On Wed, Jul 13, 2005 at 05:16:43PM -0300, Derek Broughton wrote: > s. keeling wrote: > > > Colin Cotter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > >> On 7/12/05, Steffen Waldherr <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> > >> > If this doesn't work, you might > >> > want to try "fdisk /dev/sda" to see the partition > >> > table of the stick and maybe repartition and/or > >> > reformat it to your needs. > > > > Beware, however, others have reported that once reformatted, the stick > > became a paperweight. > > Having done that, I can assure you it's not (quite) true (anyway, they're > way too light to be good paperweights). If you don't format it correctly, > _Windows_ will treat it as a paperweight. HP provides a handy reformatting > tool on their website (google for HPUSBFW.exe) that seems to work to fix up > memory sticks, if you run into that problem. Been there, done that. :-)
For what it's worth, I have run ``mkfs -t vfat'' on a memory stick once, after it had accumulated some weird and (as far as I recall) undeletable files (due to a sequence of events involving unplugging without dismounting, Windows or Macintosh system freezes, and other things). The stick has been working normally ever since; I use it almost every day. However, given the multitude of USB flash drive like devices, I would not be surprised if this didn't work on other models. Certainly, for things like USB MP3 sticks, cameras etc. I would not recommend the mkfs approach, as reformatting them just like that may e.g. erase configuration information. Best regards, Jan -- +- Jan T. Kim -------------------------------------------------------+ | *NEW* email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | | *NEW* WWW: http://www.cmp.uea.ac.uk/people/jtk | *-----=< hierarchical systems are for files, not for humans >=-----* -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
