[SOLVED] WinXP Won't Read USB Flash Drive

I used GParted to format and partition my USB Flash Drive:
sdb1: ext2, on which i successfully installed Puppy 4.2.1 and,
sdb2: FAT32, which i only used so far to store the `pup_save-username.2fs' file.
(That file's normally supposed to be stored on the HDD of the PC you use Puppy with. Meant for Live CDs actually i think.)

sdb1 has the flag `boot' on it, the other none.

Puppy mounts them on /initrd/mnt/dev_ro2 and /initrd/mnt/dev_save, respectively.
I guess that's because it boots from the former and takes the save file from the latter.

The Linux on my PC (an avarage desktop distro) also mounts them succesfully on /media/sdb{1,2}.

When i plug the drive on Windows XP though, there appears ONE drive named `Removable Disc', and when i try to open it, it says that the disk is not formatted and asks me if i'd like to format it now.

If it won't even see the ext2 partition, fine. But the FAT32 one is especially meant to store any kind of normal data to be used on any OS.
So, what did i do wrong?

You probably didn't do anything wrong other than maybe you made a mistake on fdisk when you created the drive. I always make sure the Fat partition is first and
ext partition after that. You might just try doing that, see if it helps.

That means reformatting the whole drive, right?

Actually i wasn't planning to use Puppy much longer anyway.

Thanks, will try.

Actually, you might be able to reconfigure the partition table so that the first partition points to the fat32 data and the second points to the ext2 one. You need to not the start/end cylinders for both partitions, and then using fdisk you can switch them around. If that doesn't work, then you'll need to reformat the device, but it's worth a try.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TaylanUB

That means reformatting the whole drive, right?

Actually i wasn't planning to use Puppy much longer anyway.

Thanks, will try.

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Maybe try fdisking the partitions too.

Sorry i don't get that. Isn't fdisk just an utility for partitioning? (I wikied it, seemingly a general term.)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rubberman

Actually, you might be able to reconfigure the partition table so that the first partition points to the fat32 data and the second points to the ext2 one. You need to not the start/end cylinders for both partitions, and then using fdisk you can switch them around. If that doesn't work, then you'll need to reformat the device, but it's worth a try.

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Really no need for that. I was going to delete Puppy eventually anyway and don't need it for anything at the moment really.
Thanks for letting me know about the possibility of that though. I'll keep in mind for the next time.

I seemingly forgot to mention that Windows now perfectly detecs my USB stick, after having put the FAT32 partition on sda1.

So yeah...

SOLUTION:
Put the file-storage partition (FAT or NTFS, former usually recommended for flash devices) onto the first place (sdx1) in the USB stick, while partitioning it, if you want Windows to detect it too.