subject: How To Make Usb, Read-only [print this page] USB Storage is a very important part of our Computer life, it is used to store important data, some time very confidential.
Almost all users need to use USB storage devices to store data, but with the size of USB storage devices increasing raidly in recent years, the risk is also continually growing as more and more data can possibly be stolen or lost accidentally.USB Devices are a big source of Computer Virus Spread. Many Companies have completely banned USB storage devices and disabled from use on company computers.
In Win Vista, there is a solution that allows Corporate users to be able to read from USB devices, but not write any data to them. This will effectively turn on USB storage devices for all users and theyll be safer to use because of the read only feature. This way, users can still read information off of USB storage devices that a third party vendor may provide data on, while preventing the employee from writing any data back to it.
To set up a read-only USB storage device, just follow steps given below. You will have to make changes inthe registry. So, be very careful while youre doing this. The registry is not difficult to use, if you follow the directions exactly, but if youre not sure you can do it, please ask someone else for some help. If you make a mistake in your registry, it could cause you more problems or may crash your Operating System.
Now Lets start the work.
1.) In Vista, click on the Start button and type regedit in the search box and then hit Enter.
2.) Navigate through to this location: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetControl.
3.) Right click on Control and select New, then Key. Call the new key StorageDevicePolicies.
4.) Right click on StorageDevicePolicies and select New, then Dword. Call the new Dword WriteProtect.
5.) Right click on WriteProtect and select Properties. Then set the value to 1 and hit OK.
Your computer is now configured to disable any writing to USB storage devices. They will all be read only from now on.
Although this tip is about corporate computers the most, but the same configuration can also be used for individual desktops for home PC users.
