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Jonas
Asked: 2013-06-24 06:53:00 +0800 CST

How do I know the device path to an USB-stick?

  • 772

I have a USB-stick (used as an installation medium). Now I need to install a driver from a restricted folder on that device). But how do I get the device path to my USB-stick (e.g. /dev/sda3 so I can mount it using the mount command?

I have read the answer to https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/18925/how-to-mount-a-device-in-linux-beginners-confusion but fdisk -l shows nothing to me.

usb

6 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    First plug in your USB-Stick.
    Then type: 

    lsblk

    Your output should look something like this

    NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0 465,8G  0 disk 
├─sda1   8:1    0  74,5G  0 part /
├─sda2   8:2    0 390,2G  0 part /home
├─sda3   8:3    0     1K  0 part 
└─sda5   8:5    0     1G  0 part [SWAP]

    Now you can use the size to determine which one is your usb stick . To mount it somewhere in your home folder for example just type: 

    mkdir ~/UsbStick
sudo mount /dev/PATH_TO_YOUR_STICK ~/UsbStick

    obviously replacing PATH_TO_YOUR_STICK with the right /dev/sdX path and ~/UsbStick with the directory you created using the mkdir command

    • 60

  2. find device path, LABEL, UUID and TYPE of block devices with help of command 

    sudo blkid

    result will be like 

    /dev/sda1: UUID="XXXX" TYPE="ntfs" 
/dev/sda5: UUID="XXXX-XXXX" TYPE="ext4"
/dev/sda6: UUID="XXXX-XXXX" TYPE="swap" 
/dev/sda7: UUID="XXXX-XXXX" TYPE="ext4" 
/dev/sda8: UUID="XXXX-XXXX" TYPE="ext4" 
/dev/sdb1: LABEL="p" UUID="XXXX-XXXX" TYPE="vfat"

    get your device path and fire mount command for usb-stick.

    • 14

  3. Device names of flash drives

    A flash drive can be connected

    • via USB (typically a USB stick or a memory card via a USB adapter)

    • the device name is the same as for SATA drives, /dev/sdx

    • and partitions are named /dev/sdxn

    where x is the device letter and n the partition number, for example /dev/sda1

    • via PCI (typically a memory card in a built-in slot in a laptop)

    • the device name is /dev/mmcblkm

    • and partitions are named /dev/mmcblkmpn

    where m is the device number and n the partition number, for example /dev/mmcblk0p1

    Example with an SSD, HDD, USB pendrive and an SD card

    lsblk

    $ sudo lsblk -o model,name,fstype,size,label,mountpoint
MODEL            NAME        FSTYPE    SIZE LABEL              MOUNTPOINT
Samsung SSD 850  sda                 232,9G                    
                 ├─sda1      vfat      300M EFI                /boot/efi
                 ├─sda2                  1M                    
                 ├─sda3      ext4      100G root               
                 └─sda4      swap        5G                    [SWAP]
00BEKT-00PVMT0   sdb                 298,1G                    
                 ├─sdb1      vfat      480M                    
                 ├─sdb2      ext4       80G lubuntu-xenial64   /media/tester/lubuntu-xenial64
                 ├─sdb3      swap      3,9G                    [SWAP]
                 ├─sdb4      ext4      100G ubuntu-artful64x   /
                 └─sdb5      ext4    113,7G ubuntu-artful64w   /media/tester/ubuntu-artful64w
Extreme          sdc                  14,6G                    
                 ├─sdc1      ntfs      6,7G usbdata            /media/tester/usbdata1
                 ├─sdc2                  1M                    
                 ├─sdc3      vfat      244M usbboot            
                 ├─sdc4      iso9660   948M Lubuntu 17.10 i386 /media/tester/Lubuntu 17.10 i386
                 └─sdc5      ext4      6,7G casper-rw          /media/tester/casper-rw
                 mmcblk0               3,7G                    
                 ├─mmcblk0p1 ntfs      661M usbdata            /media/tester/usbdata
                 ├─mmcblk0p2             1K                    
                 ├─mmcblk0p3 vfat      122M usbboot            /media/tester/usbboot
                 ├─mmcblk0p4 iso9660   355M 9w-dus             /media/tester/9w-dus
                 └─mmcblk0p5 ext4      2,6G persistence        /media/tester/persistence

    Edit for lsblk list: With modern versions of Ubuntu you need not use sudo, and when there are (many) snaps, and we don't want them to clutter the list, you the following command line,

    lsblk -o model,name,fstype,size,label,mountpoint | grep -v " loop.*snap"

    parted

    $ sudo parted -ls
[sudo] password for tester: 
Model: ATA Samsung SSD 850 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 250GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End    Size    File system     Name  Flags
 1      1049kB  316MB  315MB   fat32                 boot, esp
 2      316MB   317MB  1049kB
 3      317MB   108GB  107GB   ext4            root
 4      244GB   249GB  5369MB  linux-swap(v1)


Model: WDC WD32 00BEKT-00PVMT0 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 320GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    File system     Name                  Flags
 1      33,6MB  537MB   503MB   fat32           EFI System Partition  boot, esp
 2      537MB   86,4GB  85,9GB  ext4
 4      86,4GB  194GB   107GB   ext4
 5      194GB   316GB   122GB   ext4
 3      316GB   320GB   4161MB  linux-swap(v1)


Model: SanDisk Extreme (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdc: 15,7GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    File system  Name     Flags
 2      1049kB  2097kB  1049kB               primary  bios_grub
 3      2097kB  258MB   256MB   fat32        primary  boot, esp
 4      258MB   1252MB  994MB                primary
 5      1252MB  8473MB  7221MB  ext2         primary
 1      8473MB  15,7GB  7221MB  ntfs         primary  msftdata


Model: SD SD04G (sd/mmc)
Disk /dev/mmcblk0: 3965MB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    Type      File system  Flags
 3      2097kB  130MB   128MB   primary   fat32        boot
 4      130MB   502MB   372MB   primary
 2      502MB   3272MB  2769MB  extended               lba
 5      503MB   3272MB  2768MB  logical   ext2
 1      3272MB  3965MB  693MB   primary   ntfs
    • 6

  4. Check how many USB ports available in your machine so that we can connect USB devices to these ports.

    find /dev/bus/

    Source

    • 2

  5. What worked for me -

    I have connected my Android device via USB.

    To find mount point -

    1) Go to Files - files application using GUI(attached image)

    2) Right click on Disk whether it is USB or Phone Disk -

    3) Click on Open in Terminal.

    In my case, it was mounted under /run/user, and when doing lsblk no disk was added, because it was adding in the tmpfs filesystem

    You can also check using df -h where tmpfs filesystem is mounted.

    • 0

  6. Easiest way to get the path of the mounted USB is open Files, right-click on the USB in the sidebar and click properties. Concatentate the parent folder entry with the name of the USB (look at topbar for name). for example: /home/user/1234-ABCD.

    • 0