Thanks for the quick reply.  However, I'm wondering if there's a way to *fix* this issue, as opposed to just hiding it?  Or is this a hopeless side effect of rolling back to XP when you have Vista-compliant hardware?

Hello 30sauce, I know of no way to correct this. I run into this on nearly every system I work on and have never found a way around it.

Sorry this did not resolve the issue for you.

Thanks for the quick reply.  However, I'm wondering if there's a way to *fix* this issue, as opposed to just hiding it?  Or is this a hopeless side effect of rolling back to XP when you have Vista-compliant hardware?

Hello 30sauce, You can hide any of the Icons in the Taskbar by going to Start, Control Panel, Taskbar and Start Menu.

Under the Notifications Tab, make sure the Hide Inactive Icons is checked and then choose Customize on the right.

In the top pane you can click on any Icon listed and in the menu tab at the right of the Icon, you can choose to Hide, Hide When Inactive, Always Hide, or show.

I hide everything but the sound Icon, Anti-Virus Icon and Network Icon.

Apply your settings and exit. Now only the Icons that you chose to show will be in your Taskbar.

Hope this helps.

If you can determine what card reader you have, it should be simply a matter of updating the firmware or updating the driver. Have a look here - expand the CD/DVD section. I had the same issue with a Dimension 9200, but updating the driver (or the firmware - can't remember which) resolved the problem. No more "safely remove hardware" icon for the card reader in the system tray.

Unfortunately, I've tried that already.  There were apparently a two options available for this model: a 13-1 reader and a 19-1 reader, each with their own driver/firmware (though both by the same manufacturer).  Maybe there's an entry in the Control Panel or something where I can get more details...?  I'll snoop around some more tonight -- unless anyone has any other suggestions?

You might try searching the Drivers & Downloads using your Service Tag rather than the computer model. This might narrow it down.

Thanks.  I wondered if it might be a driver/firmware issue.  I tried to figured out which card reader I had via the Device Manager, but couldn't find the specific model number and there are multiple card reader drivers/firmwares listed for my machine -- is there another place I could find this info? The description in my account reads more like the order they place with the manufacturer than a customer-friendly system profile...

I'm not sure how this works with a refurb unit, but if you created a Dell Account, go to the Support page, login to your account and click on Technical Support.

Under Product Support, click on "Find the latest solutions and help for your Dell products", and when the next page comes up, click on System Configuration Information. When this page loads, you should see something like "Assembly,Flash Storage Device Universal Serial Bus,Reader Half Height,Teac,Black". Opposite this entry will be a part number. You may be able to track it down via this part number.

Don't post it here on the forums, but if you send me the service tag of the system via PM I'll be happy to look up which one your system shipped with.

Thanks, Larry.  Just sent you a PM.

Don't post it here on the forums, but if you send me the service tag of the system via PM I'll be happy to look up which one your system shipped with.