Sandisk Cruzer U3 Flash Drive, !!! Options

[Ed_P]

Anyone seen one of these things?? It has 2 partitions, both of which are accessible by XP! The 1st partition is formated as CDFS!!

Can we put BartPE on the 2nd partition and boot it on one of these drives?

Can we add CDFS partitions to other flash drives?

Where the heck are U3 apps stored on these thing?

Seems like an interesting concept and might offer some interesting senarios for BartPE.

[diddy]

I've never seen one of these drives but seem to remember from past research that the CDFS partition is there to trick XP into thinking that the drive is CD - enabling autorun.inf to start the U3 apps. I also seem to remember that the apps are not stored on the CDFS partition. A word of caution - not sure if the CDFS partition can be restored if deleted.

Would love to get hold of a U3 drive to play around with - unfortunately Santa forgot to bring one. B@!*ard also forgot my laptop.

[SteelTrepid]

@diddy- were you good this year? I'm thinking santa didn't bring anything to you because of that?? Remember, he knows everything you do!! That's why I didn't get anything this year, making seigfried cry a few months ago=no presents for me!!!!

[Former_LittlBUGer_post]

@diddy- were you good this year? I'm thinking santa didn't bring anything to you because of that?? Remember, he knows everything you do!! That's why I didn't get anything this year, making seigfried cry a few months ago=no presents for me!!!!

Oh jeez...

[ewieldra]

pffff.. ED_P..

Where were you last year.. the cdfs partition is used for autorun the U3 launchpad
the applications are stored on the usb part of the stick .. in a hidden folder called system

U3 application leave settings on the usb stick .. so your applications with your settings..... without leaving them onto your computer...

for more information http://www.u3.com

[Former_hooovahh_post]

Yeah U3 looks really cool, I thought about getting one but it's hard to justify getting one. I have a 2.5 external drive 20GB and a 3.5 external drive 160GB. I just could spend more money for a drive which is only like a gig. I just use PStart, So when I plug in my drive one of the options is to run pstart so I click that and there are all my programs.

But I must admit the synchronize stuff sounds useful.

[Ed_P]

Yes, yes, I understand what the CDFS partition is for, but can we create one ourselves? We could put BartPE in it and other data on the updateable partition?

And I found the U3 programs once I changed folder options to display hidden folders. Thanks.

My Christmas wish list had been for a bigger USB stick and the one I got has the U3 system on it which is pretty clever. At this point though I can't use it for BartPE without formating it and I'm a little leery about doing that if I can't back it up so I can restore it later. U3 is an interesting concept and should be fun to experiment with. I like having Firefox on it with my own bookmarks.

[Jaque]

Hi, it is possible to create your own iso image and flash it as a CDFS partition. Tools and howto circulate on the internet (don't remember where I got it from). I succesfully flashed my own ISO image. Unfortunately I couldn't boot from the ISO image.

Now it is possible to use your own software instead of using the default U3 software. That is already great!

I created a CDFS partition containing Truecrypt and another partition as a Truecrypt protected partition.
Now I have my own Truecrypt protected flash drive.

Don't know if it is possible to boot BartPE from the flash drive.

[Ed_P]

An update on my experience with my new SanDisk Cruzer toy.

On the CDFS drive is a file named LaunchPad.zip, date October 4, 2006. Whether this is the original file or the result of my updating it when 1st playing with the device I don't know. Within this zip file exists a program named LaunchPad Removal.exe. Executing this program will remove the CDFS partition and combine it's space with the FAT partition. It has an option to retain the data on the FAT partition which basically copies it to the hd then moves it back after reformating the device.

NB Uninstall and Autorun are U3 Launchpad Settings menu tabs. Whatever complaints people had with these options or the lack thereof are not an issue with this SanDisk version of mine.

On the SanDisk website, www.sandisk.com/Retail/DriverDownloads.aspx, there exists a utility labeled U3 LaunchPad Installed, which downloads a program named LPInstalled.exe. Executing this program re-establishes the CDFS utility. No option is given for saving files on the FAT partition and I suspect if any had been there they would have been purged. The newly formed CDFS partition invokes LaunchPad but there are no default apps installed. There is an autorun iso at u3.sandisk.com/download/apps/lpinstaller/isofiles/cruzer-autorun.iso, which I found via here but I haven't played with it to see what it has yet.

All-in-all, this is a neat device so far.

[diddy]

Yes, yes, I understand what the CDFS partition is for, but can we create one ourselves? We could put BartPE in it and other data on the updateable partition?

there exists a utility labeled U3 LaunchPad Installed, which downloads a program named LPInstalled.exe. Executing this program re-establishes the CDFS utility.

As I mentioned earlier I don't have a U3 stick - I have tried adding a CDFS partition to a normal stick using the LPInstaller.exe app you mentioned earlier however this would not work with a non U3 drive. In terms of adding BartPE to the CDFS partition I'm not sure this would be possible - the information I read somewhere (god only knows where) implied that the CDFS partition somehow works as a CD Drive in Windows. The only way to use the partition to boot PE, or anything else, would be if the partition is read as a CD drive in the system BIOS - is there any chance of you checking this out.

I'm interested in whether BCDW or CDSHELL can be booted from this partition.

Where's Jaclaz - he seems to have been absent from the forum for a few days. Would be interested to know whether he has done any experiments with U3 drives.

diddy

[Nuno Brito]

Where's Jaclaz - he seems to have been absent from the forum for a few days. Would be interested to know whether he has done any experiments with U3 drives.

He'll be back after the 5th day of january:
http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...post&p=6444

In the meanwhile I remembered some feedback from Jaclaz on U3 pendisks:
http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=35

Hope this helps!

[WinSmith]

It's quite easy to "flash" the CD-ROM device of the u3 stick yourself :
Get the LP-Installer for your stick.
Create a ISO and name it (for SanDisk) "cruzer-autorun.ISO".
Place it in the same DIR as where "LPInstaller.exe" is located and double-click
"LPInstaller.exe" , wait a few seconds and that's it !
You can even do it from the stick itself .

The only "problem" is that you can not use a ISO larger than 6,291,456 bytes.
the size seems to be set by the u3-controller and there are no known tools circulating that
can re-program it .
Some OTi 2168 controllers have support for CD-ROM "partition" and there is a tool circulating for
re-programming the OTi controller .

From what I hear it should be possible to create a CD-image and use some
disk-imaging tool to transfer it to a flash-stick . Windows only supports multiple
partitions on devices that have the RMB set to "Fixed" .

This post has been edited by WinSmith: Jan 23 2007, 12:01 PM

[jaclaz]

@diddy
I have no news, besides my post on bootland Nuno Brito already pointed to:
http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=35

Ed_P might confirm if the "double device" idea I had at the time is valid or not.


@WinSmith

Windows only supports multiple partitions on devices that have the RMB set to "Fixed" .

...unless you install a filter, like the Hitachi or the dummy.sys one, though as said, I have the impression that Sandisk U3 consists of two devices, one that "introduces" itself to Windows as a CD-ROM, and another one that does the same but as floppy/hd.
I am pretty confident that a MBR can be put on the second one, so that you can have (with two partitions on the second part) a device that gets three drive letters (with filter installed).
Just like the OTi 2168 can be "set up" by its "Production Tool" as a two LUN device, of which the first (usually is read-only - but still is seen as a Mass Storage Device - with FAT filesystem) and the second can be partitioned at will.

jaclaz

This post has been edited by jaclaz: Jan 23 2007, 02:26 PM

[Ed_P]

!!!! The 2nd device can be made bootable!!! What an interesting idea. How do I make it bootable? The HP utility, PEtoUSB? hmmmmm Has to be a one time thing, U3 stores it's utilities/apps on the drive in a hidden System folder. If U3 apps have been installed, and tweaked, need to backup the folder before formating. Wow!! What a cool idea. I thought I would have to remove the CD partition to make the device bootable.

Might still need the host's basic OS's boot.ini or GRldr to boot it though I suspect. Not sure it can be done via the BIOS.

I think the CD partition can be updated with any CD pgm capable of writing an ISO to it, including Nero, but the ISO has to be less than 6MB which is unfortunate. Not sure what is driving the limitation.

How do I confirm the ""double device" idea ??

[jaclaz]

How do I confirm the ""double device" idea ??

You could try running SIV:
http://siv.mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk/
with and without the stick connected.

Though the fact that it is possible to put an MBR on the second "drive-like" device does not automatically means that the stick will boot, as I presume that the "cd-like" one will be enumerated before, if I am right, that means that most probably you'll have to put grldr as a no-emulation cd boot sector inside the roughly 6 Mb .iso.

jaclaz

[Ed_P]

Well, PowerQuest's Partition Magic doesn't see the drive but their Partition Table Editor does. And it shows a FAT16x,Bootable,973MB Drive 2.

I'm just not sure if that's the 2nd partition or the whole USB drive. When I boot the nb with the drive plugged in I get an error that the device is not bootable but it doesn't indicate whether it the CD portion of the drive or the hd portion, of which of course neither is bootable at this point. I may have to go thru boot.ini or GRldr on the primary hd to get to the hd portion of the USB drive but that can be ok.

As I noted in the U3 forum it would be great if the device could boot GRldr or QEMU and still support the U3 apps if it's plugged into a running OS. The U3 concept has potential.

[jaclaz]

@Ed_P

FYI:
http://www.hak5.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3989
http://www.hak5.org/wiki/Universal_U3_LaunchPad_Hacker
http://www.hak5.org/packages/files/Universal_Customizer.zip

N.B.: UNTESTED, NO strings, as well as NO guaarantees attached .


jaclaz



P.S.:Did you try with SIV ?

[Jaque]

Here is how I flashed my own ISO image.

Download http://u3.sandisk.com/download/apps/LPInstaller.exe

Run LPInstaller.exe

Click Next until you see the screen "Confirm Installation Options"

Now replace the file "%UserProfile%\Application Data\U3\temp\xxxx\cruzer-autorun.iso" with your own ISO.
(Type SET in a Command Prompt to find your UserProfile path, xxxx is a random path)

Click Next on the "Confirm Installation Options" screen

Press Finish

[Ed_P]

Thanks Jaque. I've used that app, it does indeed work as far as removing and restoring the Sandisk ISO but I didn't try customizing an ISO.

Here is a link that references several different ISOs that can be used: http://www.u3community.com/viewtopic.php?t=936

It would be nice if a BartPE ISO could be used but the firmware currently limits the CDFS partition to about 6MB. There is however the possibility that the FAt partition might be bootable regardless of the CDFS partition's presense. I just have not gotten around to trying it.

Update

I formated the U3's FAT partition, loaded BartPE to it and Voila!! it boots! So it is possible to have U3 and BartPE on the same stick.

However, be sure to backup the U3 folders, especially the hidden System one, before the format is performed and then restore them once BartPE is loaded.