No entry in /dev/ folder for external hard disk
 

Hi,

I am trying to mount an external hard disk using a USB docking station but I am kind of stuck.

I can see the entries for different partitions of the hard disk in fdisk -l but there is no node file created in /dev folder. So, I am not able to mount.

Something like this -

#sudo fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sdd: 320.1 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 38913 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xf5bdf0ff

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdd1 131 654 4196352+ 83 Linux
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sdd2 654 1176 4196352+ 83 Linux
/dev/sdd3 1176 1437 2098176+ fe LANstep
/dev/sdd4 1437 38914 301031254+ 83 Linux

#ls -l /dev/ | grep sdd
brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 48 2010-03-29 17:38 sdd

So, there are the entries sdd1, sdd2 .. in fdisk -l but I dont see any entries in /dev/ folder for separate partitions.

Any inputs on how to mount this disk ?

Look into dmesg for errors when you plug in your USB hard drive. Also, what file system the HDD has? Make sure your kernel supports the file system.

Moved to "Linux-General".

A hard drive should be recognized even if it has no file system. e.g. a command like "fdisk -l" will list all drives and partitions regardless of whether they are formatted.

I think my machine was acting kind of weird. After an "unintentional" reboot, everything came back to shape. I could see all the entries sdc1,sdc2... in /dev folder.

@pixellany: absolutely; "fdisk -l" lists all the partition of the hard disk irrespective of the file system

@Hammett: dmesg is the first place where we look for any issues, isnt it ? :-). It was fine then and now. I mean it showed the partitions -
sdc: sdc1 sdc2 sdc3 sdc4

I am not sure about the reason yet (may be my machine was tired of running endlessly without reboot :-) which is highly unlikely).

Thanks for all the replies