[Bug 1708881] Re: USB Stick corrupted - The driver descriptor says the physical block size is 2048 bytes

[Damiön la Bagh]

So I finally found the answer after searching for a year!

First identify which drive letter the USB stick has received from the
kernel

sudo parted --list
For example this USB drive is on Device Serial Disk h: (/dev/sdh)

Model: KINGSTON DataTraveler G3 (scsi) Schijf /dev/sdh: 4001MB
Use the information to wipe all the partition tables and data from the drive

⚠ WARNING THIS NEXT STEP WILL DESTROY ALL DATA ON THE DRIVE ⚠

sudo wipefs --all /dev/sdX
Make sure that you have chosen the correct USB stick for the value of X so you don't accidentally wipe your harddrive/SSD

Warning message

"The driver descriptor says the physical block size is 2048 bytes, but
Linux says that it is 512 bytes." Means that the dd command in behind
the nice GUI forgot to specify the bs=2048 option.

Background

It's not that the unused space is wasted. The USB disk has been
corrupted by USB Startup Disk Creator. For some reason USB Startup Disk
Creator has become CD-ROM creator. It writes your USB-Stick to iso9660
format which is only intended for CD-ROM's. Since new computers don't
come with CD-ROM players or writers anymore this is a regression bug

-- 
You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu
Foundations Bugs, which is subscribed to usb-creator in Ubuntu.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1708881

Title:
  USB Stick corrupted - The driver descriptor says the physical block
  size is 2048 bytes

Status in usb-creator package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  After using the usb-creator-gtk program the resulting Ubuntu 16.04.3 stick is corrupted.
  The error message when re-purposing the stick is:

  "The driver descriptor says the physical block size is 2048 bytes, but
  Linux says that it is 512 bytes."

  It seems like usb-creator-gtk is using dd without specifying the
  correct blocksize corrupting the USB stick.

  I've now lost 4 USB sticks on two different computers that I now can't
  format back to a usable stick.

  Steps to reproduce:
  Insert a blank USB stick into the USB port of the computer
  Run usb-creator-gtk with an Ubuntu 16.04.3 ISO
  Open gParted (parted, blkid, lsblk etc...)

  "The driver descriptor says the physical block size is 2048 bytes, but
  Linux says that it is 512 bytes."

  try to clean the disk with
  dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/$USBSTICK bs=2048; sync

  again check the disk with gParted (or other disk utility)
  "The driver descriptor says the physical block size is 2048 bytes, but Linux says that it is 512 bytes."

  USB stick is destroyed.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
  Package: usb-creator-gtk 0.3.2
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-89.112-generic 4.4.76
  Uname: Linux 4.4.0-89-generic x86_64
  NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_uvm nvidia_drm nvidia_modeset nvidia
  ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.10
  Architecture: amd64
  CurrentDesktop: Unity
  Date: Sat Aug  5 22:40:59 2017
  InstallationDate: Installed on 2015-11-15 (628 days ago)
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 14.04.3 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Beta amd64 (20150805)
  SourcePackage: usb-creator
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to xenial on 2017-06-16 (49 days ago)

To manage notifications about this bug go to:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/usb-creator/+bug/1708881/+subscriptions