Can't see USB in lsblk

[isaacdchan]

Version

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.22000.739]

WSL Version

• WSL 2
• WSL 1

Kernel Version

5.10.102.1-microsoft-standard-WSL2

Distro Version

Ubuntu 20.04

Other Software

No response

Repro Steps

I followed this instruction to get my USB seen by WSL2:
https://github.com/dorssel/usbipd-win

PS C:\Users\isaac> usbipd wsl list
>>
BUSID  VID:PID    DEVICE                                                        STATE
1-4    046d:0892  HD Pro Webcam C920                                            Not attached
1-12   8087:0aa7  Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R)                                Not attached
1-19   1058:0730  USB Mass Storage Device                                       Attached - Ubuntu-20.04
5-6    931c:6c65  USB Input Device                                              Not attached
6-1    b58e:9e84  Yeti Classic, USB Input Device                                Not attached
6-2    046d:c539  USB Input Device                                              Not attached
6-4    04d9:0192  USB Input Device                                              Not attached
7-4    043e:9a8a  USB Input Device                                              Not attached

❯ lsusb
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 1058:0730 Western Digital Technologies, Inc. My Passport Essential (WDBACY)
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

Expected Behavior

I'd expect Device 002 to show up as a block device when running lsblk

Actual Behavior

❯ lsblk
NAME MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda    8:0    0   256G  0 disk
sdb    8:16   0 339.8M  1 disk
sdc    8:32   0   256G  0 disk /

Diagnostic Logs

No response

[elsaco]

@isaacdchan the current WSL kernel is built with CONFIG_USB_STORAGE is not set. This option needs to be enabled in order to mount USB flash drives and show in lsblk output.

[isaacdchan]

@elsaco is there a official MSFT guide on how to simply do this?

I wish there was a flag I could set when running wsl --install to enable this feature. Is there a reason why this feature is disabled by default?

I saw that someone wrote this guide but it seems very complicated

[elsaco]

MS is using a different approach to share USB devices in WSL, USB over IP with the usbipd daemon running on host. Since this is usbip it works both ways, a WSL client can attach a remote device also.

To get support for USB storage devices 5.10.102.1 kernel needs to be rebuild. However, if you don't want to go this route I could share a kernel built with USB storage support. This is a diff between the custom kernel config and https://github.com/microsoft/WSL2-Linux-Kernel/blob/linux-msft-wsl-5.10.y/Microsoft/config-wsl:

diff config config-wsl
5c5
< CONFIG_CC_VERSION_TEXT="gcc (Ubuntu 9.4.0-1ubuntu1~20.04.1) 9.4.0"
---
> CONFIG_CC_VERSION_TEXT="x86_64-msft-linux-gcc (GCC) 9.3.0"
7c7
< CONFIG_GCC_VERSION=90400
---
> CONFIG_GCC_VERSION=90300
11,12d10
< CONFIG_CC_CAN_LINK=y
< CONFIG_CC_CAN_LINK_STATIC=y
24c22
< CONFIG_LOCALVERSION="-custom-WSL2"
---
> CONFIG_LOCALVERSION="-microsoft-standard-WSL2"
748a747
> # CONFIG_GCC_PLUGINS is not set
2418,2433c2417
< CONFIG_USB_STORAGE=y
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_DEBUG is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_REALTEK is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_DATAFAB is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_FREECOM is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_ISD200 is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_USBAT is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_SDDR09 is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_SDDR55 is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_JUMPSHOT is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_ALAUDA is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_ONETOUCH is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_KARMA is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_CYPRESS_ATACB is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE_ENE_UB6250 is not set
< # CONFIG_USB_UAS is not set
---
> # CONFIG_USB_STORAGE is not set
3541c3525,3531
< # CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO is not set
---
> CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO=y
> # CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_REDUCED is not set
> # CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_COMPRESSED is not set
> # CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_SPLIT is not set
> # CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_DWARF4 is not set
> CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_BTF=y
> # CONFIG_GDB_SCRIPTS is not set

Nothing different beside CONFIG_USB_STORAGE=y and CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO=n

[isaacdchan]

Got it. Thanks for the info @elsaco. So it should be as simple as

1. Cloning the kernel git clone https://github.com/microsoft/WSL2-Linux-Kernel.git
2. Modifying WSL2-Linux-Kernel/Microsoft/config-wsl
3. Running sudo make $new_config
4. Copy the kernel to windows host
5. Create C:\\Users\\ischan\\.wslconfig which points to new kernel

[wsl2]
kernel=C:\\Users\\your-user-name\\bzImage
swap=0
localhostForwarding=true

6. Restart wsl

[microsoft-github-policy-service]

This issue has been automatically closed since it has not had any activity for the past year. If you're still experiencing this issue please re-file this as a new issue or feature request.

Thank you!