USB booting :: Can't kill Win partition on Kingston USB U3



I recently got a Kingston DataTraveler U3.

I really want to get rid of the first partition that has the following files:
% ls -l /Volumes/KINGSTON\ U3/
total 7658
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  2999761 Feb 28  2006 LaunchPad.zip
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   921600 Feb 13  2006 LaunchU3.exe
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel      145 Feb 13  2006 autorun.inf

I have tried every suggestion that I could find from the DSL Board.  I have installed various versions of DSL and DSL-N, I have used sfdisk to format, I have tried to change the partitions etc.  I don't have a Windows PC.  Only a PC with Vector and a bunch of Macs.  The Mac Diskutilities will not wipe the USB U3 key either.

I am able to change the rest of the drive, just not the U3 part with these three files.

I've tried to use chmod, chown, chgrp to unlock or take over the files but this hasn't worked either.  

I'm stumped.  (perhaps not hard for a newbie ...)

Any suggestions as to how to wipe this Win part of the USB key would be appreciated.

thanks
Quote (Nuke @ Nov. 12 2006,20:35)
I recently got a Kingston DataTraveler U3.

I really want to get rid of the first partition that has the following files:
% ls -l /Volumes/KINGSTON\ U3/
total 7658
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  2999761 Feb 28  2006 LaunchPad.zip
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   921600 Feb 13  2006 LaunchU3.exe
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel      145 Feb 13  2006 autorun.inf

Hi, I'm still exploring U3 myself. I have a SanDisk U3 micro but so far I have not been able to even mount or even see the first (partition) under Linux. This makes me think it may not even be a partition. My understanding on U3 is it uses different hardware then standard USB drives. Perhaps it is burned into the chip and can not be changed.

So you have no use at all for U3? No access to a Win XP or 2000 box?

In my opinion U3 is one of the neatest things since sliced bread, there are some very nice portable programs available for U3 and more on the way.

I have my U3 setup with portable U3 programs, non U3 portable programs and Embedded DSL that I can run inside Win 2000 using QEMU. The one XP box I have access to won't run DSL but I'm still working on that.

Just yesterday I booted DSL from a CD and could mount the U3 flashdrive. This may be the best way to go on the U3 stick. Boot off of the CD then save to the stick. This gives me four ways to use the U3 stick, one is for running U3 programs, the second is for running non U3 portable programs, the third way is to run DSL within Windows and the forth is to use the stck to save data. Makes a great way to show friends some of the things the little flashdrive can do.

Here is what the first directory looks like on the U3 SanDisk 1GB.

dc@linux-xiwa:/media> cd usbdisk
dc@linux-xiwa:/media/usbdisk> ls -l
total 2992
drwxr-xr-x 5 dc root  16384 2006-10-28 16:05 7-ZipPortable
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root    110 2006-05-27 18:17 boot.msg
drwxr-xr-x 8 dc root  16384 2006-11-12 23:51 Documents
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root    226 2006-05-27 18:17 dsl-linux.sh
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root    364 2006-05-27 18:17 dsl-windows.bat
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root   1592 2006-05-27 18:17 f2
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root   1595 2006-05-27 18:17 f3
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root    256 2006-05-27 18:17 german.kbd
drwxr-xr-x 5 dc root  16384 2006-11-03 06:38 GIMPPortable
drwxr-xr-x 2 dc root  16384 2006-05-27 18:17 knoppix
-r-xr-xr-x 1 dc root 950272 2006-04-18 16:33 LaunchU3.exe
-r-xr-xr-x 1 dc root 994807 2006-05-27 18:17 linux24
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root  36649 2006-05-27 18:17 logo.16
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root 801359 2006-05-27 18:17 minirt24.gz
drwxr-xr-x 5 dc root  16384 2006-11-03 06:35 NVUPortable
drwxr-xr-x 3 dc root  16384 2006-05-27 18:17 qemu
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root    468 2006-05-27 18:17 qemu-linux-notes.txt
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root   1965 2006-05-27 18:17 readme.txt
-rwxr-xr-x 1 dc root   2075 2006-05-27 18:17 syslinux.cfg
drwxr-xr-x 3 dc root  16384 2006-05-24 13:43 System

Note - the U3 programs are in the System directory.

Here is the disk usage.

dc@linux-xiwa:~> df -h
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
---cut---
/dev/sda1             974M  290M  684M  30% /media/usbdisk

Even with all the U3 stuff on the stick I still have lots of room left over.

Later, DC
Yesterday after making the post, I remembered that I have Virtual PC on one of our Macs.

I also found an uninstall program at U3.com.  If I remember correctly it was at http://u3.com/uninstall.  On this site, it indicates that the U3 doesn't work for Macs or Linux systems.

Virtual PC was able to mount the USB drive and run the uninstall program.  

So now I have a clean usb flashdrive! :-)

I am surprised that there wasn't a way to clean up the U3 CD disk partition using Linux tools.

If you happen to find a way to do it, please let me know.

Thanks for your help.

original here.