cannot view files on cruzer usb drive, transferring from slax to xp
 

apologies in advance if i am repeating a question seen elsewhere (i swear i searched for it)...

i'm trying to retrieve files from my hard drive (sniffle...what's left of it), which ordinarily runs xp, bootstrapping my way into the file system using slax. i've been copying files a cruzer usb drive; but when i open the drive using a separate laptop running xp, i can't see the files. (when i put the usb back in the computer running slax, i can see still the files; they haven't disappeared.)

is this a slax problem, or an xp problem? (my heart wants me to believe it's an xp problem; but i'm not talented enough with linux to be that snooty.)

any thoughts?

Perhaps you changed the FS on the USB drive from the standard FAT to ext?

You can check this by inserting the USB drive and typing `fdisk -l` and a line should look something like this for the drive:

If the system is Linux, it explains why XP can't see the information.

good thought. (and i would be slow enough to have missed something like that)

unfortunately, though, the usb drive system is listed as "FAT16".

nuts...

I actually had a problem similar to this with an MP3 player of mine. A couple things, make sure you are root while you copy the files, always unmount before removing the drive, other than that, what files are you trying to put on the drive, if I may ask?

mostly office-type and pdf files; a few multimedia files.

You should definately verify that you can't see these files while the USB drive is removed :x I've been caught by that a few times, the mounting scheme of LiveCD's can be funny and it isn't hard to accidentally write the files to the wrong drive. Outside of that, good luck :) I hope someone else comes along for to help.

one more query, if you have a moment.

i am having trouble unmounting the usb from slax. after i've mounted the drive and transferred the files, i try to unmount it; but the shell keeps telling me that the "unmount" command is not found.

i know i must be missing something basic here, but i can't figure out what.

thanks again for all your help.

umount is the command, odd naming, I know; unmount is the logical spelling.

Just a minor side-note, if you don't unmount the drive, the next time you mount it, it will appear as sdX+1...for example, my drive was sdb1, it will appear as sdc1 next time I mount it if I didn't unmount. So, if you didn't unmount, and just unplugged it, it is feasable that if you ls'ed the directory it was originally mounted in, it would have printed a list that wasn't actually live. That might illustrate the importance of the unmounting procedure.

HTH

many, many thanks. i'm still getting used to this thing, and you've been a big help. your advice was spot-on. i'm transferring files as we speak.

thanks again.