Why would a USB thumb drive work on one computer and not another?

Why would a USB thumb drive work on one computer and not another? I have a 256 Gb USB Sandisk thumb drive that I want to use for backup with Macrium Reflect.

I have two computers:
A Dell T1700 desktop running Windows 10 Pro. v10.0.19045.
An HP Spectre laptop running Windows 10 Home v10.0.19045.

The thumb drive can be seen on both computers in their respective Device Managers.

But that is where the similarity ends.
The laptop's File explorer sees the drives letter, name, and all contents -- folders and files.

The desktop's File explorer sees nothing: not even the drive letter.

An "identical" Sandisk drive can be seen by both computers.

What might explain this?

Try this once. In the problematic computer's Device manager uninstall the the device by right clicking on it and choosing the option. Unplug and plug back in. Can Explorer now see the contents?

Or you can try the free program USBDeview and uninstall all past devices except the mouse and keyboard, reboot and try the USB drive again.

View any installed/connected USB device on your system

I honestly don't know why this problem occurs as I've seen it mentioned on other tech forums before. Been meaning to look into it more.

cereberus said:

The usual cause is that a drive letter has not been assigned to the partition on the usb drive.

You have to go to disk management and manually add a drive letter to the usb partition. Then Windows remembers it thereafter.

That was the problem. I chose a drive letter. Now the thumb drive is visible to File Explorer and Macrium. Thanks
These links helped me to understand the method.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/wi...isk-management

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/wi...a-drive-letter