[SOLVED] how to enable my 3.5" floppy drive in my Linux Mint pc
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how to enable my 3.5" floppy drive in my Linux Mint pc
I am greener than a newbie. May someone give me a line by line procedure to make this internal drive function, please? The drive is installed and is properly powered and cable connected to the mother board. Or point me to a tutorial where I can learn the procedure.
Thanks,
Ted.
Should be as simple as "modprobe floppy" which will give you a device to use - /dev/fd0.
Depending on what you plan to do you may require package(s) to give you the tools you need - maybe mtools, maybe dosfstools (I also don't use Mint much).
May someone give me a line by line procedure to make this internal drive function, please?
Hi Ted, welcome to the forum
First, what is the version of Linux Mint you're using and what is the brand and model (and model number) of your computer? Are you sure your drive is enabled in your computer's BIOS? If so, I'm not sure if it will work (because the tutorial is around six years old) but I did find this thread. Although written for an older version of Ubuntu, there is some additional information here, which may be helpful. You will need to use the terminal (or CLI) to perform the suggestions offered. Please see here for directions on how to bring up a terminal.
If you need additional help, please let us know. Please post relevant information such as error messages, logs and detailed information on what you did.
If you feel these suggestions are too difficult (having been new to Linux myself at one time,) perhaps the folks at a local Linux user's group (LUG) might be willing to lend a hand or you can take your computer to a local computer repair shop or technician who is knowledgeable with Linux.
Regards...
Last edited by ardvark71; 11-13-2016 at 03:33 AM.
Reason: Changed wording.
If it's not there, enter the following and check again:
Code:
modprobe floppy
If you're not using a desktop environment that automounts the floppy drive disk's filesystem, then you might have to do it manually. With a disk in the drive:
Code:
mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy
That should give you the contents of the floppy disk at /mnt/floppy.
After you're done, you'd have to unmount the drive floppy disk's filesystem before physically removing the disk from the drive:
Code:
umount /mnt/floppy
Last edited by dugan; 11-15-2016 at 12:56 AM.
Reason: Description of mounting is clarified a bit
how to enable my 3.5" floppy drive in my Linux Mint pc
Quote:
Originally Posted by dugan
Your floppy drive should be here:
Code:
/dev/fd0
If it's not there, enter the following and check again:
Code:
modprobe floppy
If you're not using a desktop environment that automounts the floppy drive, then you might have to do it manually. With a disk in the drive:
Code:
mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy
That should give you the contents of the floppy disk at /mnt/floppy.
After you're done, you'd have to unmount the drive before physically removing the disk:
Code:
umount /mnt/floppy
I'll try these steps again and report back. I'm wondering why the drive has to be unmounted after use. Seems to me once mounted, leave it for next time. Just asking. Remember, I said I'm greener than a newbie!
Thanks,
Ted.
Which is one reason I keep a Puppy 4.31 and a Puppy 4.12 cd on the shelf.
Puppy throws a floppy icon on JWM on a live session run. Just click and go for floppy.
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