Formatting a usb drive........

**JonathanJ** · 10-09-2009

I have a hard drive that I put into an external case that plugs into my usb port. My system is not even seeing it, let alone allowing me to format it. Any suggestions? Other then cursing it.

**mr805newbie** · 10-09-2009

Do you see it listed if you run lsusb?

**Daan** · 10-10-2009

Also, have a look at the system messages about two minutes after you have plugged it in:

Code:

# dmesg | tail -n100

**JonathanJ** · 10-10-2009

Originally Posted by mr805newbie

Do you see it listed if you run lsusb?

jonathan@jonathan-laptop:~$ lsusb
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 22b8:2b24 Motorola PCS
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 1241:1177 Belkin F8E842-DL Mouse
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub

and

jonathan@jonathan-laptop:~$ dmesg | tail -n100
[ 3.833950] usb 2-2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 3.889985] md: raid10 personality registered for level 10
[ 4.019365] usbcore: registered new interface driver hiddev
[ 4.028369] input: Holtek Optical Mouse as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:03.0/usb2/2-2/2-2:1.0/input/input6
[ 4.045623] sis900.c: v1.08.10 Apr. 2 2006
[ 4.045664] sis900 0000:00:04.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 19 (level, low) -> IRQ 19
[ 4.050334] 0000:00:04.0: Realtek RTL8201 PHY transceiver found at address 13.
[ 4.056323] 0000:00:04.0: Using transceiver found at address 13 as default
[ 4.056987] generic-usb 0003:1241:1177.0001: input,hidraw0: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Holtek Optical Mouse] on usb-0000:00:03.0-2/input0
[ 4.057006] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbhid
[ 4.057009] usbhid: v2.6:USB HID core driver
[ 4.059445] eth0: SiS 900 PCI Fast Ethernet at 0x1800, IRQ 19, 00:16:36:11:7e:4f
[ 4.435581] Marking TSC unstable due to TSC halts in idle
[ 4.465553] PM: Starting manual resume from disk
[ 4.465558] PM: Resume from partition 8:5
[ 4.465560] PM: Checking hibernation image.
[ 4.465783] PM: Resume from disk failed.
[ 4.544344] kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
[ 4.544360] EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
[ 13.990705] udev: starting version 141
[ 14.682677] ndiswrapper version 1.53 loaded (smp=yes, preempt=no)
[ 15.395438] Linux agpgart interface v0.103
[ 15.664729] synaptics was reset on resume, see synaptics_resume_reset if you have trouble on resume
[ 15.815754] ndiswrapper: driver bcmwl5 (Broadcom,12/22/2004, 3.100.46.0) loaded
[ 15.816106] ndiswrapper 0000:00:0b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 17
[ 15.824434] ndiswrapper: using IRQ 17
[ 16.099419] input: PC Speaker as /devices/platform/pcspkr/input/input7
[ 16.300713] wlan0: ethernet device 00:16:ce:13:d8:ce using NDIS driver: bcmwl5, version: 0x3642e00, NDIS version: 0x501, vendor: 'NDIS Network Adapter', 14E4:4318.5.conf
[ 16.300746] wlan0: encryption modes supported: WEP; TKIP with WPA, WPA2, WPA2PSK; AES/CCMP with WPA, WPA2, WPA2PSK
[ 16.300824] yenta_cardbus 0000:00:06.0: CardBus bridge found [1025:0083]
[ 16.300839] yenta_cardbus 0000:00:06.0: Using CSCINT to route CSC interrupts to PCI
[ 16.300841] yenta_cardbus 0000:00:06.0: Routing CardBus interrupts to PCI
[ 16.300845] yenta_cardbus 0000:00:06.0: TI: mfunc 0x00521d22, devctl 0x64
[ 16.339467] acer-wmi: Acer Laptop ACPI-WMI Extras
[ 16.339482] acer-wmi: No or unsupported WMI interface, unable to load
[ 16.533166] yenta_cardbus 0000:00:06.0: ISA IRQ mask 0x06f8, PCI irq 19
[ 16.533171] yenta_cardbus 0000:00:06.0: Socket status: 30000007
[ 16.533854] shpchp: Standard Hot Plug PCI Controller Driver version: 0.4
[ 16.550173] sis96x_smbus 0000:00:02.1: SiS96x SMBus base address: 0x8100
[ 16.550587] agpgart-amd64 0000:00:00.0: AGP bridge [1039/0760]
[ 16.552027] agpgart-amd64 0000:00:00.0: AGP aperture is 32M @ 0xe0000000
[ 16.562628] usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper
[ 16.636581] Synaptics Touchpad, model: 1, fw: 6.2, id: 0x12a0b1, caps: 0xa04713/0x204000
[ 16.675567] input: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad as /devices/platform/i8042/serio1/input/input8
[ 17.042089] pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket0: cs: IO port probe 0x100-0x3af: clean.
[ 17.043714] pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket0: cs: IO port probe 0x3e0-0x4ff: excluding 0x480-0x48f
[ 17.044392] pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket0: cs: IO port probe 0x820-0x8ff: clean.
[ 17.044963] pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket0: cs: IO port probe 0xc00-0xcf7: clean.
[ 17.045675] pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket0: cs: IO port probe 0xa00-0xaff: clean.
[ 17.139891] Intel ICH 0000:00:02.7: PCI INT C -> GSI 18 (level, low) -> IRQ 18
[ 17.964029] intel8x0_measure_ac97_clock: measured 55466 usecs
[ 17.964032] intel8x0: clocking to 48000
[ 18.191814] lp: driver loaded but no devices found
[ 18.322676] Adding 3229024k swap on /dev/sda5. Priority:-1 extents:1 across:3229024k
[ 18.870720] EXT3 FS on sda1, internal journal
[ 20.170777] type=1505 audit(1255194995.126:2): operation="profile_load" name="/usr/share/gdm/guest-session/Xsession" name2="default" pid=2040
[ 20.228455] type=1505 audit(1255194995.186:3): operation="profile_load" name="/sbin/dhclient-script" name2="default" pid=2044
[ 20.228656] type=1505 audit(1255194995.186:4): operation="profile_load" name="/sbin/dhclient3" name2="default" pid=2044
[ 20.228730] type=1505 audit(1255194995.186:5): operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-client.action" name2="default" pid=2044
[ 20.228788] type=1505 audit(1255194995.186:6): operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-script" name2="default" pid=2044
[ 20.389079] type=1505 audit(1255194995.346:7): operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/cups/backend/cups-pdf" name2="default" pid=2049
[ 20.389374] type=1505 audit(1255194995.346:

: operation="profile_load" name="/usr/sbin/cupsd" name2="default" pid=2049
[ 20.422932] type=1505 audit(1255194995.378:9): operation="profile_load" name="/usr/sbin/tcpdump" name2="default" pid=2053
[ 20.984028] eth0: Media Link Off
[ 20.984291] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready
[ 26.931085] NET: Registered protocol family 15
[ 27.146254] alg: No test for cipher_null (cipher_null-generic)
[ 27.146330] alg: No test for digest_null (digest_null-generic)
[ 27.146350] alg: No test for compress_null (compress_null-generic)
[ 27.275173] padlock: VIA PadLock Hash Engine not detected.
[ 27.358889] padlock: VIA PadLock Hash Engine not detected.
[ 27.518416] padlock: VIA PadLock not detected.
[ 31.242957] Bridge firewalling registered
[ 31.368040] virbr0: starting userspace STP failed, starting kernel STP
[ 32.024695] ip_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
[ 32.689079] nf_conntrack version 0.5.0 (16384 buckets, 65536 max)
[ 32.689339] CONFIG_NF_CT_ACCT is deprecated and will be removed soon. Please use
[ 32.689342] nf_conntrack.acct=1 kernel paramater, acct=1 nf_conntrack module option or
[ 32.689345] sysctl net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_acct=1 to enable it.
[ 37.474423] device eth0 entered promiscuous mode
[ 37.478487] device eth0 left promiscuous mode
[ 37.479787] device eth0 entered promiscuous mode
[ 41.836010] virbr0: no IPv6 routers present
[ 46.529629] vboxdrv: Trying to deactivate the NMI watchdog permanently...
[ 46.529633] vboxdrv: Successfully done.
[ 46.529635] vboxdrv: Found 1 processor cores.
[ 46.529730] vboxdrv: TSC mode is 'synchronous', kernel timer mode is 'normal'.
[ 46.529733] vboxdrv: Successfully loaded version 2.1.4_OSE (interface 0x000a0009).
[ 50.460515] Bluetooth: BNEP (Ethernet Emulation) ver 1.3
[ 50.460519] Bluetooth: BNEP filters: protocol multicast
[ 51.239188] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): wlan0: link is not ready
[ 53.060197] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver
[ 60.712018] pan0: no IPv6 routers present
[ 81.506964] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): wlan0: link becomes ready
[ 84.764039] usb 3-3: new full speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 2
[ 84.985505] usb 3-3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 91.948017] wlan0: no IPv6 routers present
[ 120.056040] Clocksource tsc unstable (delta = -62527249 ns)
[ 196.000167] usb 1-4: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 4
[ 205.796088] hub 1-0:1.0: unable to enumerate USB device on port 4

**mr805newbie** · 10-10-2009

Have you tried different USB ports on your computer?

**JonathanJ** · 10-10-2009

Originally Posted by mr805newbie

Have you tried different USB ports on your computer?

No matter what port I put it in, my system only sees the mouse and cell phone(there to recharge). This is a new hard drive(unformatted).

**mr805newbie** · 10-10-2009

Do you have a formatted hard drive you've known to work? Maybe you can try that to make sure it's the formatting causing the problem?

May I also suggest you check the (if using IDE) jumper on the hard drive is set to what the USB interface requires.

**JonathanJ** · 10-10-2009

Originally Posted by mr805newbie

Do you have a formatted hard drive you've known to work? Maybe you can try that to make sure it's the formatting causing the problem?

May I also suggest you check the (if using IDE) jumper on the hard drive is set to what the USB interface requires.

It is a SATA drive.

oz · 10-11-2009

Welcome to the forums!

Is the drive powered externally, or is it powered by the USB port?

If it's the USB port only, it might be underpowered. Sometimes, certain hard drives need more power than some USB ports can provide.

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