Why my USB (Handy) Drive is not working?

[Harami]

I'm having the same problem, except I have no idea what you guys are talking about. I'm new to the whole linux thing, just using it to recover some important files off a friends machine. Someone referred to a doc with this information, where can I find that, and what are the first steps I can take to recognizing the drive?

Thanks,

Hamid.

[user unknown]

The file he is talking about is /etc/fstab but the line should start with /dev/sda1.

[Harami]

Ok, so whats the first things i should type in console to detect/install the drive?

Sorry for this newb question, but its really important my friend gets these files.

[user unknown]

There are three questions on the last page - so what means 'the same problem'?

First the optimistic test:

mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/usb

while /mnt/usb has to exist.
Test with

ls -la /mnt

and create it with

mkdir /mnt/usb