Need Driver Uninstall Without Administrator Privileges.

[Dollanganger]

Sorry this is so long but I want to be detailed.

OK, here’s the situation we’re dealing with a Windows XP laptop where the USB drivers are set NOT to accept memory sticks. The USB drives will take devices like printers, a mouse, yes it will even take a camera when memory can be accesses, but I need the USB drives for regular flash cards.

The solution would normally be simple, go to Control Panel, System (etcetera) and uninstall the drivers. When the laptop restarts all the USB drivers are fresh and ready to accept a flash card.

However I cannot uninstall the drivers because I do not have Administrative privileges. Our company’s tech support team does and they can remote in with Administrative privileges and make the change. But the change only lasts for a long as the laptop is on.

Hence every morning I must spend 30 minutes on the phone going through protocols just to get my laptop to take flash drives. (which are essential to our business.)

We’ve been searching for a more permanent solution. Tech support has tried activating registry files without success.

So the bottom line is I need to uninstall a driver without admin rights. I can get temporary admin rights but I need to make a change to the drivers that will either be permanent or some kind of app I can run every time to get my drivers working.

Remember this is Windows XP.

Thanks.

[jdc2000]

It sounds like your company's IT group needs to get their act together. They are the ones that have locked out USB drives, and they should be able to remove that lockout permanently.

[SpywareDr]

I'm afraid we cannot help you hack into your Company's laptop.

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[Dollanganger]

A corporation’s IT group get its act together? What are your other two wishes?

Seriously, you’re absolutely right, they SHOULD be able to permanently fix this problem but they don’t know how to so that’s why I’m here.

The point is I can work with IT to get admin rights to make the change once we have a solution. But we need to solution first.

As I said they did try so registry apps for me to run each morning but the apps didn’t work.

[jdc2000]

They are likely using Group Policy settings to block access to USB drives. Info on how to do that can be found at the links below. They will need to alter their Group Policy settings to remove this block.

http://www.petri.co.il/disable_usb_disks_with_gpo.htm

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sclient...79&safe=active

[Dollanganger]

Thank you for all your advice but I need to clarify 2 things:


First, I am not asking for help with “hacking” my company laptop. As I said I’m working with IT on this. Not against them. Which why I need to know how to advise them.


Second, I read the article and it’s mostly Greek to me. But it does seem to be addressing “group settings.” IT will not change the group settings for all of its employees but they will grant me permission.


When IT logs in as admin and makes the change and I log back on as me the settings are fine.



The problem occurs when I “turn on” my laptop in the morning. All the settings are back to the way they were. This is true for almost all settings which is why I cannot save “favorites” the desktop background and so forth. The laptop resets the settings which each start up.


I’ll pass the article on to my IT but there must be some way to prevent some settings from being reset or to trick the laptop into reading a memory card.


So far the only thing I’ve found is using a SD card in a digital camera.


We also tried simply putting a memory card into the printer but the laptop won’t let me access the driver. Yes when I tell it to print it prints but I still can’t access the driver.


Are there any flash drives for sale which trick a PC’s drivers into reading it as a device like a printer, camera, or mouse?

[jdc2000]

The settings on your laptop reset when it is started up due to the group policies in effect. To change this, you either need to change the group policy settings, or have your IT department create a group for your user account that does not have the USB drive restriction in the group policy. Group Policy settings wouldn't be worth much if there was an easy way for users to reset them.

[SpywareDr]

First, I am not asking for help with “hacking” my company laptop. As I said I’m working with IT on this. Not against them. Which why I need to know how to advise them.

Due to the open, public nature of this forum, any assistance given to help circumvent security measures, even for legitimate purposes, would be available for unscrupulous individuals to use for illegitimate purposes.

[Dollanganger]

Unfortunately IT already tried and failed to put me into a separate group.


Thanks for the warning Spyware doctor. I’m always amused when bank robbers get caught bragging on Face Book about their crimes.


However as I said I’m working with my company’s IT department to help solve this problem they cannot, so it’s nothing sinister or even embarrassing.

[jdc2000]

What issue(s) did they encounter when they tried to put your user login into a different user group? That should be a simple process.

[jdc2000]

Where are the files that you have on your USB drive originating from? Depending on the source(s) of the files, there may be alternate methods of transferring them.