On 07/08/2011 06:04 AM, listreader wrote:
On Wed, 2011-07-06 at 21:18 -0400, listreader wrote:
openSUSE 11.4 / kernel 2.6.37.6-0.5-desktop / Gnome 2.32.1
I have been using SDHC flash cards for data backups, reformatting them as ext4 with LUX encryption. This has worked very nicely with a mixture of cards from various manufacturers, but now I've come across a problem one. The card is a SanDisk 16gb SDHC 'standard version' (their words) that refuses to format as anything other than FAT. It seemed to format OK, but when mounting it fails (with the all too familiar log message of 'JBD: no valid journal superblock found' and 'EXT4-fs (dm-1): error loading journal').
I'm going to answer and close my own question here. I got an extremely quick response from the manufacturer's (SanDisk) Technical Support who says....
"I understand that you are trying to format the card with an ext 4 file system and LUX encryption. i would like to inform you that SanDisk SDHC cards can only be formatted in FAT file system."
So there you have it. Exactly 'why' this is true I don't know for sure but anyone intending to reformat a SDHC card to something other than FAT should obviously buy another brand rather than SanDisk.
It's instructive to view the partitioning structure of any SanDisk memory stick; I used DFSee, but I'm sure there are others for the same purpose. There are two partitions on SanDisk devices, the larger of which is the one you can use. I think its virtually certain that it can be formatted with anything you like The other contains their execrable "U3 Feature", which is useful (and a great money maker for them) only for users of Windows. It is possible that the "problem" seen by their support people is that, since you are "obviously" going to use the stick with Windows, you will be unable to use the applications on the U3 partition unless you use a FAT filing system on the larger partition. Since the "support" person thinks everybody will enjoy the U3 thing with his Windows Machine (is there any other kind?), he doesn't need to explain this. The MBR of the stick is non-standard. Don't be tempted to remove the smaller partition, because you will simply lose that space; If you try to replace the MBR with a standard one, you will decrease the size of the large partition by the size of the useless smaller one. If you repeat this operation several times, you will decrease the larger partition by the same increment each time. There is no way around this, and you have to just accept the presence of the junk partition. Forgetting about SanDisk and buying something else is good advice. -- Stan Goodman Qiryat Tiv'on Israel -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org