Ubuntu can't read files on USB

[Jojoyee]

Using Ubuntu 9.04, go to Places -> Computer
The File Browser shows up the USB Drive when inserted.
Right-click the USB Drive under File Browser, it has the following error message:
Unable to mount location, can't mount file

From Terminal, enter command, sudo fdisk -l, showing this:

Disk /dev/sda: 250.0 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x48b548b4

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 6574 52805623+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 6575 13197 53199247+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda3 13198 23389 81859211+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda4 23390 30401 56323890 83 Linux
/dev/sda5 6575 9761 25599546 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda6 9762 13197 27599638+ 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sdf: 4043 MB, 4043309056 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 491 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x04dd5721

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdf1 * 1 492 3948512+ b W95 FAT32
Partition 1 has different physical/logical endings:
phys=(490, 254, 63) logical=(491, 145, 38)

Looks like the 4GB USB drive is located at sdf1.
Any ideas to get it to read the files from the USB thumb drive?

[lonny]

did you look under media

hal should do it auto magically

did you try just clicking of the drive in file manager

[lonny]

*buntu has some probs with hal

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&ei=zmPo...c9ea851cee2c5b

[Jojoyee]

Thanks lonny for the reply and good to share with your experience. I replaced Ubuntu 9.04 with the newer version 9.10 to see if there's any difference.

Still, the new version can't read my files on USB, but I experienced the difference here.

I tried another USB thumb drive formatted with FAT system, it works. It just pops up all the files on the screen after inserting the USB, without the need to do anything. This is what I want from Ubuntu, plug and play.

Another USB thumb drive which is not working on Ubuntu is formatted with FAT32, but the same thumb drive has no problem on Windows at the same USB port on my PC. I tried to manually mount it following the guideline here but not really successful so far. Even longer steps to take if the thumb drive is formatted with NTFS.

I'd just use the FAT formatted thumb drive to work on Ubuntu, at least for me and for now.

[lonny]

@jojo

HP tool to format all the thumb,flash drives in same file system (Fat16) works for most all

other things you can do besides formatting the drive good site

http://www.bay-wolf.com/usbmemstick.htm

cheers

[wdhpr]

Ubuntu can't read files on USB

Interesting problem.
I have never had an issue like this. In fact I can run all my portable apps using Wine. Portable apps and linux
I do have have two thumb drives one for windows and one for linux. Although I can run both on either OS. I believe Lonny may have a point when it comes to the (fat16) format.

Cheers
Wdhpr