We usually create a bootable USB using any GUI programs like Brasero, Nero, Xfburn, etc in Linux or PowerISO, UltraISO, Rufus, etc in Windows, Here I list the command for formatting and creating a bootable USB stick using the terminal, this will be useful for advanced Linux users.
2. Open the terminal. (CTRL + ALT + T)
3. Look for the USB drive you want to format, by running:
You can use either df or lsblk
The command above will display the directory path of your various drives. Take note of the drive you wish to format.
mahesh@mahesh-server:~$ df
Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on
udev 1829088 0 1829088 0% /dev
tmpfs 372824 1532 371292 1% /run
/dev/sda8 400531824 9285936 370830300 3% /
tmpfs 1864116 111024 1753092 6% /dev/shm
tmpfs 5120 0 5120 0% /run/lock
tmpfs 1864116 0 1864116 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
/dev/loop0 23040 23040 0 100% /snap/snapd/5643
/dev/loop3 45312 45312 0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1353
/dev/loop4 55936 55936 0 100% /snap/core18/1279
/dev/loop2 160512 160512 0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/110
/dev/loop1 428928 428928 0 100% /snap/libreoffice/160
/dev/sda6 2819104 96152 2560036 4% /boot
/dev/sda2 98304 30741 67563 32% /boot/efi
tmpfs 372820 8 372812 1% /run/user/1000
/dev/sda5 240821244 21773628 219047616 10% /media/mahesh/Local Dick
/dev/sdb4 29998976 2345504 27653472 8% /media/mahesh/MAHESH
3. Unmount drive using the syntax below:
sudo umount /dev/drivename
mahesh@mahesh-server:~$ sudo umount /dev/sdb4
4. Now run this command to format drive
sudo mkfs.vfat -n 'Usbname' -I /dev/drivename
mahesh@mahesh-server:~$ sudo mkfs.vfat -n 'MAHESH' -I /dev/sdb4
Understanding the above command
mkfs
mkfs is used to build a Linux filesystem on a device, usually a hard disk partition. The device argument is either the device name (e.g. /dev/hda1, /dev/sdb2), or a regular file that shall contain the filesystem. The size argument is the number of blocks to be used for the filesystem.
vfat
Formats the drive to FAT32, other formats available are mkfs.bfs, mkfs.ext2, mkfs.ext3, mkfs.ext4, mkfs.minix, mkfs.msdos, mkfs.vfat, mkfs.xfs, mkfs.xiafs etc.
-n
Volume-name sets the volume name (label) of the file system. The volume name can be up to 11 characters long. The default is no label. In this tutorial my volume-name is Ubuntu.
-I
It is typical for fixed disk devices to be partitioned so by default, you are not permitted to create a filesystem across the entire device.
Running $ df will show formatted USB without name along with other drives
You are done and your pen drive has successfully been formatted.
Now Create a Bootable USB Stick
5. Go to your directory where your iso file is downloaded
mahesh@mahesh-server:~$ cd Downloads
mahesh@mahesh-server:~/Downloads$ ls
Zorin-OS-15-Lite-64-bit.iso
mahesh@mahesh-server:~/Downloads$ sudo dd if=Zorin-OS-15-Lite-64-bit.iso of=/dev/sdb bs=4M
572+1 records in
572+1 records out
2401763328 bytes (2.4 GB, 2.2 GiB) copied, 311.976 s, 7.7 MB/s
OR
OR
mahesh@mahesh-server:~/Downloads$ sudo dd bs=4M if=Zorin-OS-15-Lite-64-bit.iso of=/dev/sdX status=progress && sync
That's all you have created USB stick using the command
