CDROM refuses to mount, /dev/cdrom does not exist

Hi all,
I am running Knoppix 3.4 its grand, except for a little problem with the cdrom drive. My friend gave me a cd full of some great stuff I want to try in Linux... problem is I can not mount the cd.

I enter in the command:

root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /dev/cdrom /cdrom
mount: /dev/cdrom is not a block device

and get the ensuing error message.

I did some googling and I tried this and got what follows:

root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount -t iso9660 /dev/cdrom /cdrom
mount: /dev/cdrom is not a block device

here is my fstab

# /etc/fstab: filesystem table.
#
# filesystem  mountpoint  type  options  dump  pass
/dev/hda2  /  ext3  defaults,errors=remount-ro  0  1

proc  /proc  proc  defaults  0  0
/dev/fd0  /floppy  vfat  defaults,user,noauto,showexec,umask=022  0  0
usbdevfs  /proc/bus/usb  usbdevfs  defaults  0  0
sysfs  /sys  sysfs  defaults  0  0
/dev/cdrom /cdrom  iso9660  defaults,ro,user,noexec,noauto  0  0
/dev/dvd /dvd  iso9660  defaults,ro,user,noexec,noauto  0  0
/dev/cdaudio /cdaudio  iso9660  defaults,ro,user,noexec,noauto  0  0
# Added by KNOPPIX
/dev/sda1 /mnt/sda1 vfat noauto,users,exec,umask=000 0 0
# Added by KNOPPIX
/dev/hda1 none swap defaults 0 0
# Added by KNOPPIX
/dev/sdb /mnt/sdb auto noauto,users,exec 0 0

i have had this cdrom drive work in the past... so i know that works


on knoppix 3.3 i was able to mount for cd data but not audio


any help is greatly appreated


shane

p.s. i tried adding /dev/cdrom/... nothing changes

/dev/cdrom /cdrom iso9660 defaults,ro,user,noexec,noauto 0 0 <--- setup for the logged in user ;-)

You can mount that thing as a user. Just issue
shane@RSWLinux:/home/shane$ mount /cdrom
Now, that is assuming you have a mount point named /cdrom.
If you don't, then make one by issuing
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mkdir /cdrom

That should work, eh?

shane@RSWLinux:~$ mount /cdrom
mount: /dev/cdrom is not a block device

unfortunately no such luck

Where is your cdrom located in your machine? Is it master or slave, and which controller? Issue as root
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# /sbin/fdisk -l
and that will show your hard drive(s). Then you should be able to tell from there what is you CD-ROM drive. What you got in that box? Are you making those symlinks, or is that something your distro does? Is Vector based off of Debian?
Looks like you've got one hard drive, so your CD-ROM is most probably /dev/hdb and if so, did you try
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /dev/hdb /cdrom

What I am getting at, is that you may be missing the symlink from your actual CD-ROM device to /dev/cdrom, which is easily fixed by issuing
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# ln -sf /dev/hdX /dev/cdrom
where X stends for a letter a...d that is the block device for your CD-ROM. This is how your drives are labeled:
/dev/hda - primary master
/dev/hdb - primary slave
/dev/hdc - secondary master
/dev/hdd - secondary slave
so during start up if you check dmesg you should see which is your CD-ROM.

actually its knoppix.... i'm just bad about updating my profile


i tried your first suggestion:

root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# /sbin/fdisk -l

Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40020664320 bytes
240 heads, 63 sectors/track, 5169 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 15120 * 512 = 7741440 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1               1         129      975208+  82  Linux swap
/dev/hda2   *         130        5169    38102400   83  Linux

and furthur i tried to sym link:

root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# ln -sf /dev/hdc /dev/cdrom
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /cdrom
mount: /dev/cdrom is not a block device
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /hdc
mount: can't find /hdc in /etc/fstab or /etc/mtab
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /dev/cdrom/
mount: /dev/cdrom is not a block device
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /cdrom
mount: /dev/cdrom is not a block device
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane#

interestingly I was looking through my system setup and i found this in the system>info center menu on KDE


under the SCSI tab:


attached devices:

scsi0 Channel: 00 Id: 00 Lun: 00
Vendor: COMPAQ Model: CD-ROM LTN486S Rev: YQS8
Type: CD-ROM ANSI SCSI revision: 02


is it possible this is an scsi cd rom? that would explain a lot... my last cdrom drive went belly up and i bought a new one, which did not work... so i got an older one from a friend of mine, this being it. but with the last one i was always able to mount it just fine, just never tried in knoppix.

Okay, here's the plan. Issue
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# cdrecord -scanbus
just to be sure we got a scsi drive. If you get something like this

bash-2.05b# cdrecord -scanbus
Cdrecord 2.00.3 (i686-pc-linux-gnu) Copyright (C) 1995-2002 Jörg Schilling
Linux sg driver version: 3.1.25
Using libscg version 'schily-0.7'
scsibus0:
        0,0,0     0) 'SONY    ' 'CD-RW  CRX230E  ' 'QYS1' Removable CD-ROM
        0,1,0     1) 'SONY    ' 'DVD RW DRU-500A ' '2.0c' Removable CD-ROM

you got one. If so, it will have a device name /dev/scd0 and not /dev/hda (or b, c, d). The drive names in *nix are /dev/hda for the first hard drive and /dev/scd0 for the first scsi drive. The scsi drives are listed by numbers starting with 0 for the first drive.

It's late at night, I'm tired, and I use Slackware, which doesn't create a bunch of funky symbolic links but just uses the drive names. Anyway, this is how you mount the thing, if you do have a scsi drive at 0,0,0 ->

First, make sure you have a mount point for the drive. Issue
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mkdir /mnt/cdrom
so that we can mount the drive and you can use it. Some guy who uses Knoppix might come around and straighten out your /etc/fstab file. If not, you and I can struggle through it after I get some sleep. ;-) I used to run Debian, and I have some Knoppix CD's around here, so the worst case scenario is no one who runs a Deb system shows up to help you, and I boot a Knoppix CD to figure out what they do... mumble, mumble, why can't everyone just run one Linux so everything is in the same place, the same way...

Next, you issue
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /dev/scd0 /mnt/cdrom
and then you issue
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# ls -alc /mnt/cdrom
to see if you got some filenames in there. Shane, you did put the CD in the drive before mounting it, didn't you? Good on yah!

Okay, you should now have a mounted CD. As for whatever you were going to do with it with whatever gui app, I can't help you there. The power of Linux is at the command line - learn it, use it.

Hey, go update your profile, will yah? Hit that user cp button at the top right of this page, then choose Edit Profile. Don't forget to save your changes, eh.

Btw - when you issued
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# ln -sf /dev/hdc /dev/cdrom
you created a symbolic link from the master drive on your secondary controller (dev/hdc) to /dev/cdrom - which from looking at your /etc/fstab, I'd say you linked the DVD-ROM to /dev/cdrom. So, yes, your /etc/fstab is pretty much all messed up. Of course, IMO it's messed up the way Knoppix did it to start with.

If you want to get it straight, issue
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane$ dmesg | less
and look for lines that begin with hda, hdb, hdc, hdd like these

hda: Maxtor 6Y060L0, ATA DISK drive
hdb: SONY CD-RW CRX230E, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
hdc: Maxtor 6Y060L0, ATA DISK drive
hdd: SONY DVD RW DRU-500A, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
hdb: attached ide-scsi driver.
hdd: attached ide-scsi driver.

and post them here. That will get us a long ways down the road.

I'm rambling now. Mount your CD and check out your friend's goodies, will yah?

you my friend are awesome

no symbolic linking needed.... i issued this command and got the following....

root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /dev/scd0 /cdrom
mount: block device /dev/scd0 is write-protected, mounting read-only
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# cd /cdrom
root@RSWLinux:/cdrom# ls
(ebook - PDF) Ted The Tool - MIT Guide to Lock Picking.pdf
47 O'Reilly Books (TCP-IP, Unix, Web, Perl, Java, Oracle) by.zip
AOL.mov
Adobe Acrobat 6.0 Professional
Anarchy Cookbook 2000.doc
CIA - Book of Dirty Tricks.zip
Douglas Adams
Illustrator 9.0
O'Reilly - Practical Unix and Internet Security, 3rd Edition.pdf
Quicktime 5.1 Professional
Seven Deadly Motivational Posters
The UNIX-HATERS Handbook.pdf
[eBook] - CIA's Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warefa.pdf
linux
win32

yeah i know some of that stuff is ummmmmm not open source... opps

as for issuing the dmesg | less command i got a very messed up looking output that seemed to be in the vi editor since i had to get out of it with :q to be able to use the commandline again

t ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 32
Directory sread (sector 0x20) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 32
Directory sread (sector 0x20) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.
 I/O error: dev 08:01, sector 33
Directory sread (sector 0x21) failed
Device 08:01 not ready.

my friend allen has impressed the love of the command line upon me, your words do not fall on deaf ears, just not the greatest with it. Allen is a Slackware person.... I think you people are slightly insane.... but a good kind of insane

chaning my profile now, thank you very very much

shane

Originally posted by shane25119 you my friend are awesome

Only God is awesome!
I am, however, excited that you can mount CD's.
If you know a website with ftp access, I sure would like a few of those "goodies"
below - edited your output. Or, I can receive up to 20MB per email attachment. ;-}
Where I live there are very, very few Linux books - and they are all in Chinese. :/

root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# mount /dev/scd0 /cdrom
mount: block device /dev/scd0 is write-protected, mounting read-only
root@RSWLinux:/home/shane# cd /cdrom
root@RSWLinux:/cdrom# ls
47 O'Reilly Books (TCP-IP, Unix, Web, Perl, Java, Oracle) by.zip
Douglas Adams
O'Reilly - Practical Unix and Internet Security, 3rd Edition.pdf
The UNIX-HATERS Handbook.pdf
linux

yeah i know some of that stuff is ummmmmm not open source... opps

Seems as if you and your friend would like it here - in China, copyright means "the right to copy."
You can get any software you want for 3RMB (about 36 cents USD) - or free from a friend. ;-)

as for issuing the dmesg | less command i got a very messed up looking output that seemed to be in the vi editor since i had to get out of it with :q to be able to use the commandline again

DANGER: WILL ROBINSON ! ! !
Do not issue
$ dmesg | less
from Vi - in fact, stay away from Vi every chance you get. Actually,
Vi is probably a good editor - just haven't progressed to the point where
I need anything more than pico, personally. If you want a command line,
doesn't Knoppix run on the KDE (bloated) desktop environment? If so,
there should be an icon that resembles a monitor with a shell overlay -
that's a "shell" icon. Click it, and when you get in your shell, then you
may issue commands. If all else fails, hit Ctrl+Alt+Backspace and kill X
and you'll have a very nice cli. ;-)

If you'd like to get a proper, working, /etc/fstab - ask Allen for help, and
if he's too busy, post that dmesg mess and we'll get you going. I personally
don't work as root unless I have to be super user. So all my mount points
(and there are quite a few) can be mounted as a normal user.

my friend allen has impressed the love of the command line upon me, your words do not fall on deaf ears, just not the greatest with it. Allen is a Slackware person.... I think you people are slightly insane.... but a good kind of insane

Learn and use cli - therein lies the raw power of Linux. Read those O'Reilly
books - read the Rute Users Tutorial and Exposition

I don't know about insane - I just hate Micro$loth with a holy passion ! ! !

chaning my profile now, thank you very very much shane

Good on yah...

Java time...

How to know which cd/dvd drive/rom/rw is for what logical name like /dev/cdrom or /dev/cdrom1 or /dev/dvd0 ???

Is there an optical drives device mapping report?

Yes, there is: $ sudo lshw -C disk