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I installed a "All-in-one USB Card Reader" to read SD cards and other media.

It has caused six new drives to appear in Disk Management with six new drive letter assignments. These drives and letters are always present, even when there are no cards in the reader. When unused, they are labeled "No Media".

Why does this multifunction reader cause these phantom Disks to appear and consume drive letters? Every USB port can (and does) allow removable media to be mounted and assigned a drive letter, and the drive letter assignment "disappears" when the USB drive is removed. Why are these card reader's drives and letters staying allocated permanently? Is there anything that can be done to make the slots work like a typical USB drive? (The reader is in fact connected to USB).

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  • There is a setting for this somewhere... looking it up...
    – Keltari
    Nov 3, 2013 at 3:56
  • You gotta love Googling the answer and it takes you to SU. Although the answer isnt selected, Randolf Richardson's answer is correct
    – Keltari
    Nov 3, 2013 at 3:58
  • thats pretty much the idea ;)
    – Journeyman Geek ♦
    Nov 3, 2013 at 7:16

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
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Control Panel >> Folder Options >> View tab

Select "Don't show hidden files, folders, or drives." Check "Hide empty drives in the Computer folder."

that should solve the problem...

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  • This is about hiding drives in the Computer window. OP is asking about Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc)
    – gronostaj
    Nov 3, 2013 at 7:13
  • gronstaj is correct. The question "How do I delete “Removable Disk” listings?" refers to in Windows Explorer. I was asking about Disk Management. So the question is not a duplicate, IMHO.
    – tim11g
    Nov 3, 2013 at 20:04
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The answer is: because your card reader was designed like that. To be honest, all all-in-one readers I've seen did that, so I assume there's some non-trivial technical obstacle or it's just much easier to do it that way.

PCI-E card readers (sometimes used in laptops) work as you expect, drives appear as you insert the card.

By the way, you have 26 drive letters available. After connecting the reader you still have 20 left, that's quite a lot of drives. (related: Why can't I use more drive symbols than letters A to Z?)

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