External USB does not show up in fdisk -l

[lynne14]

question is why do you want to fdisk it . . Linux has a partition manager which formats it and slices it up for you . .You must be using windblows yet

[masam]

you also might want to check on the motherboard beneath the jumper settings, sometimes they label them as "MA SL CS"(and something else) i usually go with CS as it is Cable Select, and if you only have one cable in the USB enclosure, it should determine it automagically.

hope this helps.

[snikkith]

Thanks again for the responses. When I turn the enclosure on, it does start to spin as the power-led lights up. The disk then clicks several times (5-7 ?) and then turns silent. When trying to mount it becomes audible again.


I bet the clue is somewhere in these lines where it says very big device and prints out a huge number of bytes...

[63328.498645] scsi6 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
[63328.498965] usb-storage: device found at 12
[63328.498972] usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
[63328.499027] drivers/usb/core/inode.c: creating file '012'
[63329.221425] usb 1-6: uevent
[63333.540670] scsi 6:0:0:0: Direct-Access                                    PQ: 0 ANSI: 2 CCS
[63333.541109] sd 6:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0
[63333.542922] usb-storage: device scan complete
[63333.544517] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Very big device. Trying to use READ CAPACITY(16).
[63333.545681] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] 72057594037927936 512-byte logical blocks: (0 B/0 B)
[63333.546678] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[63333.546690] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 28 00 00 00
[63333.546697] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[63333.548075] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Very big device. Trying to use READ CAPACITY(16).
[63333.549675] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[63333.549687]  sdb: unknown partition table
[63333.554069] usb 1-6:1.0: uevent
[63333.554512] usb 1-6: uevent
[63333.557074] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Very big device. Trying to use READ CAPACITY(16).
[63333.558715] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[63333.558728] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
[63333.571648] usb 1-6:1.0: uevent

I would try inserting it, if I wasn't using a netbook here, thats why I got the external drive. (It is SATA btw. seems I have createt the impression its an IDE-drive)

I'll try the XP-Settings and try it on a WinXP-PC as soon as I get home, just got Linux-PCs around here, except one with Vista on it, but that one only had cables for one drive -> I unplugged the old one and plugged in the new one. Result is the screen turning black after bios loading and some clicking, but no "Insert Systemdisk" or similar messages.

Sorry, I don't know which partition manager you are talking about, lynne14. Do you mean GParted or a specific one for such a task? The only "partition-manager" that I know of, that basically every linux based system has is fdisk or cfdisk... if they both fail to display a drive, I assume every other partition-manager will fail as well... I am not using windows, otherwise I'd be posting in another forum

Well, since I am using a netbook here I don't really want to be messing around with my motherboard and there are no settings to be made on the chip inside the enclosure at all... The only possibility would be the jumpers on the drive but they are not labeled in any way. As the drive is actually SATA, I guess there are no MA SL and CS jumpers, but I don't think I really got all the details about these different architectures :/

Anyway, thanks for the help so far, I will try the last few options I got and if it still insists in not working, I will just have to send it back for a replacement. Only problem is I still don't know, whether it is the drive or the enclosure that causes the trouble... Guess the drive, cause dmesg at least tells me about JMicron USB to ATA/ATAPI bridge and stuff... it just says could not read partition-table as well...

Greetings, snikkith

[creamer]

try running gparted in the terminal