How to remove iso 9660 from USB?
Solution 1
Okay, it turns out that in this case something (possibly when I wrote the iso-9660 file system to the drive) has triggered some form of internal write protection on the drive. There are no external write protection / hold switches, but yet this is the output in dmesg
when I run
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb
as root:
sd 9:0:0:0: [sdb] Add. Sense: Write protected end_request: I/O error, dev sdb, sector 4028744 sd 9:0:0:0: [sdb] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK sd 9:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense Key : Data Protect [current] Info fld=0x0
Note the comments in there about protection! However, when I plug the device in, I get,
scsi 10:0:0:0: Direct-Access FLASH Drive AU_USB20 8.07 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2 sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] 4069376 512-byte hardware sectors (2084 MB) sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00 sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] 4069376 512-byte hardware sectors (2084 MB) sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00 sd 10:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
Note that this message says that the device is not write protected! So unfortunately, it looks like the disk has had it (i.e kaput).
Solution 2
I am new to this Linux sys admin stuff, so when I had exactly the same problem I poked and prodded with no madness to my method but managed to remove the iso9660 fs and reclaim the thumb drive.
sudo fdisk -l /dev/sdb1
returned
Disk /dev/sdb1: 16.0 GB, 16037969920 bytes
64 heads, 32 sectors/track, 15295 cylinders, total 31324160 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I>/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x57155aa7
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1p1 2048 31324159 15661056 5 Extended
So I then tried
sudo fdisk /dev/sdb1
Command (m for help): m
Command action
. . .
followed by
Command (m for help): d Extended
Selected partition 1
Command (m for help): v
Remaining 31324159 unallocated 512-byte sectors
Then when prompted again selected for fdisk to create an empty dos partition table (something I figured I could overwrite with whatever I wanted later)
Command (m for help): v
Remaining 31324159 unallocated 512-byte sectors
Command (m for help): o
Building a new DOS disklabel with disk identifier 0xea06616f.
Changes will remain in memory only, until you decide to write them.
After that, of course, the previous content won't be recoverable.
Warning: invalid flag 0x0000 of partition table 4 will be corrected by w(rite)
Command (m for help): w
The partition table has been altered!
Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.
WARNING: Re-reading the partition table failed with error 22: Invalid argument.
The kernel still uses the old table. The new table will be used at
the next reboot or after you run partprobe(8) or kpartx(8)
Syncing disks.
I took the returned messages to mean that I at least "broke" the iso9660 fs so went on to try mkfs
sudo mkfs /dev/sdb1
mke2fs 1.41.14 (22-Dec-2010)
Filesystem label=
OS type: Linux
Block size=4096 (log=2)
Fragment size=4096 (log=2)
Stride=0 blocks, Stripe width=0 blocks
979200 inodes, 3915520 blocks
.195776 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user
First data block=0
.Maximum filesystem blocks=4009754624
120 block groups
32768 blocks per group, 32768 fragments per group
8160 inodes per group
Superblock backups stored on blocks:
32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208
Writing inode tables: done
Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done
This filesystem will be automatically checked every 28 mounts or
180 days, whichever comes first. Use tune2fs -c or -i to override.
All this left me with the "lost+found" directory on the thumb drive.
sudo mount /dev/sdb1 /media/
ls /media/
lost+found
Finally, I went to the Ubuntu website (http://www.ubuntu.com/download/ubuntu/download, section 2) and used the stick to create a bootable image of Ubuntu for trial use, and it let me. The beauty of the Ubuntu images made on the stick this way is that they can be deleted easily and the stick reclaimed for other use.
I mention this very last step because in hindsight I wonder if I had done just that in the first place that it would have worked, I dunno. As mentioned, I am new to this Linux stuff and am trying different distro's (e.g. Fedora, Ubuntu, etc.) on live cd's with whatever media is most convenient, and I sure do break a lot of stuff along the way.
Solution 3
mkdosfs -I /dev/sdb
will create a vfat file system on the drive. The -I has to be passed if you want the file system to be created on the entire drive and not on a partition. If you want to partition the drive first, use fdisk. Of course fdisk can't read the drive now, because it doesn't have any partitions. But I'm sure it will be able to write to it.
Solution 4
The best and proper way to do it is:
# wipefs --all /dev/sdX
As from the wipefs
manual:
wipefs can erase filesystem, raid or partition-table signatures (magic strings) from the specified device to make the signatures invisible for libblkid.
wipefs does not erase the filesystem itself nor any other data from the device. When used without any options, wipefs lists all visible filesystems and the offsets of their basic signatures.
wipefs calls the BLKRRPART ioctl when it has erased a partition-table signature to inform the kernel about the change.
This has many advantages like informing the kernel about the change (so you don't get any errors when formatting afterwards), not erasing data nor filesystems, and so on.
Solution 5
Last night I did
dd if=fedora.iso of=sdx
After four hours I had an unbootable, unchangeable, iso9660 brick. Following David's train of thought, I called Ubuntu's 'startup disk creator' (Type 'startup disk creator' in the dash), and merely selected 'erase'. That did it.
The USB drive was then reported as FAT32 and all is well.
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a_m0d
Updated on September 17, 2022Comments
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a_m0d over 1 year
I have somehow managed to write an iso 9660 image onto my USB drive, which makes all my computer think that the device is actually a CD. I have tried various methods of removing this partition, but nothing seems to work. I have tried
fdisk
, which says$ fdisk -l /dev/sdb Cannot open /dev/sdb
parted crashes when I try to use it on this device.I have even tried
$ dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb
but it just hangs with no output (either on screen or on disk). However, when I plug the USB in, it does mount, and I can view (but not edit) the files on it.edit: now the result is
$ dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb dd: opening `/dev/sdb': Read-only file system
I have also tried re-formatting it on Windows, but it gets to the end of the format process and then says "Couldn't format the drive".
How can I remove this partition and get my whole USB drive back to normal again?
EDIT 1: Trying a simple
mkfs
doesn't work:$ sudo mkfs -t vfat /dev/sdb mkfs.vfat 3.0.0 (28 Sep 2008) mkfs.vfat: Will not try to make filesystem on full-disk device '/dev/sdb' (use -I if wanted)
I can't domkfs
on/dev/sdb1
because there is no such partition, as shown:$ ls /dev | grep sdb sdb
EDIT 2: This is the information posted by dmesg when I plug the device in:
$ dmesg . . (snip) . usb 2-1: New USB device found, idVendor=058f, idProduct=6387 usb 2-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3 usb 2-1: Product: Mass Storage usb 2-1: Manufacturer: Generic usb 2-1: SerialNumber: G0905000000000010885 usb-storage: device found at 4 usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning usb-storage: device scan complete scsi 6:0:0:0: Direct-Access FLASH Drive AU_USB20 8.07 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2 sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] 4069376 512-byte hardware sectors (2084 MB) sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00 sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] 4069376 512-byte hardware sectors (2084 MB) sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00 sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through sdb: unknown partition table sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk sd 6:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0 ISO 9660 Extensions: Microsoft Joliet Level 3 ISO 9660 Extensions: RRIP_1991A SELinux: initialized (dev sdb, type iso9660), uses genfs_contexts CE: hpet increasing min_delta_ns to 15000 nsec
This shows that the device is formatted as ISO 9660 and that it is/dev/sdb
.EDIT 3: This is the message that I find at the bottom of
dmesg
after runningcfdisk
and writing a new partition table to the disk:SELinux: initialized (dev sdb, type iso9660), uses genfs_contexts sd 17:0:0:0: [sdb] Device not ready: Sense Key : Not Ready [current] sd 17:0:0:0: [sdb] Device not ready: <> ASC=0xff ASCQ=0xffASC=0xff <> ASCQ=0xff end_request: I/O error, dev sdb, sector 0 Buffer I/O error on device sdb, logical block 0 lost page write due to I/O error on sdb
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a_m0d almost 15 yearsDoesn't work - see edit to question
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a_m0d almost 15 yearsDoesn't work - just prints the version number and exits. Also, fdisk is "Unable to write /dev/sdb"
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a_m0d almost 15 yearsTried this - when I plug it back in, it mounts it fine, and I can read everything fine. According to
mount
, it is an iso9660 file system. However, gparted just shows 2GB of un-allocated space on the drive.dd
complains that /dev/sdb is a read-only file system -
a_m0d almost 15 yearsHah, nah, doesn't work, because
mount
checks the file type first -
Kirill Strizhak almost 15 yearsYep, suspected as much :] Ok, no more 'out of the blue' ideas.
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Kim almost 15 yearsi just tried the command and it does write to the device specified. It also only prints the version number. You can test this with a regular file that you created with dd. You can see the changes it makes with od. My guess is that it's a hardware problem.
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a_m0d almost 15 yearsI have done that, but even though the whole disk seems to be filled with zeros, it still somehow mounts and reads the disk!
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a_m0d almost 15 yearsTried this; cfdisk doesn't produce any error messages, but a quick look in
dmesg
shows there is actually an error message. (see Edit 3 in question above) -
gbarry almost 15 yearsDoes Linux still use /etc/fstab ? That's where these "associations" used to be stored.
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a_m0d almost 15 yearsNo, its using (I think)
udev
, or whatever it is that automatically mounts the drive. -
CesarB over 14 yearsI heard in the past about flash devices which became bricked if you ever used a non-FAT filesystem with them (because they used the FAT to know which blocks were unused and could be discarded). I have not heard of that for a long time, and I could not find anything about it with a quick Google search.
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CesarB over 14 yearsSo far I have found one person mentioning the FAT dependency: linux.derkeiler.com/Mailing-Lists/Debian/2008-08/msg00761.html
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Kirill Strizhak over 14 yearsSorry to hear that it's dead... Heh, I should be glad that I didn't manage to reproduce your problem :] Although I've tried it on an old 'disposable' drive, it still would be sad to lose it that way.
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a_m0d over 14 yearsyeah, especially since it was only about a week old! oh well...
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CesarB over 14 yearsFound what I was looking for: lkml.org/lkml/2009/3/16/363 ("Some SDD manufacturers (I don't know which ones) are actually examining the partition table and doing different things. I know this because they are permanently bricked if one writes an invalid partition table.")
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ott-- over 12 years@a_m0d: Is this by chance a stick with warranty? I have some with 2 or 4 years, one even with lifetime warranty. If there's no sensitive data in the image, I'd try to return it.
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a_m0d over 12 years@ott-- probably not. It was a while ago now, and I've just abandoned the stick. It probably had a small one on it, but since it was only a fairly cheap stick I didn't bother returning it.
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ott-- over 12 years@a_m0d one last thing: has this device node the mount option
errors=remount,ro
? If yes, you could try to change it toerrors=continue
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vgoff over 11 yearsSometimes it is appropriate to use a hammer, like this. I wonder what was in the first few sectors of the drive.
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Sebastian Godelet almost 11 yearsAll the way up to Windows 8 :)
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Ⴖuі over 8 yearsthis worked for me to remove a Centos bootable image when the above solutions had all failed.
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Ravindra Bawane over 3 yearsThis is a very old question that already has accepted answers. Your post lists a few general suggestions but does not explain how to use the tools it suggests to solve the problem that was presented.