you badly need to login, and you can’t, you will be ready to do whatever needed to get in and show any degree of the patience needed. So, after hitting the login request, do not touch anything on the keyboard, do not touch or move your mouse, do not switch to another screen, window, or program, and do not open any new applications.
   
8. Do not connect any external hardware devices and do not insert DVD or Floppy, while in the process of logging in. Do not use your RAM for side operations.
   
9. Nothing helps - close all browser windows, and restart the browser.
   
10. Security settings of your browser might be too tight to enable your login. Set your browser security to its default settings and try again.
    
11. Many web sites use cookies to identify registered users. If you have disabled cookies on your computer, you will not be able to login. So, change this setting in your browser.
    
12. If cookies, for some reason, have not been properly accepted, you might have problem of being logged out of your account as soon as you move to a different page, or you might be completely unable to login. Delete your cookies: close all browser windows, find the "cookies" directory, and delete the cookie files inside. Or, use any of the special software to clean cookies safely.
    
13. In some cases, you might need to clear your browser’s cache to refresh the content of the recently visited web pages.
    
14. And the last generic recommendation: perform the “cold” computer reboot. Shut down your computer, wait for 5 minutes, and turn it back again.
    
15. If the problem persists, for further investigation, you can try to login to your account using a different browser, or from another computer. At least, you will be clear if the problem is server or your personal account related, or it can be linked to your computer and settings. Remember also, that in some servers there is a limited amount of attempts you can make entering incorrect login. You will not be able to login, if the you try to input the correct login after that for safety reasons. Call to the company tech support and clear the issue.