📦 USB-to-USB Copy Guide for Raspberry Pi

This guide explains how to:

• Mount a USB drive
• Copy files from one USB drive to another
• Unmount both safely

🔌 1. Insert Both USB Drives

Plug in both USB drives (source and destination) into your Raspberry Pi.

🔍 2. Identify USB Devices

lsblk

Look for output like:

sda1  8:1    1  16G  0 part
sdb1  8:17   1  32G  0 part

Unplug/replug to verify which is which.

📁 3. Create Mount Points

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/usb1
sudo mkdir -p /mnt/usb2

📦 4. Mount Both USB Drives

Replace sda1 and sdb1 with your actual devices:

sudo mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/usb1
sudo mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/usb2

Check mounts with:

df -h

📤 5. Copy the Files

Copy a specific folder:

sudo cp -r /mnt/usb1/myfolder /mnt/usb2/

Copy everything:

sudo cp -r /mnt/usb1/* /mnt/usb2/

Tip: To show progress and support resume, use rsync instead:

sudo rsync -avh /mnt/usb1/ /mnt/usb2/

✅ 6. Verify the Copy

ls /mnt/usb2/

🧹 7. Unmount Both Drives

sudo umount /mnt/usb1
sudo umount /mnt/usb2

If you get a “device is busy” error, switch away from the mount folder:

cd ~

⏏️ 8. Remove USB Drives

Once unmounted, it's safe to remove both USB sticks.

Note: If your system auto-mounts USBs under /media/pi/, you may not need to mount manually.