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USB Flash Drive driver for Windows 95 OSR/2.1

As some people may know I am a big fan of Windows 95 because it can be installed without any web browser. Unfortunately for me manufacturers no longer provide Windows 95 drivers for most newer devices, or if they do they install a mess of software that often requires IE. As such I am very cautious about what hardware I add to my computer.

From using flash drives on other computers I have discovered how incredibly useful these things are. They can store as much as or more than a CD-ROM but they can be written to randomly. Supposedly there is a write limit of perhaps a hundred thousand writes but this still makes them way more reliable than floppy disks.

Of course the only driver I could find for my Sandisk Cruzer only worked on Windows 98 SE. Now the funny thing is that USB mass storage devices like this use a somewhat standard communication protocol and work "out of the box" on most newer operating systems. This is true for Linux, MacOS X, OS/2 eComstation, and Windows XP. So I looked around to see if anybody had a USB mass storage driver for Windows 95 that would work with standard devices like this.

I eventually found one that was intended for an older Sandisk USB device. I had to modify the Plug-And-Play ID numbers to match the one being sent by the Cruzer before Windows would accept the driver. But after that it worked perfectly! I just plug in the Cruzer and a new removable drive letter appears in My Computer.

I also added PNP ids for many devices. I don't know if it works with all of the IDs I added, but feel free to let me know what works and what doesn't. You should even be able to use it even if it doesn't specifically recognize your device!

Requirements:

Disclaimers:
  1. This driver is not supported by SanDisk or any other manufacturer.
  2. This driver may not work on your machine or with your USB memory device, I only know it works for me.
  3. For all I know this driver may cause damage to your machine, your USB memory device, or the files on your USB memory device.
  4. Any additional software that comes with your USB memory device probably will not work and should not be used.
Typical first time usage:
     
    Download USB mass storage driver for Windows 95 OSR/2.1 (Updated 1/24/2007) w95usbflash11.zip
     
    Same thing as above, but in a self extracting executable format in case you do not have a program to uncompress ZIP files.  95usbflash11.exe
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