Re: Repartitioning a USB external HD. Need help removing existing partition
>> There's probably Windows backup software on it; and who knows what else.
> Helpful post from Tom, I've done similar but only on Sandisk products. I
> thought U3 was only a Sandisk thing but now WD is using it too?
> Some of the Windows software Tom H mentioned and shown here makes me
> skeptical at best. I just get rid of U3 by default now.
Welcome. Sandisk may have been the first but all flash drive sellers
seem to have U3 options. I could not understand how WD managed to turn
an HD partition into an ro disk but Stan H seems to have found the
answer (although it is not, AFAICT, on the pdf that he posted): it is
a separate flash drive.
That also clarifies two methods to deal with U3 that I found through
Google last night and that I did not post because they did not make
sense.
1) ./u3-tool -vp0 /dev/sdb1
which zeroes the u3 partition and prevents it from auto-mounting
2) echo "1" /sys/block/sr0/device/delete
which (theoretically) does the same thing without having to install any package
I am still curious whether the flash drive can be turned into a usable
rw partition...
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