/dev/fd0 is not a valid block device

[Jeff Vian]

James Kosin wrote:

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> Rick Stevens wrote:
> <<-- snip -->>
>
> If you use fdformat to format the floppy in Linux, you still need to use
> mkfs to build a file system on the floppy.  Otherwise, you will still
> get this error, even after the format.
>
> /dev/fd0 is only permitted if fdformat knows the format already or can
> find it out from the floppy.
>
> You can use mount /mnt/floppy to try again.  Or better still, get a disk
> you know is good... and try mounting that.
>
If you use "/sbin/mkdosfs /dev/fd0" it will format the floppy as a dos 
filesystem and check the lowlevel format at the same time. Use of 
"/bin/fdformat" does the lowlevel format only and from the man page it 
does require the use of "/dev/fd0H1440" or equivalent in order to know 
how to do that format.

However, if that disk has been used for some things (like making a linux 
boot disk) it cannot be reformatted using mkdosfs and would have to be 
reformatted with fdformat first.

Bottom line -  to do the low level format use fdformat,   -- to make the 
usable format use mkdosfs.