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I need to low-level format floppies with an external usb floppy drive in ubuntu 10.04 (or later) server.

I have tried the tools that come with util-linux-ng, and contain (specifically) fdformat.

Unfortunately these tools are written to use /dev/fd* devices, and not /dev/sd* that is used with the usb floppy drives I have on hand.

Alternatives to using the tools would be appreciated (note, the computers I have at my disposal do not have floppy connectors on the main board, so please don't recommend using a "real" floppy drive).

for example, I know dd works to zero the drive, but I suspect I need a copy of a working, blank formatted floppy as the if= parameter. I have my doubts this would be a robust, ongoing solution for actually writing out the tracks on the floppy.

the answers are not at: How can I get a USB floppy drive to work? How to format a USB or external drive? ...and lots of others

Community
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derekshaw
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    Have you tried 'gparted'? – Marc Aug 29 '13 at 00:42
  • just try: 1. unmounting the floppy (umount /dev/fd) and 2. overwriting the floppy (sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/fd). if you are not sure what "fd*" you are targeting, try lsblk and locate the one of 1.44 or 2.88 MB – Yoran Jansen Nov 19 '17 at 19:04

3 Answers3

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The fdutils web site refers to http://www.geocities.jp/tedi_world/format_usbfdd_e.html for usb floppy drives.

psusi
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Try mtools. apt-get install mtools

Edit the /etc/mtools.conf file to have one of the drive letters point at your usb floppy drive. For me the usb floppy was /dev/sdg (Use dmesg to determine this.)

# # Linux floppy drives
#drive a: file="/dev/fd0" exclusive
drive a: file="/dev/sdg" exclusive

Then mformat a:

mformat a:

Steve Queen
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  • worked perfectly with xubuntu 16.04. Will have to verify at the client that actually needs it, using older ubuntu versions. Also appears to automatically format it with fat12 filesystem – derekshaw May 17 '17 at 23:27
  • It did not work on an Ubuntu 18.04 ... ufiformat did the trick ... see below... – ciampix Aug 25 '19 at 17:08
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Have you tried gparted as the root (sudo) user? I use this tool daily for all kinds of drives yet I a floppy - I have not.

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install gparted
sudo gparted

Look to the top right to find your drive. If Linux can mount it - Gparted should be able to format it!

Tim
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TJ_IN_AK
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    gparted is for partitioning hard disks, not low level formatting floppies ( which are not partitioned ). – psusi Aug 29 '13 at 02:04