[vox-tech] Hosed hard drive?

[Ken Bloom]

On Saturday 13 May 2006 00:30, Richard Crawford wrote:
> On Thursday 11 May 2006 23:23, Alex Mandel wrote:
> > Richard Crawford wrote:
> > > Running Kubuntu Dapper flight 6 on dual-core PIII.  The hard
> > > drive is 120 GB.
> > >
> > > This evening, while working on this computer, it started telling
> > > me that my filesystem was read-only.  I rebooted, and the system
> > > got as far as checking the root filesystem, whereupon it gives me
> > > the following error:
> > >
> > > /: UNEXEPECTED INCONSISTENCY; RUN fsck MANUALLY
> > >    (i.e., without -a or -p options)
> > >
> > > When I execute fsck...
> > >
> > > root at seamus:  fsck
> > > fsck 1.38 (30-Jun-2005)
> > > e2fsck 1.38 (30-Jun-2005)
> > > fsck.ext3: No such file or directory while trying to
> > > open /dev/mapper/Ubuntu-root
> > >
> > > The superblock could not be read or does not contain a correct
> > > ext2 filesystem.  If the device is valid and it really contains
> > > an ext2 filesystem (and not swap or ufs or something else), then
> > > the superblock is corrupt, and you might try running e2fsck with
> > > an alternate superblock:
> > >     e2fsck -b 8193 <device>
> > >
> > > So I tried...
> > >
> > > # e2fsck -b 8193 /dev/hda
> > >
> > > and got the same message.  I also tried 16384 and 32768 (based on
> > > the information from man e2fsck -- I honestly don't know the
> > > blocksize on my filesystem).
> > >
> > > dmesg shows nothing useful.  However, syslog has the following
> > > entries from just before the system crashed:
> > > May 11 18:12:44 seamus kernel: [4478515.955000] ppdev: user-space
> > > parallel port driver
> > > May 11 18:13:05 seamus kernel: [4478537.620000] hda:
> > > task_in_intr: status=0x49 { DriveReady DataRequest Error }
> > > May 11 18:13:05 seamus kernel: [4478537.620000] hda:
> > > task_in_intr: error=0x04 { DriveStatusError }
> > > May 11 18:13:08 seamus kernel: [4478537.620000] ide: failed
> > > opcode was: uknown
> > >
> > >
> > > What's really annoying is that the computer has suddenly decided
> > > it will no longer boot from the CD-ROM drive, even though I have
> > > the BIOS set to boot from CD-ROM, then the hard drive.  Thus, I
> > > can't boot from the installation media to attempt a system rescue
> > > there.  I've tried booting using recovery mode from GRUB, but I
> > > only get the same issues.
> > >
> > > Any thoughts?  This is a fairly old computer (five years old) so
> > > I guess all manner of horrors, including a failed motherboard,
> > > are possible.
> >
> > Got a floppy on that, try a Smart Boot Disk to get the CD to boot.
> > http://linux.simple.be/tools/sbm
>
> It has a floppy drive, but it won't boot from it, even with the BIOS
> set to do so.  I suspect my IDE controller is FUBAR.  Ah, well.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the floppy drive connects by 
something other (and older) than IDE.

> > I'd also recommend if you have the hardware, put the drive into
> > another machine as a 2nd drive and run more in depth tools from a
> > working OS. Maybe try to read the S.M.A.R.T status too (if the
> > drive has that).
>
> Well, I'm about to head off to Ireland for three weeks, so I'll have
> to deal with it in June.  :-D

Enjoy

--Ken Bloom


-- 
I usually have a GPG digital signature included as an attachment.
See http://www.gnupg.org/ for info about these digital signatures.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://ns1.livepenguin.com/pipermail/vox-tech/attachments/20060513/9da0d995/attachment.pgp