[REQUEST] Dell recovery flash drives

[urcomputech]

I have a good number of 8GB flash drives that come with new Dell machines. I'd like to repurpose them but they are somehow write-protected. I've used windows native reformat functions, downloaded 3rd party low-level reformatter, and nothing. I keep hitting a wall with error messages basically saying the drive is write-protected. I even found an open-source low-level reformatter specifically designed for these drives on github (https://github.com/amgxv/DellMentorMediaUSBFormat) and still nothing. The writing on the drive says Mentor Media U02-003. I'm hoping someone here has any experience with these. Thank you all.

In addition, I have to admire how well locked-down this flash drive is. I'd love to know what process they used, it can come in handy.

 

[Joep]

I even found an open-source low-level reformatter specifically designed for these drives ....

These are 4 years old. What's inside the archive look like MP tools, or 'mass production tools' that can be used to configure firmware of the UFD. You need to one specific to your controller, can be found on mostly Chinese and Russian websites (flashboot.ru for example). ChipGenius can often point you to the right MPtool and then it's hit and miss mostly trying different firmwares.

Don't be surprised if your virus scanner goes berserk when you try to run ChipGenius or any MPtools. Softpedia often has a clean version of ChipGenius but it may not be most recent one, so it may fail to point to newer MPtools.

 

[urcomputech]

These are 4 years old. What's inside the archive look like MP tools, or 'mass production tools' that can be used to configure firmware of the UFD. You need to one specific to your controller, can be found on mostly Chinese and Russian websites (flashboot.ru for example). ChipGenius can often point you to the right MPtool and then it's hit and miss mostly trying different firmwares.

Don't be surprised if your virus scanner goes berserk when you try to run ChipGenius or any MPtools. Softpedia often has a clean version of ChipGenius but it may not be most recent one, so it may fail to point to newer MPtools.

Thank you for the great leads. I'll look into it!

 

[Nathan Igo]

I did a bunch of these a few years ago when I bought a bulk of about 200 for around $100. I ended up formatting them from linux through the command line and then they were basically like new flash drives. You could probably do the same on a MAC since I think the protection is just in the file format partitions.

 

[NviGate Systems]

Just beware some of them may brick when you try to unlock them. I used to have a bunch of the Windows 10 GM Upgrade flash drives (Kingston 8GB) but they brick when you try and unlock them.

Flash drive controllers are best kept factory.