UNetbootin needs FAT32 formatted USB - cannot find drive

[logicalconfusion]

UNetbootin, for some reason, cannot find my thumb drive even though Linux shows that its active and accessible. The application recommends using a different file format on my USB (FAT32, the old Win98 format). I tried loading it through the cmdline too. I've never had this problem in the past. Any suggestions?

[vector]

UNetbootin, for some reason, cannot find my thumb drive even though Linux shows that its active and accessible. The application recommends using a different file format on my USB (FAT32, the old Win98 format). I tried loading it through the cmdline too. I've never had this problem in the past. Any suggestions?

ok so then format the drive. i usually just wipe the whole drive clean no partitions no format just empty. then i unplug it plug it back in and unetbootin sees it just fine. i format the drive it self not just the volume on the drive. the volume has to be unmounted before you can format it btw.

[logicalconfusion]

Please explain how to - OH GREAT ONE. I don't have access to G-Parted or GUI based apps like gnome disk. How can I format it using utilities like fdisk and mkfs?

[vector]

Please explain how to - OH GREAT ONE. I don't have access to G-Parted or GUI based apps like gnome disk. How can I format it using utilities like fdisk and mkfs?

ok so if you want to format the usb drive to fat32?

first plug the usb into the computer run the command df

this will list your devices, it will probably be listed something like /devsdb1 or something like that and it will tell you where its mounted something like /media/'whatever the name of the volume is'

so with this info you can format using mkfs

first yo uneed to unmount the device something like sudo umount /dev/sdb1

now the device should be unmounted and you should be ready to format it to fat32

sudo mkfs.vfat -n 'whatever you want to name the volume' -I /dev/sdb1

it should now be formatted to fat32 now unplug it and plug it back in and run df again to see if it worked.

remember that there might show /dev/sdb and /dev/sdb1 one is the drive itself the other is a volume on the drive

you can format the drive and or a volume on the drive

Edited September 11, 2013 by vector

[TN.Frank]

I've always used "Disks" in Linux Mint 15 MATE to format my USB drives without any problems. Just have to click to unmount then you can format then remount and UNetbootin finds it just fine. Under Ubuntu 12.04LTS I used "Disk Utility" and did the same thing. Just make sure you unmount it before you format. Should work like a charm.

[vector]

I've always used "Disks" in Linux Mint 15 MATE to format my USB drives without any problems. Just have to click to unmount then you can format then remount and UNetbootin finds it just fine. Under Ubuntu 12.04LTS I used "Disk Utility" and did the same thing. Just make sure you unmount it before you format. Should work like a charm.

you missed the whole point that he is restricted to the terminal. unable to use a window manager fr whatever reason.

[logicalconfusion]

Actually, the proper way to format a drive is by using fdisk to erase and delete the partition, just incase it appears invalid or won’t load, and then either mkfs.vfat or mkdosfs to create the (vfat) file system. Mount, df, dmesg | tail, and fdisk –l can be invoked to locate the USB once it’s inserted to confirm that it’s on the bus. I had to use fdisk –l since the system didn’t detect the my corrupted old USB. Here’s how to format the USB for uNetbootin:

1. Place the USB in the drive, switch to root and execute fdisk –l . It should display something similar to

/dev/sdb1 on /media/98617130-8c3e-43e0-9a19-005b5a3cc5d4 type ext3 (rw,nosuid,nodev,uhelper=udisks)

2. Now, type 'fdisk /dev/sdb' to access the drive and the type ‘p’ to list the partitions. If it’s just a single-partition USB it might show something like:

     Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1            2048     3915775     1956864    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT

3. Delete what’s stored on the drive by issuing a ‘d’ cmd and ‘p’ to confirm that it’s gone.

4. After deleting the partition, type ‘n’ to create a new partition. Fdisk will then display options to size and number the partition(s). Press enter 4 times to use the defaults.

5. Press ‘p’ again and it will show the newly created dummy partition

Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1            2048     3915775     1956864   83  Linux

6. Press ‘L’ to display the hex codes of all the available file systems. Hex code - b (W95 FAT32) is vfat.

7. Press ‘t’ and type the preffered hexcode ('b') and then ‘w’ to commit the changes and sync/save.

8. Fdisk will automatically exit so a simple mount cmd should display the partition.

9. Now its time to umount and use mkdosfs to create a vfat file system.

Umount /dev/sdb1
Mkdosfs /dev/sdb1

10. The pmount cmd can be used to mount vfat partition, so to mount it simply type ‘pmount /dev/sdb1’ and check unetbootin.

According to my research, Windows prefers to use the NTFS file-system for all disks, and does not let you format large disks in any other file system. Windows refuses to use anything except NTFS to format an external disk if it is bigger than 32 Gbytes. Macs will read but not write the NTFS file system. Linux systems vary, but most will not guarantee to write NTFS properly. This method can be used to re-format any USB. Have fun!

Edited September 14, 2013 by logicalconfusion

[logicalconfusion]

Is uNetbootin the only way to make a bootdisk? Can any of the L33tHax0rZ here explain how to prepare a bootable ISO drive using Linux system tools?

[vector]

Is uNetbootin the only way to make a bootdisk? Can any of the L33tHax0rZ here explain how to prepare a bootable ISO drive using Linux system tools?

there are so many programs avail to install linux on to a usb drive from an iso. if you understand what unetbootin is actually doing then you could easily do the same thing from other distros of linux that might not work with unetbootin. so basically to replicate what its doing you

need to do a couple of things

#1 create a fat32 partition on the USB drive (perferably, the first partition)

#2 mount the ISO image so that you can access its contents.

#3 copy the contents of the ISO image to the partition you just created.

#4 you would use the syslinux utility to make the usb bootable. essentially makes a master boot record-MBR boot sector.

thats pretty much it.