I am constantly getting these random media write protected and disk write protected problems. This is a new build, a gigabyte EP45-UD3P motherboard with the Q9650 processor and 8GB of RAM. I have SATA drives in the machine. I have my C: primary partition where I have installed my OS. On the same physical drive I created another primary partition (E:\) for applications. On another physical drive I have partitioned the whole thing as G:\ (232 GB) for virtual machines. Randomly the partitions become write protected and I can't seem to figure out why it is happening nor exactly how to fix this. I have also noticed that the write protected partitions have an 8,386,568 KB page.sys on them. I have looked through event viewer without any help. I have used unlocker on the drive just to see what has control of it and it seems AVG and VMWare had some locks. I am trying to follow that lead, assuming it is one, but any help would be appreciated. I have tried reinstalling numerous times and always end up with this problem-specifically, the disk write protected or media write protected. Thanks in advance

The only way I have been able to get into these drives was to remove the drive letter (E:\) from the Physical Drive 1\Partition 2 where I had loaded my applications. I then restarted the computer. When I logged in my G:\ partition (which is actually an entire physical drive set aside for virtual machines) was unlocked and I could delete the weird 8GB page.sys file, which looks like a pagefile to me. I then reassigned the letter E:\ to my apps partition and found it still locked. I then changed the letter assignment to J:\ and was able to access the partition. I deleted the strange 8GB page.sys file and changed the drive back to E:\. I still have access to it. I will reboot and check. I do not believe this is fixed since this problem constantly comes back at random times. Still looking for thoughts, anything. Thanks.

Hi, I am having the same problem with Server 2008. Are you using seagate 250gb HDDs (ST3250310AS) ? or a SATA RAID controller? Just trying to think of things we may have in common that might be causing this. I'm also using a Gigabyte motherboard but a GA-EP31-DS3L so probably not that.

I have Western Digital drives, a 160 GB and a 250 GB though I can't remember their product code. They are older sata hard drives. I had them set up in an array (even though I lost 90 GB of the 250 GB drive) but switched to AHCI mode in Bios and disabled the raid in case that had something to do with it. (I didn't really think it would help, but I'm grasping for anything right now) It didn't help. You are using a different motherboard, but it is still Gigabyte. I wonder, do you have two controllers, the Intel chipset controller and a Gigabyte controller? My hard drives are currently connected to the Gigabyte controller. The intel controller will be used shortly for a RAID 5 setup and I may install on that later just to see. Again, I doubt this will help, but whatever. Let me know about your controller. Who knows right?

Well, it happened again. I have been trying to test the write protect status of the drives so I can narrow down the time frame during which the problem arose again. The last thing I did was create a RAID 5 array on my intel controller and then formatted a primary partition with 220 GB. I then ran a quick performance test just to compare pre RAID values. I used PerformanceTest 6.1. I then went to save a gif image of the results to my Apps partition and received the error that the media was write protected. I haven't gone through trying to correct the problem as I noticed it early this morning before I had to jump on top of planned projects. I will continue to experiment with formatting to see if that action creates a problem consistently. Again, any ideas anyone?

Hi, I'm not sure if we do have the same problem or not,, but i'll describe what happened to me, :) Basically I went to install a server someone else had setup for me, When I first booted it, I tried to create a folder on the D drive (It's 2x250gb HDDs mirrored with a startech SATA raid controller, i think the chipset is JMicron and two partitions 40gb as C the rest as D) and I got a message saying it was write protected, so I assumed it hadn't been formatted (I know it wouldn't normally give this message, but anyway) I tried to format the D drive and it came up with an error but I was then able to write to it.. Rebooted numerous times during the day and still never had a problem.. But when I returned the following day, the server had rebooted from a windows update and the D drive was again write protected.. I rebooted and i could then write to it again.. Because it's so intermittent and it's a server that I need to setup as soon as possible, I've not been able to try a lot of things.. I've just basically replaced everything.. The gigabyte board with an Intel one, The hard disks with another make, The RAID controller is now Intel.. I wish I had had more time to try and find the fault.. sorry I cant be more help. I hope you find out what's causing it.

What a mess! Your post is helpful because you have swapped out so much hardware and the problem hasn't gone away. What server OS are you running? I am running enterprise 2003. I am, and honestly, always have been suspicious of the OS. Oddly enough, my most recent bout was fixed with a reboot as well. I shut the machine down while I went to work on some projects, came back, turned it on, and all was well. Of course, this is no solution since shutting down a server regularly is not an acceptable answer - at least not when it is the same problem over and over again. Really wish I knew what else to look at or where in the software to look for logs describing events that led up to the disk becoming write protected.