Can I format a disk in an external floppy drive - solved

[Graham Watkins]

Joep L. Blom wrote:
> Graham Watkins schreef:
>   
>> Larry wrote:
>>     
>>> Graham Watkins wrote:
>>>   
>>>       
>>>> elmo wrote:
>>>>   
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>>>> Graham Watkins wrote:
>>>>>   
>>>>>     
>>>>>       
>>>>>           
>>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> When I got my new computer, it did not have a built-in floppy drive so I 
>>>>>> bought an external usb model.  Obviously floppy disks don't have much of 
>>>>>> a future so all I wanted to do was lift any valuable data off them, burn 
>>>>>> it to a CD and re-format the disks so that they could be given/thrown 
>>>>>> away.  However, kfloppy does not recognise the drive so I can't do it 
>>>>>> that way.   fdisk doesn't see it either.    Does anybody know what, if 
>>>>>> anything I should do to re-format the disks?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>   
>>>>>>     
>>>>>>       
>>>>>>         
>>>>>>             
>>>>> I use an external floppy..In Windows, it is B:\
>>>>>
>>>>> I use it the same way as an A:\ drive, formatting, etc.  I haven't tried 
>>>>> it in any Linux.
>>>>>
>>>>> elmo
>>>>>
>>>>>   
>>>>>     
>>>>>       
>>>>>           
>>>> Windows is not an option.
>>>>
>>>> A correction to my earlier mail: fdisk -l does now show the floppy 
>>>> device as sdc.  I'm not sure what all those partitions are about though.
>>>>
>>>> Disk /dev/sdc: 1 MB, 1474560 bytes
>>>> 1 heads, 3 sectors/track, 960 cylinders
>>>> Units = cylinders of 3 * 512 = 1536 bytes
>>>> Disk identifier: 0x73696420
>>>>
>>>> This doesn't look like a partition table
>>>> Probably you selected the wrong device.
>>>>
>>>>    Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
>>>> /dev/sdc1   ?   639983653   821462684   272218546+  20  Unknown
>>>> Partition 1 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
>>>>      phys=(356, 97, 46) logical=(639983652, 0, 3)
>>>> Partition 1 has different physical/logical endings:
>>>>      phys=(357, 116, 40) logical=(821462683, 0, 2)
>>>> Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
>>>> /dev/sdc2   ?   443394735   623053497   269488144   6b  Unknown
>>>> Partition 2 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
>>>>      phys=(288, 110, 57) logical=(443394734, 0, 1)
>>>> Partition 2 has different physical/logical endings:
>>>>      phys=(269, 101, 57) logical=(623053496, 0, 2)
>>>> Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
>>>> /dev/sdc3   ?   179663131   645784101   699181456   53  OnTrack DM6 Aux3
>>>> Partition 3 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
>>>>      phys=(345, 32, 19) logical=(179663130, 0, 2)
>>>> Partition 3 has different physical/logical endings:
>>>>      phys=(324, 77, 19) logical=(645784100, 0, 3)
>>>> Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
>>>> /dev/sdc4   *   464875888   464883000       10668+  49  Unknown
>>>> Partition 4 has different physical/logical beginnings (non-Linux?):
>>>>      phys=(87, 1, 0) logical=(464875887, 0, 3)
>>>> Partition 4 has different physical/logical endings:
>>>>      phys=(335, 78, 2) logical=(464882999, 0, 3)
>>>> Partition 4 does not end on cylinder boundary.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>   
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>> *Try this, to see if it shows your floppy drive...
>>>
>>> cd /media then type ls...
>>>
>>> Then try mount /dev/fd0, <--- that's a zero...
>>>
>>> Mine is internal floppy, which uses the fd0, your's might be alittle 
>>> different...
>>>
>>> See if it will work for you then format it...
>>>
>>> Larry
>>> *
>>>
>>>   
>>>       
>> There is no fd0.  fds are internal floppy drives. If you look at my 
>> fdisk output you will see that it's sdc. But that was yesterday - it's 
>> sdg today.
>>
>>  I think that this can probably be formatted from the command line. 
>> Anybody know of a formatting disks for dummies type tutorial?
>>
>>     
> I just typed:
>   sudo mount /dev/fd0 /media/floppy0/
> [sudo] password for joep: password
> and then -after some waiting):
>
>   ls -al /media/floppy0/
> total 1385
> drwxr-xr-x 2 root root   7168 1970-01-01 01:00 .
> drwxr-xr-x 9 root root   4096 2008-08-17 17:29 ..
> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  11208 1994-05-31 06:22 attrib.exe
> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root     45 2004-03-25 10:39 autoexec.bat
> .....
>
> So I don't see why a simple format /media/floppy0/ would'nt work.
> (Hardy:  2.6.24-19-generic #1 SMP Fri Jul 11 21:01:46 UTC 2008 x86_64).
> I didn't try it but if ubuntu is like fedora (in this respect) it will work.
> Joep
>
>   
Tried gfloppy, it recognised /dev/sdg and formatted a disk 
successfully.  All sorted now.

-- 
Graham Watkins

"To mess up a Linux box, you need to work at it; to mess up your Windows
box, you just need to work on it."
SecurityFocus columnist Scott Granneman.