How to remove write protection from a USB flash drive

Today i will show how to remove write protection from a USB flash drive (pendrive).When a pendrive is write protected, no files cannot be copied to it. It cannot be formatted also.When ever you will try to format the pendrive it will show you an error message -"Disk is Write Protected" exactly like the picture show below 

 In order to format the penndrive and remove the write protection you need to do the following steps below:

First check whether the USB drive has a write protection switch on the bottom or the sides of the drive If it has a write protection switch then push the switch to the unlock position.Then insert the pendrive to your pc's USB port & go to "My computer".select that USB drive and right click on it and then Click on the Format.A dialog box will appear exactly like the picture below 

 

click on the start button and your USB drive will be formatted. 

If above method doesn't work then you have to remove the write protection manually.In order to do this ..do the following steps below.

Step 1

Open the Start menu & go to "run".Type "regedit "& press enter or click on OK.This will open the windows registry editor.

Step 2

Navigate to the following path - " HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\StorageDevicePolicies " 

 Step 3 

After that Double-click on the "WriteProtect" value in the right-hand pane of the  Regedit.exe. Change the Value data from 1 to 0 and then click OK to save the change.

Step 4 

Close Regedit exe and remove your USB drive .Then restart your PC. 

Step 5

After restarting you pc connect your USB drive again and u will find it is not longer right protected.Then format the USB drive manually in the normal way by right clicking on it and choosing Format.

Note- 

Sometimes you may find that StorageDevicePolicies doesn't exist .In such cases you need to create it manually. In order to do this. simply right click on the black spaces of the control folder & choose New -> key and enter the following name "StorageDevicePolicies" 

Now Double click on the new key and right click then choose New -> DWORD.Name it WriteProtect  then set the value to 0.Then click ok,exit regedit & reboot your pc..Hope this will work... :)

I will be posting a video tutorial on this..keep visiting regularly 

REGARDS 

SHANKHA JANA