Hi list,
does someone know, why when writing an ISO-file with the tool "dd" to an USB-
stick, this stick can not be mounted writable? Tricks like "remount rw" or similar do not work?
On the other hand, when I am writing the same ISO-image to the stick by using
Unetbootin, the files on the stick are writable.
What did I miss? It looks, Unetbootin (and I believe BalenaEtcher, too) are working other than dd.
Is there an option, using dd and let the stick writable iIn case, I want to edit some files, like syslinux.cfg, grub.cfg or similar)?
Thanks for enlightening me.
Best
Hans
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The ISO-9660 file system was originally intended for CD-ROMs (note "ROM": Read^- NOT (opps!)
Only Media). It is was designed as a writable file system. I have no idea what
Unetbootin is doing, but it obviously NOT directly copying the ISO-9660 disk image to the flash drive.
There is no reason to make the ISO boot image itself writable. If you want to
create a self-contained bootable Linux system on a flash drive and use it as a
rwad/write Linux system, that is something else.
At Wed, 07 Oct 2026 14:15:15 +0200 hans.ullrich@mail.de wrote:
Hi list,
does someone know, why when writing an ISO-file with the tool "dd" to an USB-
stick, this stick can not be mounted writable? Tricks like "remount rw" or similar do not work?
On the other hand, when I am writing the same ISO-image to the stick by using
Unetbootin, the files on the stick are writable.
What did I miss? It looks, Unetbootin (and I believe BalenaEtcher, too) are working other than dd.
Is there an option, using dd and let the stick writable iIn case, I want to edit some files, like syslinux.cfg, grub.cfg or similar)?
Thanks for enlightening me.
Best
Hans
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Deepwoods Software -- Custom Software Services http://www.deepsoft.com/ -- Linux Administration Services heller@deepsoft.com -- Webhosting Services
On 2026-10-07, Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> wrote:
The ISO-9660 file system was originally intended for CD-ROMs (note "ROM": Read
Only Media). It is was designed as a writable file system. I have no idea what
Unetbootin is doing, but it obviously NOT directly copying the ISO-9660 disk
image to the flash drive.
There is no reason to make the ISO boot image itself writable. If you want to
create a self-contained bootable Linux system on a flash drive and use it as a
rwad/write Linux system, that is something else.
Aren't there bootable ISOs that have a writable part (certain "live" systems)? Maybe they're not ISO-9660.
On 2026-10-07, nwe <nwe@gitcoding.net> wrote:
One of my 32GB USB sticks here I dd copied an ISO-9660 to it then
formatted the remaining space as an additional partition with
FAT32. It is not very user friendly, most file browsers do not
even list that second partition for me until I mount it manually
at the terminal.</p>
What's confusing to me is when you write the ISO to the thumb drive it
uses the entire space, though the drive might have a larger capacity
than the ISO itself. So where is the latter written: At the beginning, the end,
in the middle, or all over the place? Could you have a partition at the
"end" of the drive and use some tool to write the ISO at the "beginning"
so that the end partition is preserved? I've never heard of that being
done; it's always the inverse case, like your own. ISO first, then data partition (I think the term they used to use was "persistence").
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