[Solved] iPod Help or How To Determine Filesystem Type

bjackman · 2012-02-12 19:39:12

Yesterday I was trying to mount my ancient iPod Mini (replace the battery; extend lifespan by 5 years). My problem was that I couldn't discover what filesystem type it used. Google was telling me it was most likely FAT32, but "mount -t vfat" produced the "wrong fs type.." error. The same for hfsplus (apparently some old iPods are HFS+). I even tried nfts-3g. mount wouldn't automatically detect the filesystem if I just left out the "-t" argument.

Well, today I happened to run PCManFM as root and I found that it automatically mounted the iPod for me in /media/<the ipod's "name">. "stat -f /media/theipod" said, amongst other things, "Type: msdos". I later tried mounting with "mount -t msdos .." but that threw the same old error.

So what does PCManFM know that I don't? How can I look at /dev/sda1 and find out the filesystem type of the device it points to? Is there a way to find the name of that filesystem's implementation for Linux (e.g. you use ntfs-3g for an NTFS device)?

edit: for clarity, I'm not using LXDE, I'm using i3, the WM, but I installed PCManFM because I like having a file browser. That's why it didn't auto-mount until I happened to run PCManFM as root (I'm guessing LXDE has a clever system whereby PCManFM has privileges to mount devices).

Last edited by bjackman (2012-02-21 19:40:06)

Anders H · 2012-02-13 09:15:04

When PCManFM starts up and finds the device try this in the command line -

 sudo fdisk -l

and see if the iPod is listed.

That will list all of the disks on your system. Should work even without PCManFM finding the iPod. The file type should come up with that command.

bjackman · 2012-02-14 20:47:20

Anders H wrote:

When PCManFM starts up and finds the device try this in the command line -
 sudo fdisk -l 
and see if the iPod is listed.
That will list all of the disks on your system. Should work even without PCManFM finding the iPod. The file type should come up with that command.

Ah, thanks, that's exactly what I was looking for.

Weirdly, it _is_ FAT32 and mounted fine with vfat. It's quite possible I was trying before to mount /dev/sdd rather than /dev/sdd2. I'm not quite sure.

Anders H · 2012-02-14 21:25:08

Glad that helped.

Please edit the first post and mark as solved. This will help others later.

Arch Linux

#1 2012-02-12 19:39:12

[Solved] iPod Help or How To Determine Filesystem Type

#2 2012-02-13 09:15:04

Re: [Solved] iPod Help or How To Determine Filesystem Type

#3 2012-02-14 20:47:20

Re: [Solved] iPod Help or How To Determine Filesystem Type

#4 2012-02-14 21:25:08

Re: [Solved] iPod Help or How To Determine Filesystem Type

Board footer