Sorry, im not sure if this is a duplicate but i havent been able to find anything that fits my current problem. i have a flashdrive which mounts as two seperate flashdrives and i would like to know if i can format/partition it back into one flash drive.

i am able to edit/delete/format/partition the first usb mount, but the second always mounts as a ro usb. i have tried various methods to try and fix it in the command line, ive tried to use gparted, disks, ect. am i doing something wrong or is it just not possible?

i only have access to Bodhi linux until i can figure out how to make the usb "whole"

You could always zero the entire flash drive with something along the lines of

sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb bs=1M (assuming the flash drive is /dev/sdb; use with caution; all data will be lost)

Then use gparted to do any partitioning/filesystem creation you require.

Post the manufacture of the drive if possible.

The short answer is it depends. Some manufactures like Sandisk produced a series of drives called U3. They also had a special partition that was unusable in linux but you could delete it using a special Windows program you could download. Others do not have an option to be removed but basically normal partitioning/formatting tools will not work.

the only thing on the flash drive that it says is Learning Clicks, and i did try to use the
sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sd command but it said that it requires write priveiges or something along those lines and the same with gparted :/

Can you attach the device, run lsusb and paste the output here please?

That should give the hexadecimal identification code of the device.

-Enguarde:~$ lsusb
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 8087:07dc Intel Corp.
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 04f2:b471 Chicony Electronics Co., Ltd
Bus 001 Device 008: ID abcd:1234 Unknown
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub


from what i could tell from removing the usb is that it registers as

Bus 001 Device 003: ID 04f2:b471 Chicony Electronics Co., Ltd
Bus 001 Device 008: ID abcd:1234 Unknown

To dd to a drive requires root priveledges so means logging in as root or usinf sudo or su.
That said, what does gparted show on the drive? How big are the partitions and what are they labelled, and which file system?

http://http://imgur.com/7ZRqp5O
http://imgur.com/JWSQVPt

those are the screenschots from gparted

Also the output of the command.
sudo lsblk

A quick google pops up a company called ALIS (website URL contains Alberta) that has an interactive multimedia tool on a flash drive called Learning Clicks. So it is possible that your flash drive is not "normal". I looked through a few of the USB vender databases and there isn't anything registered for a b471 device although that does not mean much. Chicony makes electronics i.e cameras, keyboards etc but not sure about regular flash drives although the information could be out of date.

In addition the drive could be corrupted or broken.

ALIS makes sense its the school who i got the flashdrive from xD

ivan-Enguarde:~$ sudo lsblk
[sudo] password for ivan:
NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
mmcblk0rpmb 179:24 0 4M 0 disk
sdb 8:16 1 510M 1 disk
└─sdb1 8:17 1 510M 1 part /media/ivan/DISK_IMG
mmcblk0boot0 179:8 0 4M 1 disk
sda 8:0 1 1.4G 0 disk
└─sda1 8:1 1 1.4G 0 part /media/ivan/GALLIUMOS1
mmcblk0boot1 179:16 0 4M 1 disk
mmcblk0 179:0 0 14.7G 0 disk
├─mmcblk0p2 179:2 0 488M 0 part /boot
├─mmcblk0p3 179:3 0 13.7G 0 part
│ └─mmcblk0p3_crypt 253:0 0 13.7G 0 crypt
│ ├─ubuntu--vg-root 253:1 0 9.9G 0 lvm /
│ └─ubuntu--vg-swap_1 253:2 0 3.9G 0 lvm [SWAP]
└─mmcblk0p1 179:1 0 512M 0 part /boot/efi

Looks like your sda1 is 1.4 GB and the GalliumOS ISO files only about 1 GB so do you really need the extra space? It also looks like you tried copying the ISO to the drive. What method did you use? Were there any error messages.

Looks like your sda1 is 1.4 GB and the GalliumOS ISO files only about 1 GB so do you really need the extra space? It also looks like you tried copying the ISO to the drive. What method did you use? Were there any error messages


the sda1 has the right size beside it but the sdb has an unused 3.5GB(or so), when i look at its partition, that id like to be able to use as one whole usb

and the iso did fit on the usb but i couldnt boot from it after i tried to burn it i UNetbootin

If you look at the GalliumOS instructions they state do not use UNetbootin.

https://wiki.galliumos.org/Installin...g_Bootable_USB

oops xD

In the terminal as root first check where your usb is mounted (if mounted)
Once you know where its mounted /dev/sd* make sure you unmount it first
Next you can format your usb drive. Most people like to format
it in fat format but you can always format it in whatever format you like.
You don't have to name your USB if you don't want to.
Once it is completed you can mount it back and you are good to go.

Hope it helps.

- art3m