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Mounting an External USB Drive in WSL and Downloading Data from a Server: My Journey

Introduction

Working with WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) is convenient for Linux workflows on Windows, but mounting external USB drives can be confusing. Recently, I needed to download large datasets from a remote SLU server directly to my USB drive. What seemed simple turned into a learning experience. Here’s the full story, including the problems I faced and the step-by-step solution.

The Problem

I plugged in my USB drive (karima-cz) and expected it to show up in WSL using:

lsblk

But here’s what I saw:

NAME MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINTS
sda    8:0    0 388.6M  1 disk
sdb    8:16   0   186M  1 disk
sdc    8:32   0     2G  0 disk [SWAP]
sdd    8:48   0     1T  0 disk /mnt/wslg/distro

No sign of my USB drive.

I checked kernel logs:

dmesg | tail -n 20

Output:

mount error: could not resolve address for vbsg-bio1.vbsg.slu.se: Unknown error
mount point does not exist.
WSL ERROR: Processing /etc/fstab with mount -a failed.

No USB detection messages—only WSL-related errors.

At this point, I realized:

  • WSL does not automatically mount physical USB drives like Linux does.
  • It only mounts Windows drives under /mnt/ if configured.

The Solution

Here’s what worked for me:

✅ Step 1: Verify USB in Windows

  • Open File Explorer → Confirm the USB drive appears (mine was D:).

✅ Step 2: Check WSL Mount Points

Inside WSL:

ls /mnt/

No d folder → automatic mounting was disabled.

✅ Step 3: Create Mount Point

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/d

✅ Step 4: Manually Mount the USB

Use drvfs to mount the Windows drive:

sudo mount -t drvfs D: /mnt/d

Now:

ls /mnt/d

✅ USB contents visible!

✅ Step 5: Download Data from Server

Use scp:

scp username@hpc:/path/to/data /mnt/d/

Example:

scp bioinf4@hpc:/data/project/* /mnt/d/

✅ Step 6: Optional – Enable Auto-Mount

Edit WSL config:

sudo nano /etc/wsl.conf

Add:

[automount]
enabled = true
root = /mnt/
options = "metadata"

Restart WSL from PowerShell:

wsl --shutdown
wsl

Key Issues & Fixes

  • Issue: USB not detected in lsblk → WSL doesn’t handle raw USB devices.
  • Fix: Mount Windows drive using drvfs.
  • Issue: wsl --shutdown failed inside WSL → Must run in PowerShell.
  • Fix: Restart WSL from Windows, not Linux.

Conclusion

If you’re using WSL and need to access an external USB drive, don’t panic if lsblk shows nothing. Just mount the Windows drive manually using drvfs. This method works perfectly for transferring large datasets from remote servers directly to your USB.

Pro Tip: If you need full Linux control over USB (e.g., raw device access), use WSL 2 with --mount or a native Linux system.

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