according to my fstab file my entry for my pen drive is

none /mnt/removable supermount dev=/dev/sda1,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0022,iocharset=iso8859-1,kudzu,codepage=850 0 0

What do I need to change to make the pen drive writable by non-root users?

Try using "umask=0000", you will need to unmount then remount the partition after changing fstab. You may also want to add a "user" option so that anyone can mount the device too.

mandrake 10 (don't know about 9.2) automatically mounts it when hotplug detects it. Make sure it is not formatted ntfs for some silly reason, then writes will be difficult. Mine is using vfat.

/dev/hda1 / ext3 defaults 1 1
/dev/hdb1 /Oneniisama ext3 defaults 1 2
none /dev/pts devpts mode=0620 0 0
/dev/hdc /mnt/cdrom auto umask=0022,user,iocharset=iso8859-1,codepage=850,noauto,ro,exec 0 0
/dev/hdd /mnt/cdrom2 auto umask=0022,user,iocharset=iso8859-1,codepage=850,noauto,ro,exec 0 0
none /mnt/floppy supermount dev=/dev/fd0,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0022,iocharset=iso8859-1,sync,codepage=850 0 0
none /mnt/removable supermount dev=/dev/sda1,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0000,iocharset=iso8859-1,kudzu,codepage=850 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/sdb1 /usb1 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/dev/sdb2 /usb2 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/dev/sdb3 /usb3 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/dev/hda5 swap swap defaults 0 0
none /mnt/hd supermount dev=/dev/ide/host0/bus0/target1/lun0/part1,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0022,iocharset=iso8859-1,kudzu,codepage=850 0 0
none /mnt/removable2 supermount dev=/dev/scsi/host0/bus0/target0/lun0/part1,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0022,iocharset=iso8859-1,kudzu,codepage=850 0 0

That is my fstab file, I noticed there are some mounts in there I want to move,
if i edit this file, does that allow me to remove mounts or move them?

/dev/sdb1 /usb1 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/dev/sdb2 /usb2 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/dev/sdb3 /usb3 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0

instead of being located in the /mnt/ folder
they are just in the / folder
can i move to the /mnt/ folder by simpling editing

to

/mnt//dev/sdb1 /usb1 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/mnt//dev/sdb2 /usb2 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0
/mnt//dev/sdb3 /usb3 vfat noauto,rw,users 0 0

and thanks for the pendrive help, though I dont know what you mean about adding users

make sure you do
mkdir /usb1
mkdir /usb2
etc. before you change the mountpoints. you might also want to change noauto to auto so it will mount automaticlly when you plug it in. If you plug one in that only has 1 partition, i don't know what will happen

well that is odd, that you bring that up see the drive made a mount point of /removable2 which isnt valid, you can probably see that in my ftab, can I just remove that invalid mount point?

and would it be makedir /mnt/usb1 or just /usb1?

i put it on no auto cause the thing trys to mount it at boot, and its only one when i back up my data
other than that its usually off and never plugged in

you can mkdir either /mnt/usb1 or just /usb1 (this is linux, not windows, the user gets to make decisions, not the OS ) just as long as the fstab matches. If you want you can mount it under /home/[username]/usb1 each device/mountpoint/file is treated the same as far as where in the tree it may fall, remember. As to the invalid mount point, you may remove it, but usb-storage module may re-create it, or something from hotplug may, as to that someone with more knowledge will have to help there.

awesome thanks for you help, i will go make those fstab changes later today and tell you how it goes

kewl, i hope it works out