How to find out the VID and PID of a flash drive: a review of utilities. Determining the VID and PID identifiers of a flash drive USB flash controller detection program

USB flash drives are reliable devices, but there is always a risk of failure. The reason for this may be incorrect operation, firmware failure, unsuccessful formatting, and so on. In any case, if this is not physical damage, you can try to restore it using software.

The problem is that not every tool is suitable for recovering a specific flash drive, and using the wrong utility can permanently damage it. But knowing the VID and PID of the drive, you can determine the type of its controller and select the appropriate program.

VID is used to identify the manufacturer, PID is the identifier of the device itself. Accordingly, each controller on the removable drive is marked with these values. True, some unscrupulous manufacturers may neglect the paid registration of ID numbers and simply assign them at random. But this mainly concerns cheap Chinese products.

First, make sure that the flash drive is at least somehow detected by the computer: a characteristic sound is heard when connected, it is visible in the list of connected devices, and is displayed in "Task Manager"(possibly as an unknown device) and so on. Otherwise, there is little chance not only of determining the VID and PID, but also of recovering the media.

ID numbers can be quickly determined using specialized programs. Alternatively, you can use "Device Manager" or simply disassemble the flash drive and find information on its “internals”.

Please note that MMC, SD, MicroSD cards do not have VID and PID values. By applying one of the methods to them, you will receive only card reader identifiers.

Method 1: ChipGenius

It perfectly reads basic technical information not only from flash drives, but also from many other devices. Interestingly, ChipGenius has its own VID and PID database to provide guessable device information when the controller fails to interrogate for some reason.

To use this program, do the following:

  1. Launch it. At the top of the window, select the flash drive.
  2. Below opposite the value "USB Device ID" You will see VID and PID.

Please note: older versions of the program may not work correctly - download the latest ones (you can find the exact one using the link above). Also in some cases it refuses to work with USB 3.0 ports.

Method 2: Flash Drive Information Extractor

This program provides more detailed information about the drive, of course, including VID and PID.

After you have downloaded the program, do the following:


Method 3: USBDeview

The main function of this program is to display a list of all devices ever connected to this PC. Additionally, you can get detailed information about them.

Instructions for use are as follows:


Method 4: ChipEasy

An intuitive utility that allows you to get comprehensive information about the flash drive.

After downloading, do this:

  1. Launch the program.
  2. In the top field, select the desired drive.
  3. Below you will see all its technical data. VID and PID are on the second line. You can select and copy them ( "CTRL+C").

Method 5: CheckUDisk

A simple utility that displays basic information about the drive.

Further instructions:

  1. Launch the program.
  2. Select the flash drive from the top.
  3. Check out the data below. VID and PID are located on the second line.

Method 6: Study the board

When none of the methods helps, then you can take radical measures and open the flash drive case, if possible. You may not find VID and PID there, but the markings on the controller have the same value. The controller is the most important part of the USB drive; it is black in color and square in shape.


What to do with these values?

Now you can start using the information received and find an effective utility for working with your flash drive. To do this, you should use it, where users themselves create a database of such programs.


The flash drive has ceased to fulfill its direct responsibilities for storing and transferring information, when connected, it issues messages about zero capacity, connecting an unknown device, and also refuses to be formatted. Among the main reasons why a flash drive is no longer detected is improper operation, for example, the flash drive was removed from the device without using safe removal, low-quality components, power failure, and so on...

If the flash drive is somehow detected in the operating system, then there is a chance of restoring functionality. To restore the functionality of the flash drive, you need to reflash the controller chip in which the failure occurred. We will reprogram the controller using special firmware. We will look for this program based on what model of controller is installed inside the flash drive.

Let’s say right away that it would be most correct to search for the model of the controller installed in a flash drive using special programs. Below we will talk about all possible methods for determining and searching for a controller model and why the software method is the most correct.

  • Disassembling the flash drive and reading the inscriptions on the controller chip itself.
  • Determining the controller model by VID and PID.
  • Determining the controller model using programs.

    • Defred Dividing the controller model by disassembling a flash drive

    The controller model is applied to the chip body; to see it you will need to disassemble the flash drive. You should disassemble the flash drive very carefully. If you don’t want to open your flash drive or this is not possible due to the design of the flash drive (many models of flash drives are sealed in plastic and disassembling them is difficult), then you can go the other way. Scan the flash drive with special programs that will tell you which controller is installed in your flash drive, more on this at the end of the article..

    Defining flash drive VID and PID parameters

    VID—controller manufacturer identifier.
    PID - device identifier.

    VID and PID identifiers exist for every USB device and USB flash drives are no exception. If the VID and PID identifiers turned out to be empty or could not be read, there may have been mechanical damage to the microcircuit, then the programs are powerless here.

    After determining the VID and PID identifiers, you can determine the manufacturer and type of controller installed in the flash drive, and knowing the type of controller, you can start searching for the manufacturer’s website and the necessary program to work with the flash drive. But now this method has lost its relevance.

    The thing is that at the dawn of the development of flash drives, controller manufacturers could be counted on one hand, and the model range was not large. One utility could work with all controllers from one company. Now the situation has changed dramatically, with the development of the flash drive industry, the number of companies producing controllers has increased significantly.

    Often, companies assign their VID and PID to the flash drives they produce. As a result, one cannot count on the objectivity of determining the controller model based on the VID and PID parameters.

    The most correct and simple way to determine the controller is to scan a flash drive with special programs. Which determine the model of the controller used and, in addition, allow you to find out a bunch of other information about the flash drive.

    Determining the controller model using Flash Drive Information Extractor

    A utility from the Russian company ANTSpec Software allows you to interrogate the flash drive controller and obtain information about the device. The difference between the utility is that this data about the flash drive is determined directly, and not by indirect signs such as VID and PID, the incorrectness of which was indicated above.

    The program does not require installation, download, run and click the “Get information about the flash drive” button. After completing the survey, the program will display the information. Below is the result of scanning a USB flash drive; the first line indicates the controller model: Phison 2251-32 (2232).

    This is what the controller of this flash drive looks like on the Phison website. The website also contains the specifications for this controller, if you are interested you can read it.

    Now that you know the controller model, you can start searching for the firmware. This is done simply, we enter the name of the controller into a search engine, and we get a bunch of sites offering to download the utility for the desired controller model. It’s as simple as that, the Internet can help you, good luck with your recovery!

    If you need to install a driver for a USB drive or perform software repairs, you cannot do without obtaining two device identifiers:

    • VID- This Vendor Identifier(manufacturer ID);
    • PID- This Product Identifier(product identifier, that is, a specific device model).
    You can find out the VID and PID of a USB device through special utilities, but you can do without them. You need to open " device Manager" and find the section " Universal Serial Bus Controllers" V Windows XP or " USB controllers" V Windows Vista/7/8. There you can find your USB device, the VID and PID of which you are going to determine. After selecting the storage device you need, right-click on it and select from the context menu, “ Properties».


    In the properties window that appears, go to the " Intelligence" and select the line " Device Instance ID" in Windows XP or " Equipment ID» in Windows Vista/7/8.




    In field " Meaning", you will be shown VID And PIDUSB devices, but it is important to consider that some manufacturers, saving on registering their own VID and PID, can specify them arbitrarily!
    Let's consider getting these values ​​programmatically using Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) and class " Win32_USBHub».
    If you use the program " WmiExplorer" and open the class " Win32_USBHub", can be seen in the column " PNPDeviceID» a string of the form USB\VID_152D&PID_2509\00A123457D9C, which has the format USB\VID_XXXX&PID_XXXX\Serial_number. It is from this line that we will extract data. But this class returns a list of all USB devices connected to the computer, so it is necessary to filter them.


    Look carefully at the presented screenshot of the program “ WmiExplorer", you will see in the column " Name» device name. As in the device manager, USB drives are presented as “”. It is this value that will be used to filter. Data retrieval is carried out through the class " ManagementObjectSearcher", by specifying the request " Select", since we need to organize a filter " where", specify the search condition in the request, display only devices with the name " USB storage device».


    Functionality of this example:
    • Obtaining the VID of a usb drive;
    • Obtaining the PID of a usb drive;
    • Obtaining the serial number of the USB drive.
    Create a project Windows Form V Microsoft Visual Studio and add two components:
    • ListBox – displaying information on USB devices;
    • Button – starts the process of obtaining information.
      •
    You will end up with the example below.

    Double-click with the left mouse button on the component " button1" and go to the automatically generated method " button1_Click" Add the listing below to it.
    string PNPDeviceID = string.Empty; //Preliminarily clear the list listBox1.Items.Clear(); //Getting a list of USB drives foreach (System.Management.ManagementObject drive in new System.Management.ManagementObjectSearcher("select * from Win32_USBHub where Caption="USB storage device").Get()) ( PNPDeviceID = drive["PNPDeviceID "].ToString().Trim(); //Getting the Ven of the device listBox1.Items.Add("VID= " + parseVidFromDeviceID(drive["PNPDeviceID"].ToString().Trim()).Trim()); //Getting the Prod of the device listBox1.Items.Add("PID= " + parsePidFromDeviceID(drive["PNPDeviceID"].ToString().Trim()).Trim()); //Getting the Serial Number of the device string splitDeviceId = drive[ "PNPDeviceID"].ToString().Trim().Split("\\"); listBox1.Items.Add("Serial number= " + splitDeviceId.Trim()); //Split the list of devices with an empty string listBox1.Items .Add(""); Also add two methods for decrypting the “PNPDeviceID” values.
    private string parseVidFromDeviceID(string deviceId) ( string splitDeviceId = deviceId.Split("\\"); string Prod; //Split the string into several parts. //Each part is separated by the character & string splitProd = splitDeviceId.Split("&" ); Prod = splitProd.Replace("VID", ""); Prod = Prod.Replace("_", " "); return Prod; "\\"); string Prod; //Split the string into several parts. //Each part is separated by a character & string splitProd = splitDeviceId.Split("&"); ; Prod = Prod.Replace("_", " "); Launch your project by pressing the "" key on your keyboard. F5" Insert the USB drive and press the " Get information" You will receive information about this drive. If several devices are connected, information about the devices will be separated by an empty line.

    You can identify any flash drive by external features: by brand, storage capacity, design, and finally. But how to do this professionally, how to find out on what controller and chip the flash drive was made? Unique identifiers VID and PID will help us with this, with the help of which you can obtain any detailed information about the drive without opening the device case or examining the markings left on the device parts.

    PID is the ID number of the data storage device itself, and VID is the identifier of the brand on which the device was manufactured. Based on the received PID and VID numbers, you can find out the type of controller installed in the flash controller and the manufacturer of the device. Why else is this information needed? By determining the above device ID numbers, you can identify an effective service utility that should be used to restore the device.

    Since registration of PID and VID numbers is not free, a number of manufacturers can specify them according to their taste and color. Therefore, a situation may arise that two visually equivalent flash drives will contain identical PID and VID numbers, but the controllers installed in them are manufactured by different companies, and accordingly, different utilities will be needed to restore them. In this case, if you found out the VID and PID identifiers, selected the appropriate utility for them, and it did not work, you will have to resort to extreme measures: disassemble the flash drive into parts and select a utility based on the markings on the chip.

    Important note: MicroSD, SD, MMC cards do not have PID and VID identifiers. Therefore, it is not possible to determine them. If you use the utilities specified in this article, you will only be able to see the ID numbers of the card reader.

    So, how to find out the VID and PID numbers of a flash drive? Of course, using one of the programs listed below.

    Chinese application from a programmer with the nickname hit00. This program first appeared on the mydigit forum about digital gadgets, and immediately won favor and respect. The application is capable of polling chips of MP3 players, card readers and USB drives. In addition to a lot of other data, it displays the PID and VID of the device being used. ChipGenius is a recognized leader in this sector of system software, as it has maximum compatibility with controllers of various models.

    To get information about thematic ID numbers, you just need to insert a flash drive into a USB port, and the data will immediately appear on the screen. If you need to analyze one or more flash drives, I advise you to use it in conjunction with Flash Drive Informtion Extractor, since it is probably impossible to find a worthy replacement for this pair in a combination today.

    Flash Drive Information Extractor

    A completely free program that allows you to obtain information about flash drives. This utility allows you to determine the controller modification, type and model of memory of most modern flash drives. The main individual quality of the application is that information is determined by many characteristics, and not just by PID and VID, which makes it possible to obtain the most accurate and correct information.

    The application can only interact with USB storage devices (i.e., flash drives) and is not able to respond to other devices connected through this interface: cameras, MP3 players, smartphones, etc.

    The developers recommend launching the utility no earlier than 30-40 seconds after the flash device has been inserted into the USB port, otherwise it may happen that the drive will not be fully initialized by the operating system.

    Another simple and resource-efficient utility from Chinese programmers. In addition to VID and PID identifiers, it will help in determining the maximum current consumed by the device, the serial number and model of the controller, as well as information about firmware, memory FID, and the estimated memory model. The application works quite stable and reliably, and there is absolutely no doubt about its effectiveness. With one click of a button, you can generate an HTML report with the main information obtained, which you can later print or save in the cloud.

    This utility is capable of displaying all USB devices connected to the PC. It differs from other utilities presented in the article in that it displays information about rather rare USB flash drives and other devices connected through this port. If ChipEasy, Flash Drive Information Extractor or ChipGenius are not able to help you with the task at hand, be sure to try getting PID and VID data using USBDeview. The program is completely Russified.

    If you need to recover a damaged USB flash drive or a device with bad blocks, VID and PID identifiers will help you find the right tool to restore the device and return it to a working state. In addition, the information received will help you “get to know” your device better without opening its case or disassembling it entirely.

    Almost every computer user has a flash drive. This is a very convenient storage medium on which you can quickly write something down and throw it in your pocket. The era of disks is becoming a thing of the past, and flash drives are confidently taking their place. For the most part, this is an “indestructible” device that is very difficult to damage. But, nevertheless, due to incorrect operation, a failure of the media firmware or unsuccessful formatting, the flash drive may stop working. What does this mean? The computer writes “Unidentified USB device” instead of its name, the capacity is displayed as 0 bytes, and when trying to format the device, a constant error occurs.

    To restore the functionality of the flash drive, you need to figure out the cause of the problem.

    Some users immediately think that they need to run to the store for a new flash drive. But this is completely optional, since almost any mistake can be corrected. Well, unless the flash drive is physically damaged, then nothing will help. We provide information on how to find out the VID and PID of a flash drive, and how this will help with recovery.

    What are VID and PID for?

    Since a flash drive is an electronic device, like any equipment, it has a digital identifier. VID is the manufacturer identifier, and PID is the device. In addition to them, other information may be useful, for example, the serial number. Each chip has its own meaning. It is very important to know these parameters exactly, otherwise, if you restore the flash drive with the wrong utility, you will kill it completely. Therefore, knowing the VID and PID, you can most likely restore the performance of the media.

    How to find out VID and PID

    Via Device Manager

    Go to “Start” - “Control Panel” - “Device Manager” - “USB Controllers” - “USB Mass Storage Device”. In the “Details” tab, select “Hardware ID”. On the bottom line you will see the IDs of your flash drive.

    CheckUDisk utility

    With its help, you can find out technical information about connected USB devices. Displays all the necessary information about the controller in order to perform recovery in the future.

    Flash Drive Information Extractor utility

    The utility helps determine the controller model and the memory type of many external drives. Reads information directly, works even with partially damaged boot sectors.

    Using the application you can find out the following information:

    • Current consumption.
    • VID and PID.
    • Flash ID.
    • Physical volume.
    • Installed memory chips.
    • Device model and manufacturer.

    USBDeview utility

    An application for displaying data about USB drives connected to the computer. There is a history of connected equipment. It will help you find out the device developer.

    ChipGenius utility

    Product from Chinese developers. Determines data from flash drive controllers, card readers and MP3 players. Will be able to determine indicators such as VID, PID, serial number, controller model, manufacturer. Has excellent compatibility with a huge number of drives. There are three versions of the program, one of them will definitely start.

    Open the flash drive case

    As a last resort, if none of the utilities cope with the task, try carefully opening the flash drive casing and reading the information directly on the electronic chip itself. But we hope that we won’t have to do this, since there is a certain risk of physical damage.

    What to do next

    Once you have found out all the necessary information, use this page to find the utility you need. At the top, enter the VID and PID data in the appropriate fields and click “Search”. A list of results will open in front of you. The leftmost column displays the manufacturer, the second column shows the model of the flash drive, and the rightmost column shows the recommended utility that will help perform the recovery. If you are lucky, you will be able to find the program you need. After its completion, your flash drive will be as good as new.

    Conclusion

    We hope that after reading these recommendations, you will be able to restore your storage media without purchasing a new one. We will be grateful for your comments, in which we ask you to tell us which utility is most convenient for you.