I'm running XP Pro SP3 on both a laptop and a desktop computers. I have
System completely turned off on both machines. I know that those pesky
SVI files can not be eliminated on permanent hard drives installed
inside the computer. (Even though they serve no purpose with System
Restore disabled. However, I sure would like to find out if there is any
means to stop those SVI files from being created on EXTERNAL drives.
That would be all Flash sticks, and portable hard drives that get
plugged into a USB port.

Is this possible?

All I know is that they are annoying and when I plug in a flash drive
into my Win98 machine, I dont want to see them. Particularly because I
often transfer files and those pesky things keep getting copied to
folders when I copy the whole flash drive, so I have to manually keep
deleting them, only to find them recreated as soon as I plug that flash
stick back into any XP machine.

Sometimes I think Microsoft just wants to annoy people, because they
have a secret desire to drive people insane.