Solved manufacturer demands use of USB Stick Low Level format tool

PMc

PMc

Folks,
from my knowledge, normal USB sticks do not have any low-Level functions - there is no S.M.A.R.T. data and neither SCSI low-level format.

But the manufacturer's technical support says differently: they say one must first buy the "Windows" operating system, in order to then be able to repair broken USB sticks by "low level formatting". This needs to be done with the following tool: https://hddguru.com/software/HDD-LLF-Low-Level-Format-Tool
 
Last edited:
You can "repair" many malfunctioning USB sticks by writing a new file system unto them. Sometimes I even dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/daN to clean up and see if it gives errors. I suppose this low level format tool does something similar. Can't be much more than that.
 
This tool sounds just like a windows alternative to dd. Remember, poor windows do not have such simple tools by default.

Some days ago I want do delete a file on windows (@work). Can't, because of used by another process. But which process has opened this file? I had no clue. So: commandline... lsof ... oh damn, that's windows. Googled for a windows alternative. There was no solution for this issue. Again, poor windows.
 
Off-topic but
Ordoban said:
There was no solution for this issue.
Click to expand...
Of course there is, https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorer

PMc said:
in order to then be able to repair broken USB sticks by "low level formatting".
Click to expand...
It's probably a different process as you can't even low level format disks, let alone flash memory. They probably call it "low level format" to sound more "technical" as some people may have heard that term before.

Disk formatting - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
While it is generally impossible to perform a complete LLF on most modern hard drives (since the mid-1990s) outside the factory,[16] the term "low-level format" is still used for what could be called the reinitialization of a hard drive to its factory configuration (and even these terms may be misunderstood).

The present ambiguity in the term low-level format seems to be due to both inconsistent documentation on web sites and the belief by many users that any process below a high-level (file system) format must be called a low-level format.
Click to expand...
 
Tieks said:
You can "repair" many malfunctioning USB sticks by writing a new file system unto them. Sometimes I even dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/daN to clean up and see if it gives errors. I suppose this low level format tool does something similar. Can't be much more than that.
Click to expand...
Well, with this specific device I never got as far as to write any filesystem onto it, because already when reading the raw device with dd, it always fails after a few hundred MB and disconnects from USB .
So the only possible use was the raw device as a tape-style device for rather small archives.

Two days ago I tried and ran a loop that would write a 512 byte block onto a random place on the device every couple of seconds. It usually took 5-10 seconds to write such a single block, and after an hour the device switched itself to read-only and now shows this:

Code: 
disp kernel: da2: 40.000MB/s transfers
disp kernel: da2: 29568MB (60555264 512 byte sectors)
disp kernel: da2: quirks=0x2<NO_6_BYTE>
disp kernel: da2: Write Protected

Now there is a warranty on it, so I thought I might talk to the manufacturer - with the described outcome.
 
PMc said:
Well, with this specific device I never got as far as to write any filesystem onto it, because already when reading the raw device with dd, it always fails after a few hundred MB and disconnects from USB .
Click to expand...
Chuck it in the bin.
PMc said:
Now there is a warranty on it, so I thought I might talk to the manufacturer - with the described outcome.
Click to expand...
It's clearly broken. No amount of "low level formatting" is going to fix these issues.
 
If your flash drive switches to read-only then likely memory chip is failed. Sometimes it is possible to get it work, but it takes a lot of time.

For most of USB-sticks is possible to find some chinesse software for interaction with USB-flash chips.
Usually, general USB-flash has 1 chip like "controller" and few flash-memory chips.
You should disassemble flash-drive and read marks on these chips.
Another way is predict the controller model by USB Vendor-ID&Device-ID.
After that you can try to find some software for drive's controller. Usually that software looks like used for production on factories.

Usually, you can do low level format, add virtual CD-ROM partition, reduce the flash size, change the device identification string, etc.
I knew a man who repaired flash-drives in this way.

Look at this site for low-level-formatting software (site in russian, please use googletranslate or try to find english one):

iFlash - page #1 — FlashBoot.ru

Утилиты для флэшек. Программы восстановления данных, создания загрузочных USB Flash Drive.
flashboot.ru flashboot.ru

FlashBoot.ru

Утилиты для флэшек. Программы восстановления данных, создания загрузочных USB Flash Drive.
flashboot.ru flashboot.ru
 
im said:
Usually, you can do low level format, add virtual CD-ROM partition, reduce the flash size, change the device identification string, etc.
I knew a man who repaired flash-drives in this way.
Click to expand...
That's also what they do with those impossibly cheap large USB sticks for $2 you find on Wish and Alibaba. They just reprogram the controller to show a lot more "space" than the stick actually has.
im said:
Usually, you can do low level format,
Click to expand...
They might call it a "low level format" but it's not a real low level format. You're changing the firmware of the controller chip, that has nothing to do with a low level format.
 
I don't use any of my new USB sticks before I prep them:
Code: 
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/da0 bs=2m count=1
fdisk -BI /dev/da0
newfs_msdos /dev/da0s1
 
Something like that happened to my 32GB usb from Transcend, it was being misidentified by Windows, they have a software "Jetflash Online Recovery" I think its just a tool that reflashes firmware inside the device.

I think other brands like SanDisk have similar tools but if the drive is generic you would need a program like the ones im suggests
 
The issue has now nicely resolved: the manufacturer did not insist in leading that discussion a lot further. Instead I found this in my mail today:
retrieve.jpeg

Realworld sustained throughput (r+w combined):
Code: 
# dd if=/mnt/USB-02 of=/mnt/USB-03 bs=1m
4095+0 records in
4095+0 records out
4293918720 bytes transferred in 448.793584 secs (9567692 bytes/sec)
 
I've found that to be the case with many of the really cheap electronics you find on say, Amazon. For example, a USB to Ethernet cable didn't work. I wrote the vendor and they said don't bother returning it, we'll send a new one.
I guess that they expect a certain percentage to be bad.
But it's sounding as if you're not being expected to return the Kingston one either, which is sort of a name brand. That's pretty good.
 
scottro said:
I've found that to be the case with many of the really cheap electronics you find on say, Amazon. For example, a USB to Ethernet cable didn't work. I wrote the vendor and they said don't bother returning it, we'll send a new one.
I guess that they expect a certain percentage to be bad.
Click to expand...
Yes, it's a position in the calculation. You could even buy and sell warranty, like any insurance. A common figure is 3% of the net value. When you buy from China (or have something produced there), you will not bother to send the broken items back - instead, the 3% go off the bill rightaway, and then you are responsible to compensate your customers for defects.
scottro said:
But it's sounding as if you're not being expected to return the Kingston one either, which is sort of a name brand. That's pretty good.
Click to expand...
Yes, the old one is also on the pic. I didn't expect that. The fine print says, warranty yes, but send back on your own expenses. But it also says, free support included, so I thought I could just ask them what to do. (Obviousely they wanted proof of ownership etc., and on that bill was more Kingston stuff... so maybe I'm trustworthy ;) ). Then also, they certainly know the failure rates respective to their serials.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top