Connecting external drives - where do the names come from?

[thewul]

When connecting external drives from the same maker, the names are often identical or at least confusing.

I've a few external USB drives from WD.

When connecting from host, they show up with identical names.

Question:

where do they come from?

is that a firmware thing, or a driver thing? (so I can't influence them)

I've looked in the host Windows 10 register to try and find the name, but the way they are displayed in VM (when connecting)

that way is not listed in the registry.

Have tried to change the so-called 'friendly name' in the registry, but that doesn't help, i.e. it does not change the names that are listed when 'connecting'.

Thanks!

[bonnie201110141]

The name is a combination of Manufacturer & Product. So if two devices have the same vid and pid, the display name in Workstation Removable Devices should be the same. If they are different devices from the same maker, the display names are different from VMware Workstation 14.1.2 (prior to that, there is a bug).

[thewul]

Thanks for the reply.

I just discovered where this information comes from...

It is from "USB Friendly Name". Almost certain firmware related. Changing label within Windows has no effect.

Within Windows the drives are displayed by label, also within VM of course. But not when connecting.

There are only very few tools that provide really all/all details of hardware.

(I have not yet found a tool reporting VID and PID)

[thewul]

It would be nice if VMware would (at least optionally) use the Windows drive  label   instead of the manufacturer and model.

This would make the drives more 'distinguishable' : one might have multiple external drives running, same manufacturer, same model.