Many corporate conferences use(d) cheap branded, read-only flip card style USB flash drives to distribute demo software or other marketing materials. These are set to read-only, limiting their utility as low/no cost disposable play storage. Using undocumented vendor specific commands, this oversight can sometimes *temporarily*¹ be remedied.
¹ Needs to be done every time device is plugged in. This method uses an undocumented SCSI command to write to ram. There's another undocumented SSCI command to write a sector to flash, currently unknown.
tl;dr:
eject /dev/sdX
sg_raw -v -v -v -R -s 0 /dev/sdX
F1 0C F6 9B 70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
eject /dev/sdX
Requirements
sg3_utils:
sudo apt-get install on pi
and sometimes necessary: sudo apt-get install eject
Source: sg3_utils
Read-only (Flip Card) USB Flash Drive:
(Intel) Flip card
Example for sale: usb0218gb-8gb-flip-card-printed-usb-flash-drives
The particular 2gb Intel credit card thumbdrive variant explored here contained an auto-opened link for Parallel Studio XE and used <1mb of the capacity of the drive:
<a href="https://software.intel.com/en-us/intel-parallel-studio-xe?utm_campaign=DPD&utm_source=Collateral%20Resources%20USB&utm_content=Parallel%20Studio%20Buy%20Now" target="_blank"><img src="img/learn_more.jpg" alt="Learn more ›" /></a>
Contents:
32K ./img/box1.jpg
32K ./img/box2.jpg
64K ./img/box3.jpg
64K ./img/box4.jpg
32K ./img/box5.jpg
32K ./img/box6.jpg
32K ./img/buy_now.jpg
32K ./img/evaluate_now.jpg
32K ./img/intel_logo.jpg
32K ./img/learn_more.jpg
32K ./img/page_bg.jpg
32K ./img/parallel_universe_magazine.jpg
32K ./img/product_support.jpg
32K ./img/Thumbs.db
32K ./img/twitter_handle.jpg
576K ./img
64K ./OpenFile/STARTDOC.EXE
32K ./OpenFile/STARTDOC.INF
128K ./OpenFile
32K ./AUTORUN.INF
64K ./collateral.ico
32K ./start.htm
864K
Initial mount
[
37895007.597355] usb 1-1.4: new high-speed USB device number 4 using dwc_otg
[37895007.730866] usb 1-1.4: New USB device found, idVendor=1234, idProduct=1234, bcdDevice=11.00
[37895007.730883] usb 1-1.4: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[37895007.730893] usb 1-1.4: Product: 1234567812345678
[37895007.730903] usb 1-1.4: Manufacturer: 12345678
[37895007.731764] usb-storage 1-1.4:1.0: USB Mass Storage device detected
[37895007.735346] scsi host0: usb-storage 1-1.4:1.0
[37895007.790833] usbcore: registered new interface driver uas
[37895008.868174] scsi 0:0:0:0: Direct-Access 12345678 1234567812345678 1100 PQ: 0 ANSI: 4
[37895008.894264] sd 0:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg0 type 0
[37895008.968555] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 3893248 512-byte logical blocks: (1.99 GB/1.86 GiB)
[37895008.971146] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is on
[37895008.971198] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 43 00 80 00
[37895008.971384] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 3893248 512-byte logical blocks: (1.99 GB/1.86 GiB)
[37895008.972061] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Attached SCSI removable disk
[37895008.981651] sda: sda1
Query and Modify
Linux
Query
# sg_raw -v -v -v -R -n -r 1024 -o id.bin /dev/sda F0 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02
Attempt to decode cdb name: Vendor specific [0xf0]
open /dev/sda with flags=0x800
cdb to send: f0 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02
Command name: Vendor specific [0xf0]
sense_buffer=0x7ea5a4d4, length=32
dxfer_buffer_in=0x122e000, length=1024
SCSI Status: Good
Writing 1024 bytes of data to .bin
No errors
Check for expected SMI controller:
# strings id.bin | grep SMI
2013-02-26 SM3257ENLTBA SMI32X
Or look in-situ:
# xxd -s 32 -l 35 -u -c 32 id.bin
00000020: 2020 3230 3133 2D30 322D 3236 2020 534D 3332 3537 454E 4C54 4241 2020 2053 4D49 2013-02-26 SM3257ENLTBA SMI
00000040: 3332 58 32X
Disable Read-only
Send a stop command:
# eject /dev/sdb
Send vendor command:
# sg_raw -v -v -v -R -s 0 /dev/sda F1 0C F6 9B 70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Attempt to decode cdb name: Vendor specific [0xf1]
open /dev/sda with flags=0x800
cdb to send: f1 0c f6 9b 70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Command name: Vendor specific [0xf1]
sense_buffer=0x7ed16514, length=32
dxfer_buffer_out=0x1a10000, length=0
SCSI Status: Good
Re-attach:
# eject /dev/sda
[37955283.370850] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 3893248 512-byte logical blocks: (1.99 GB/1.86 GiB)
[37955283.371530] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[37955283.371544] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 43 00 00 00
[37955283.374875] sda: sda1
Explanation about the ejects:
eject 1 tells the PI that it's 'gone', but it's still plugged in
eject 2 should tell the PI, "I'm baaack!"
Behind the scenes, SCSI actually has a 'start'/'stop' command - and it causes a 'media changed' response - this means the kernel treats it as if you plugged an SD card into an external reader, and re-scans -- and this time, the response to the "INQUIRY" command says "I'm writable", and Linux is happy
Testing Write
dd if=systemrescue-9.03-i686.iso of=/dev/sda bs=8M status=progress
794820608 bytes (795 MB, 758 MiB) copied, 152.078 s, 5.2 MB/s
94+1 records in
94+1 records out
794820608 bytes (795 MB, 758 MiB) copied, 180.895 s, 4.4 MB/s
du -ahd 1
2.0K ./autorun
2.1M ./boot
2.9M ./EFI
162K ./isolinux
752M ./sysresccd
2.5K ./sysrescue.d
757M .
Windows
> sg_scan
PD0 [L] ST2000DM001-1CH164 ...
PD1 [C] PCIe SSD E8FM11.6 ...
PD2 [D] Seagate Backup+ Desk ...
PD3 Msft Virtual Disk 1.0
PD4 12345678 1234567812345678 1100
> sg_ident PD4
No output...
Note: sg_stop doesn't work, need --eject:
> sg_start --eject PD4
> sg_raw -v -v -v -R -s 0 PD4 F1 0C F6 9B 70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Attempt to decode cdb name: Vendor specific [0xf1]
cdb to send: f1 0c f6 9b 70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Command name: Vendor specific [0xf1]
sense_buffer=000000000065F9E0, length=32
dxfer_buffer_out=00000000001DB000, length=0
SCSI Status: Good
No errors
Re-attach:
> sg_start --start PD4
Note: Rufus won't write drive: Alt-Z to zero it.
Other notes: Some systems seem to have issues booting when it's written this way, leaving this just as a way to put some small amount of information on flash and "protect" it (say, a password database).
Unfinished Notes / Unsorted Dump
Questions
More concretely - what are the sequences of bytes sent to Port 19h (eg, 0 <1 byte>, 1 < 10 bytes?> 4 <2 bytes>)
(Port 88/Port 89 is used to 'Read Flash ID" (command 0x90/0x00), port 19 seems to be used for just about everything else.
Memory Map
8000 - Buffer (?)
9000 - Buffer (???)
Max read is 8KB (10h)
A000 - Used as code target?
B000 - ??
C000 - SM3257ENU 141027-SLC C00D version string
D000 - Bank switched based on 7C.5 ?
DBF0 - 20091116 rwcmd
DC00 - ?
DFF0 - 20070102 SETOP2
E000 - 4 banks (7C.3,4) WMP ??
F000 - 20091116 ISP1k ?
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