How to Verify the Capacity of a Flash Drive in Linux

You can determine the total capacity of a flash drive on Linux.

The Linux operating system includes utilities that can interrogate, and report on, the hardware characteristics of storage devices. The utilities can access this information regardless of whether the device in question contains data, or is even formatted to accept data. In particular, you can find out the capacity of a flash drive by using those utilities on your Linux computer.

Instructions

1. Connect the flash drive to the computer. Most flash drives use a Universal Serial Bus (USB) connection; if that is the case, plug the drive's connector into an open USB port on the computer.

2. Log in to the computer as your regular user. Launch a command shell, either by logging in in text mode, or by clicking on the "Terminal" icon to launch a terminal window from the graphical user interface.

3. Connect the flash drive to the computer. Most flash drives use a Universal Serial Bus (USB) connection; if that is the case, plug the drive's connector into an open USB port on the computer.

4. Get superuser ("root") access on the command shell. The specific way of performing this step depends on your Linux distribution. For example, for Ubuntu Linux, type the following command into the shell:

   sudo -i

   Press "Enter," enter your password, then press "Enter" again.

5. Invoke the "parted" utility to list some hardware characteristics of your flash drive, by typing the following command into the shell:

   parted /dev/sdc print

   Replace "/dev/sdc" with the name of the flash drive on your Linux system. Press "Enter." Among other pieces of information in the command's output, the total capacity of the flash drive will be listed under the "Disk" heading.

References

• Gnu.org: GNU Parted Manual