How to Format Your USB Storage

Today, I'll compare the storage formating via Microsoft Windows with storage formating via Ubuntu Linux. It's very different.
On Windows, we have served all every think instantly by Microsoft. Just open Windows Explorer, click right, adjust, and finish. This condition is very different with Ubuntu Linux. This is my first time, I format my own USB Flash storage.
The step:

1. First, plug the flash drive to the USB port.


2. Second, open Terminal, and up to super user
   Type this:

   sudo -s



3. Then, check your flash drive location.
   Type this:

   tail -f /var/log/messages

   
   After you push the enter button, there're many information about your kernel and computer's activities. From there, we can find our flash drive information

   root@phoenix:~# tail -f /var/log/messages
   Jan 3 21:54:46 phoenix kernel: [ 959.199955] scsi7 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
   Jan 3 21:54:51 phoenix kernel: [ 964.200895] scsi 7:0:0:0: Direct-Access 0.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2
   Jan 3 21:54:51 phoenix kernel: [ 964.202867] sd 7:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0
   Jan 3 21:54:51 phoenix kernel: [ 964.203765] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] 1974272 512-byte logical blocks: (1.01 GB/964 MiB)
   Jan 3 21:54:51 phoenix kernel: [ 964.204514] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
   Jan 3 21:54:52 phoenix kernel: [ 964.209024] sdb: sdb1
   Jan 3 21:54:52 phoenix kernel: [ 964.402148] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
   Jan 3 21:56:16 phoenix kernel: [ 1048.593285] r8169: eth0: link up
   Jan 3 21:56:16 phoenix kernel: [ 1048.593329] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): eth0: link becomes ready
   Jan 3 21:56:25 phoenix kernel: [ 1057.749230] lo: Disabled Privacy Extensions
   

   
   The letter with bold effect is your flash info. In my computer the location is in sdb1, maybe it may different in your computer.


4. Next, we must try to format.
   type this:

   mkfs.vfat -F32 -n storagename -I /dev/sdb1

   
   F32 is the type of your memory format. In this case, there are two difference type of memory format. They are FAT32 and FAT16. FAT32 is used for the disk (not only your flash) with the memory over 256 MB. FAT16 is used for the disk with the memory less than 256 MB.


5. If you find this after you execute the command:
   

   mkfs.vfat 3.0.7 (24 Dec 2009)
   mkfs.vfat: /dev/sdb1 contains a mounted file system

   
   Oh...., don't panic. We must unmount that file.
   

   umount /dev/sdb1

   
   Repeat the forth step.

Good Luck! ;)