"lsblk" sees flash drive but "fdisk -l" does not

themohawkninja · 06-13-2017, 10:01 AM

Hello,

I am trying to format my flash drive, but running "sudo fdisk /dev/sdf" returns

Code:

fdisk: unable to seek on /dev/sdf: Invalid argument

"lsblk" returns (in addition to the sda main drive):

Code:

sdf   8:80 1 7.5G 0 disk
-sdf1 8:81 1 7.5G 0 part

"fdisk -l" returns nothing

Some research led to a suggestion to run "ls -l /dev/disk/by-id/usb* | grep sd" which in addition to other "sdX" results, returns:

Code:

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 9 Jun 13 10:47 /dev/usb-Generic_Flash_Disk_F0D5D7B5-0:0 -> ../../sdf
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 9 Jun 13 10:47 /dev/usb-Generic_Flash_Disk_F0D5D7B5-0:0-part1 -> ../../sdf1

Also, I noticed somebody had suggested "lsmod" and to look for "usb_storage", and an "lsmod | grep usb_storage" returns:

Code:

usb_storage     62062  0

I'm not really sure what to do from here to solve my problem.

hydrurga · 06-13-2017, 10:23 AM

Which kernel do you have? 3.4 was known to act in this strange manner with USB drives.

To find out which kernel:

Code:

uname -a

themohawkninja · 06-13-2017, 10:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hydrurga

Which kernel do you have? 3.4 was known to act in this strange manner with USB drives.

To find out which kernel:

Code:

uname -a

I'm guessing 3.13?

uname -a:

Code:

Linux testuser1-RX889A-ABA-a6040n 3.13.0-39-lowlatency #66+7.0trisquel2 SMP PREEMPT Wed Oct 29 17:10:10 UTC 2014 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

hydrurga · 06-13-2017, 10:37 AM

Yup. Are you able to upgrade that, preferably to a LTS kernel that is not EOL, say 4.4.x or 4.9.x, even 3.16.x? Don't throw away the old one - you'll need a fallback if the new kernel doesn't "take".

https://www.kernel.org/category/releases.html

themohawkninja · 06-13-2017, 12:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hydrurga

Yup. Are you able to upgrade that, preferably to a LTS kernel that is not EOL, say 4.4.x or 4.9.x, even 3.16.x? Don't throw away the old one - you'll need a fallback if the new kernel doesn't "take".

https://www.kernel.org/category/releases.html

I'm not 100% sure if I can upgrade it. My boss told me to just clone the drive (the reason for wanting to wipe the flash drive was due to R/W permissions issues when I tried to copy a tiny Linux client to it) instead f fiddling around with trying to solve the permissions issue.

I'll keep this troubleshooting step in mind for next time though!

hydrurga · 06-13-2017, 01:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by themohawkninja

I'm not 100% sure if I can upgrade it. My boss told me to just clone the drive (the reason for wanting to wipe the flash drive was due to R/W permissions issues when I tried to copy a tiny Linux client to it) instead f fiddling around with trying to solve the permissions issue.

I'll keep this troubleshooting step in mind for next time though!

Ok. Welcome to LQ by the way.