How do I get my USB back to its original settings after using as a live usb?

Question

For your information, I'm using windows 10.The problems started after I used DD method with rufus to create a live Fedora usb. I'm not able to format it or create a drive letter or anything using windows partition manager. After that, trying to CLEAN the disk with diskpart only gives me access denied even in admin mode. Using a third-party software allows me to wipe the disk(which seemingly does nothing) & assign a drive letter which made it work, sort of, I'm able to create and store files in it but when I tried to use it as a live usb again it would tell me access denied,give me error etc.The interesting part is whereas before it was just an empty active FAT32 partition, after trying to burn the usb again, the fedora installer anaconda popped up. https://i.sstatic.net/A4uMk.png How do I remove this hidden anaconda partition which has caused me so much pain and restore my usb drive back to normal conditions?

Answer 1

Rufus has a FAQ entry for that very question.

You just need to select "Non bootable" in the "Boot selection" dropdown, choose the file system you want, and you'll get your drive reverted back to its original settings, i.e. regular non-bootable media storage using the full capacity of your drive and that Windows can copy data to.

Please bear in mind that an application that has the means to alter things one way usually also has the means to revert them back.

Answer 2

Delete the whole partition so that whole pendrive is unallocated. Now make a new partition with maximum size. I think this should work.

Answer 3

I had this problem multiple times and I solved it by removing all partitions and created new one in Linux (I'm using Disks utility for it, but you can use any you like), but I guess that you don't have access to one. You can install one (or use live) into VirtualBox and do it there.

Clearly Windows solution could be running the app (Rufus or Disk management) as Administrator but I'm not sure if it helps (I haven't tested it yet).

Answer 4

How do I ... restore my usb drive back to normal conditions?

Windows tends to treat a USB flash drive just like a floppy disk, that is without partitions. The entire medium is not partitioned, and treated as one logical drive or volume.

Use the Linux dd command to remove any existing partition table:

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdx count=16

where x is the drive letter for the USB flash drive (which is very likely not 'a').

Then insert the flash drive in a Windows PC, and let Windows perform a quick format.