The dismounted drives still appear in the Windows devices and drives window. You can click them and windows
says the drives don't exist. Usually, they should disappear on dismount.
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I use simple file containers. I use Windows 8.1 64-bit. I am using version 1.15.
I still see the dismounted drive letter appear. In the VeraCrypt GUI, the dismounted drive letter no
longer appears as an option to mount a new file.
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The dismounted drive letter appears in Windows until I do a restart. The drive letter is not available in VeraCrypt until I do a restart, too. Version 1.15 is the first version of VeraCrypt I have used. I use the included Windows Defender.
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The only ideas I have that may be causing this problem are:
This drive letter was proviously used as a removable drive and this is why Windows "holds" the letter after dismount. Have you tried other drive letters that you know have never been used in the past?
There is a program holding the drive letter but allowing the volume to dismount.
You might try installing Windows Sysinternals Process Explorer to see which program has a particular file or directory open.
I looked at that link, but I have been able to figure out what is going on otherwise. In TrueCrypt, mounting on the A or B drive is not available, but it is in VeraCrypt. When I select A or B, is when the drives don't dismount, and the drive is actually mounted at my first available F drive. When I dismount, the F drive is still considered mounted. If I simply don't pick the A or B drives, everything works properly.
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Actually, I believe you are encountering the bug in 1.15 that others are experiencing with an extra drive letter being mounted and fails to dismount when the volume is dismounted.
One way you can confiirm this is the issue is to downgrade version 1.14 and since you are not using VeraCrypt Favorites, you will not be impacted by the bug in 1.14 which fails mounting of favorite volumes at user logon option.
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I also have this problem, but not able to dismount it also.
Only a restart will remove the dead/ghost letter.
Windows 1903 (18362.959)
VeraCrypt 1.24-Update4
Some details:
- The drive is shown in Explorer/TotalCmd
- The driveletter is not anymore listed in VeraCrypt GUI and not able to reuse the driveletter
- The drives are hidden VC volumes in USB drives attached to a docking station
- The Laptop is heavily used with docking and undocking daily. Docking at home, Docking at office1 and office2.
- Laptop normally never restarted, just hibernation or standby every day.
- Bitlocker drives are cleaned up are remounted without problems on resume on attached docking station
Is there a workaround (and a workaround without restarting the computer)?
Last edit: svargh 2021-01-10
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It happened to me too. The problem was some program that locked a file/dir in the drive and didn't unlock it when vera-crypt tried to dismount it.
This only happens if the program was run in administrator mode.
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Okay, here's my situation on this.
Windows 7 64 bit with VeraCrypt 1.24 update 7 installed (not portable)
- Login as admin user
- mount drive without elevation (drive is a USB drive, encrypted partition).
- "C:\Program Files\VeraCrypt\VeraCrypt.exe" /q /v \Device\Harddisk2\Partition1 /hash sha-512 /l Z
- drive is mounted and fully usable under it's drive letter for non-elevated or elevated user
- volume is NTFS formatted and is used for backups
Run a cmd.exe in an elevated (run as administrator).
- try to dismount the drive results in failure message, drive still appears mounted in GUI.
- "C:\Program Files\VeraCrypt\VeraCrypt.exe" /q /d Z
- cannot dismount in GUI or as non-elevated admin user using cli options (as above), nor from within cmd script in the elevated cmd session or the plain command line prompt outside the cmd script. Normal dismount is fine if not done within the elevated cmd session so long as no attempt to dismount is done n the elevated cmd session.
To "fix", logout and login again, a full restart is NOT required.
VeraCrypt 1.24 update 4 (before upgrade) was similar, but the drive letter disappears from the GUI completely until the logout and re-login and the drive (Z:) appeared in Windows Explorer as "Local Drive", but it could not be accessed. Refresh drive letters from the GUI Tools menu didn't make any difference. Disk management tool didn't have anything for the Z: drive.
Also fixed by logging out and logging in again.
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This bug may be related: https://sourceforge.net/p/veracrypt/discussion/features/thread/2bbc7fb7/
In my case it is not user A vs user B, but it sort of is.... user Admin (non-elevated), user administrator (elevated), I hope my description helps sort out this long term problem.
The only reason I discovered this problem is because I wanted to add the dismount to the backup cmd script; before then I always manually mounted and dismounted as the normal admin user and never considered other users of the machine. The idea was to limit the online use of the drive only to the time period needed to complete the backup; so normally the backup drive is offline until manually mounted when doing backups.
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The dismounted drives still appear in the Windows devices and drives window. You can click them and windows
says the drives don't exist. Usually, they should disappear on dismount.
Can you provide details of the problem?
What type of volumes? (File container, device or partition encryption)
What is your OS, edition of OS and bit (32 or 64)?
What version of VeraCrypt?
Which Anti Virus are you using on your PC?
Are you still seeing the dismounted drive letter appear in Windows Explorer and/or the VeraCrypt GUI?
When did this issue start happening? After upgrading to the latest release of VeraCrypt or some Windows patch?
Last edit: Enigma2Illusion 2015-09-29
I use simple file containers. I use Windows 8.1 64-bit. I am using version 1.15.
I still see the dismounted drive letter appear. In the VeraCrypt GUI, the dismounted drive letter no
longer appears as an option to mount a new file.
Please answer the remaining questions in my original post.
Last edit: Enigma2Illusion 2015-09-29
The dismounted drive letter appears in Windows until I do a restart. The drive letter is not available in VeraCrypt until I do a restart, too. Version 1.15 is the first version of VeraCrypt I have used. I use the included Windows Defender.
Thanks for the answers TLP.
Are you manually mounting or using Favorites for the mount?
Are you using the command line or the GUI for mounting/unmounting?
I manually mount or simply click on the specified file container. I am using the GUI for everything.
Are the file containers located on thumbdrive, USB external and/or internal drive?
Are you selecting any options during the mount?
The file containers are located on an internal drive. I am not selecting any option during mount.
The only ideas I have that may be causing this problem are:
You might try installing Windows Sysinternals Process Explorer to see which program has a particular file or directory open.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx
Is the issue you are reporting due to extra drive letters not disappearing?
https://veracrypt.codeplex.com/workitem/226
Last edit: Enigma2Illusion 2015-09-30
I looked at that link, but I have been able to figure out what is going on otherwise. In TrueCrypt, mounting on the A or B drive is not available, but it is in VeraCrypt. When I select A or B, is when the drives don't dismount, and the drive is actually mounted at my first available F drive. When I dismount, the F drive is still considered mounted. If I simply don't pick the A or B drives, everything works properly.
Actually, I believe you are encountering the bug in 1.15 that others are experiencing with an extra drive letter being mounted and fails to dismount when the volume is dismounted.
One way you can confiirm this is the issue is to downgrade version 1.14 and since you are not using VeraCrypt Favorites, you will not be impacted by the bug in 1.14 which fails mounting of favorite volumes at user logon option.
I also have this problem, but not able to dismount it also.
Only a restart will remove the dead/ghost letter.
Windows 1903 (18362.959)
VeraCrypt 1.24-Update4
Some details:
- The drive is shown in Explorer/TotalCmd
- The driveletter is not anymore listed in VeraCrypt GUI and not able to reuse the driveletter
- The drives are hidden VC volumes in USB drives attached to a docking station
- The Laptop is heavily used with docking and undocking daily. Docking at home, Docking at office1 and office2.
- Laptop normally never restarted, just hibernation or standby every day.
- Bitlocker drives are cleaned up are remounted without problems on resume on attached docking station
Last edit: svargh 2021-01-10
It happened to me too. The problem was some program that locked a file/dir in the drive and didn't unlock it when vera-crypt tried to dismount it.
This only happens if the program was run in administrator mode.
Okay, here's my situation on this.
Windows 7 64 bit with VeraCrypt 1.24 update 7 installed (not portable)
- Login as admin user
- mount drive without elevation (drive is a USB drive, encrypted partition).
- "C:\Program Files\VeraCrypt\VeraCrypt.exe" /q /v \Device\Harddisk2\Partition1 /hash sha-512 /l Z
- drive is mounted and fully usable under it's drive letter for non-elevated or elevated user
- volume is NTFS formatted and is used for backups
Run a cmd.exe in an elevated (run as administrator).
- try to dismount the drive results in failure message, drive still appears mounted in GUI.
- "C:\Program Files\VeraCrypt\VeraCrypt.exe" /q /d Z
- cannot dismount in GUI or as non-elevated admin user using cli options (as above), nor from within cmd script in the elevated cmd session or the plain command line prompt outside the cmd script. Normal dismount is fine if not done within the elevated cmd session so long as no attempt to dismount is done n the elevated cmd session.
To "fix", logout and login again, a full restart is NOT required.
VeraCrypt 1.24 update 4 (before upgrade) was similar, but the drive letter disappears from the GUI completely until the logout and re-login and the drive (Z:) appeared in Windows Explorer as "Local Drive", but it could not be accessed. Refresh drive letters from the GUI Tools menu didn't make any difference. Disk management tool didn't have anything for the Z: drive.
Also fixed by logging out and logging in again.
This bug may be related: https://sourceforge.net/p/veracrypt/discussion/features/thread/2bbc7fb7/
In my case it is not user A vs user B, but it sort of is.... user Admin (non-elevated), user administrator (elevated), I hope my description helps sort out this long term problem.
The only reason I discovered this problem is because I wanted to add the dismount to the backup cmd script; before then I always manually mounted and dismounted as the normal admin user and never considered other users of the machine. The idea was to limit the online use of the drive only to the time period needed to complete the backup; so normally the backup drive is offline until manually mounted when doing backups.