I am using Debian Sarge and trying to get it to recognize my usb flash drive. When I plug the drive in it does not recognize it at all, the light does not even light up on the drive. I checked in /etc/fstab and I do not see sda1. I know that the usb drive works and that the usb ports on the laptop work as I am able to mount the drive under damn small linux on this laptop. Any help would be appreciated.

'dmesg' give anything USB related when you plug or unplug the drive?

Thanks for the reply. 'dmesg | grep usb' before plugging in the drive gives me

usb.c: registered new driver usbdevfs
usb.c: registered new driver hub
usb-uhci.c: $Revision: 1.275 $ time 09:50:48 Aug 17 2005
usb-uhci.c: High bandwidth mode enabled
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0x8400, IRQ 10
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
usb-uhci.c: v1.275:USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver

With the drive plugged in 'dmesg | grep usb' gives me

usb.c: registered new driver usbdevfs
usb.c: registered new driver hub
usb-uhci.c: $Revision: 1.275 $ time 09:50:48 Aug 17 2005
usb-uhci.c: High bandwidth mode enabled
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0x8400, IRQ 10
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
usb-uhci.c: v1.275:USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver
usb.c: USB device 2 (vend/prod 0xea0/0x2168) is not claimed by any active driver.
usb.c: registered new driver usb-storage

and after unplugging the drive 'dmesg | grep usb' gives me

usb.c: registered new driver usbdevfs
usb.c: registered new driver hub
usb-uhci.c: $Revision: 1.275 $ time 09:50:48 Aug 17 2005
usb-uhci.c: High bandwidth mode enabled
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0x8400, IRQ 10
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
usb-uhci.c: v1.275:USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver
usb.c: USB device 2 (vend/prod 0xea0/0x2168) is not claimed by any active driver.
usb.c: registered new driver usb-storage
usb.c: USB disconnect on device 00:07.2-2 address 2

So it does seem to know when the drive is inserted and removed, but I have no idea how to make it work. I am sorry if this is an elementary question.

usually my USB storage devices are registered as /dev/sda* , usually sda1.

try mounting them,

for example, and if it claims you need to specify a filesystem type, its probably

depending on your system the drive may or may not be sda1, but afaik it should be sda*

Thanks for your help. I was able to get it working by using the guide that I found here:
http://www.debianhelp.org/Article3529.html

Just thought I would post it in hopes that it may help someone else. Thanks again.