Jim - Thank you! That is exactly what I needed. I had to make one change though since I use rsync to copy the data to the USB drive: I could not use vfat. Instead, I used ext3. With vfat, I got errors when it tried to do a chmod (expected). I do have another fs question though. A couple of weeks ago I noticed that the USB icon was not on my desktop when I turned the drive on. Not knowing any better, I ran my rsync with the following: /usr/bin/rsync -av --exclude=".*" -e ssh /home/ /media/usbdisk/ And it went ahead and did it's thing *but* the drive was inoperable...dead. Where did the data go? And I noticed with the new drive, if I turn it off, rsync puts the data somewhere with /usr/bin/rsync -av --exclude=".*" -e ssh /home/ /media/usbdisk1/ I need a FS 101 course!! Todd Jim Perrin wrote: > On 5/24/07, Todd Cary <todd at aristesoftware.com> wrote: >> I have a USB drive that has been formatted as NTFS. Can I reformat it? >> I have identified these properties about it >> >> /dev/sda1 >> /media/Extrnl_Bkup >> >> Not sure what to do next since the GUI will not mount a NTFS disk >> (expected). > > There are kernel ntfs modules, but really, the most universally > supported option is to format with vfat. This way it will work on > windows, mac and linux systems, fully supported all the way around. > There are some limitations to fat32, 4G file sizes and the like. > > The quick and easy way is mkfs.vfat /dev/sda1....tap fingers for a > minute... then unplug/reinsert. > > -- Ariste Software 2200 D Street Ext Petaluma, CA 94952 (707) 773-4523