I have 2 usb flash drives.
One of them works just fine with regular command:
mount -t vfat /dev/sda1 /mnt/usbflash

However with the other one I get the following:
debian:/proc/bus/usb# mount -t vfat /dev/sda1 /mnt/usbflash/
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sda1,
or too many mounted file systems
(aren't you trying to mount an extended partition,
instead of some logical partition insid

I know its a fat filesystem (from windows XP)

Any Ideas?
Thanks.

Oh, I'm using debian sarge, with kernel version 2.6.8

Are you 100% certain that the USB drive was formatted as vfat? If it was done on XP then the default would be NTFS -- J.W.

Yes, I'm sure it's fat filesystem.
I didn't format it in WinXP, I just loaded it up in WinXP to make sure it works.
WinXP tells me it's a fat filesystem.

Hello endfx

I went through the same stuff you are doing.

What I discovered through tinkering with a 256meg Cig@r Pro 2 is that it is made up of several segments/partitions.

mount /dev/sdb -t vfat /mnt/usbmem makes it work. And I can use/see all of the 256meg with that command. Odd, isn't it?

Yours may be sda.

I am running Slackware 10 (2.4.26 acpi) on a Sony grz530 where this works.

Good Luck

That still seems to be giving me the same error:

debian:/home/mike# mount /dev/sda -t vfat /mnt/usbflash/
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sda,
or too many mounted file system

I'm thinking about reformatting it using WinXP (as fat32 again)
I don't think that will do anything though.

As well, I can't open the drive in fdisk or cfdisk. Shouldn't I be able to view this
thing with fdisk or cfdisk?

You might need to mount /dev/sda1

If fdisk can't see it, then you're using the wrong device point.
Check the device name with a hardware manager.

Use the following as root to see what happens when you plug it in - it might also give an indication if the box can't see it.

debian:/home/mike# tail -f /var/log/messages
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: usb 5-4: new high speed USB device using address 4
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: scsi2 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: Vendor: Kingston Model: DataTraveler 2.0 Rev: 4.10
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: Type: Direct-Access ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sda: 503808 512-byte hdwr sectors (258 MB)
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: sda: assuming Write Enabled
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost kernel: /dev/scsi/host2/bus0/target0/lun0: [CUMANA/ADFS] p1<5>Attached scsi removable disk sda at scsi2, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Dec 31 15:34:03 localhost scsi.agent[4835]: disk at /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00: 1e.0/0000:02:04.2/usb5/5-4/5-4:1.0/host2/2:0:0:0
Dec 31 15:34:04 localhost usb.agent[4829]: usb-storage: already loaded
Dec 31 15:34:55 localhost kernel: VFS: Can't find a valid FAT filesystem on dev/sda1.


Does this tell you anything?
The last line looks a little strange.

Format the drive. If data is on it and needs to be saved then backup the data that can be read from another computer, fdisk to remove partitions, and format it under linux.

Brian1
" Google the Linux way @ http://www.google.com/linux "

formatted (repartitioned) it with cfisk.
Same problems.

Could be an issue with the kernel. Have you tried a newer kernel? Or do you have an older kernel installed to try with. USB can just be flakey from kernel to kernel release.

Brian1
" Google the Linux way @ http://www.google.com/linux "

Just a thought when you repartitioned it you had access to the partition table?
You are able to remove then create partitions?
Able to define partition filesystem?
Able to save and exit?
Then can you format it?

After that what is the output of ' /sbin/fdisk -l '
Brian1
" Google the Linux way @ http://www.google.com/linux "

I dont monkey with any of the partitions on my usb drives. I just make a dir for them in /mnt and mount it with 'mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/pen' (or '/mnt/fuji' for the camera). Im using slackware 9.1 and a SD Cruzer 128mb and a Fuji s3000. hope this helps. (im still a bit n00bish with linux )