Quick Start for Adding a USB drive

This page describes how to add a USB drive to your OpenWrt device. This is commonly used to add more storage or share files on your network.

• USB drive (HDD, SSD, Flash, etc.) of any capacity.
• OpenWrt device with at least 8 MB free.
• Computer on the same network for LuCI/SSH.
• This procedure includes erasing the USB drive. Skip those steps to retain data and mount a preformatted drive.

USB drives can be installed using either LuCI or the command line as described below.

1. On the Software page, click update, then install the packages. The instructions below use ext4 filesystem, however you can replace the final package with any of these: kmod-fs-ext4, kmod-fs-exfat, kmod-fs-ntfs3, etc.

  block-mount e2fsprogs kmod-usb-storage-uas kmod-usb3 luci-app-hd-idle kmod-fs-ext4

2. Plug in your USB drive, it will be detected automatically as /dev/sdXX depending on the drive and partitions.

3. Go to the System → Mount Points page, click on the drive to mount, click Save & Apply.

4. Go to the Services → HDD Idle page, enable to idle the drive to save power and lifespan, click Save & Apply.

Done! The drive is ready to read/write data.

1. Use a computer to format your USB drive using the default options. This prepares the drive for the process below, which will erase those settings. Warning: This initial formatting will erase the entire USB drive.

2. SSH into your device to enter the following steps. More... The SSH Access for Newcomers page tells how to install and use a terminal emulator on your computer.

3. Install the required packages. Below uses ext4 filesystem, you can use any you prefer: kmod-fs-ext4, kmod-fs-exfat, kmod-fs-ntfs3, etc). More... You may see error messages about installing kmod-usb3 on certain routers. These can be ignored if the hardware does not support USB3.

opkg update && opkg install block-mount e2fsprogs kmod-usb-storage-uas kmod-usb3 kmod-fs-ext4

4. Enter ls -al /dev/sd* to show all attached USB devices. The list may be empty if there are no USB devices. More... /dev/sda is the first USB device; /dev/sdb is the second, and so on. /dev/sda1 is the first partition on the first device; /dev/sda2 is the second partition, etc.

5. Plug the USB drive into your router. Enter ls -al /dev/sd* again, now you should see a new /dev/sdXX device. sdXX is the device name of your new USB device. More... If you do not see /dev/sda AND /dev/sda1 listed, format the USB device on your computer beforehand.

    root@OpenWrt:~# ls -al /dev/sd*
    brw-------    1 root     root        8,   0 Feb  4 15:13 /dev/sda
    brw-------    1 root     root        8,   1 Feb  4 14:06 /dev/sda1

6. Make an ext4 filesystem on the USB device using the device name you just discovered. Note: Be certain you enter the proper device name - this step will completely erase the device. More... This command creates an ext4 file system on the first partition of the first USB device - /dev/sda1.

mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1

7. Create the fstab config file based on all the block devices found. More... This command writes the current state of all block devices, including USB drives, into the /etc/config/fstab file.

block detect | uci import fstab

8. Update the fstab config file to mount all drives at startup. More... /dev/sda is mount[0], /dev/sdb is mount[1], etc. If you have more than one USB device attached, substitute the proper index (0 or 1 or ...) as needed. This command mounts all drives - named or anonymous.

uci set fstab.@mount[0].enabled='1' && uci set fstab.@global[0].anon_mount='1' && uci commit fstab

9. Mount the device. More... Automount is enabled on boot.

/etc/init.d/fstab boot

Done! The drive is ready to read/write data.

To share the drives (or even specific folders) on your network see Samba or Ksmbd.

• For NTFS filesystem refer to Writable NTFS
• The full USB Drive tutorial has much more about USB drives
• Look at the fstab documentation to configure from the command line
• To temporarily mount the drive (say, for testing), you can enter: mkdir /tmp/MyDrive; mount /dev/sda1 /tmp/MyDrive, after finishing the test reading/writing the drive: umount /tmp/MyDrive