Even more strangeness via USB has come along since my other reply here.
I have an ebook reader that is Linux powered & uses an SD card, so when it mounts it has the system storage and the card as well.
In the past I would just connect it via USB to ye olde XP box - copy in ebooks & had no troubles that way at all for years.
Since using Linux full time this activity became problematic.
It mounts well enough, seems to copy well enough too - but then when 'safely removed' it safely removed my files as well !!
I had to dig up & re-copy ALL my ebooks back to it - and silly me tried it again after some months and had the same result AGAIN.
Woof.
How about this for being even more strange:
When I remove the SD card from it & add ebooks to it using a USB card reader - that works 100% fine - so no more direct reader connections for me.
Another USB oddity:
I use a nice, older Android phone as my car's MP3 player - and every so often I find some nice, new tunes I want to add...so here comes the cable connection - and I bet you can guess the result, right ?!?
Yep, bye-bye files.
The fix is also the same - so no more direct cabling THAT to the PC will happen either.
Why the ancient XP OS handled this 100% fine vs. the shiny, new U/M 18.04.4 didn't, I have no idea.
Thankfully it hasn't barfed on any more of my USB sticks lately, phew.