fix unreadble linux partitions

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Username : Date : Action : Comments [ close all ]
gelmo70 : 05/10/03 12:17 PM : Incident created -   After shipping my pc I could no longer boot it with Linux. I had some file systems errors about a "damaged superblock". I tried to fix the problem by myself but I was not able to and now, after serveral tries and system reinstalls, my pc's situation is: I have 2 hard disks and I have WinXp and Linux installed with a LILO boot manager. On the first disk I have 1 ntfs partition for XP the 3 LInux partitions and at last a ext2 unreadable partition which was the former /home partition (which I want to recover). On the second disk I have on undreadable ext2 (or ext3, I do not remember) linux partition (which I want to recover) and a FAT32 partition. If I try to mount one of the two partitions, in /mnt for instance, I cannot see the contents and at the following boot the system finds some errors and it is then impossible to boot. Here below you will find some information regarding my devices: [root@localhost gelmo]# ls /dev/hd hda hda1 hda2 hda5 hda6 hda7 hda8 hdb hdb1 hdb2 hdb5 hdc [root@localhost gelmo]# cat /etc/fstab /dev/hda5 / ext3 defaults 1 1 none /dev/pts devpts mode=0620 0 0 /dev/hda8 /home ext3 defaults 1 2 none /mnt/cdrom supermount dev=/dev/scd0,fs=auto,ro,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0 none /mnt/floppy supermount dev=/dev/fd0,fs=auto,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,sync,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0 /dev/hda1 /mnt/win_c ntfs iocharset=iso8859-15,ro,umask=0 0 0 /dev/hdb2 /mnt/win_c2 vfat iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0 none /proc proc defaults 0 0 /dev/hda7 swap swap defaults 0 0 [root@localhost gelmo]# mount /dev/hda5 on / type ext3 (rw) none on /proc type proc (rw) none on /proc/bus/usb type usbdevfs (rw) none on /dev type devfs (rw) none on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,mode=0620) /dev/hda8 on /home type ext3 (rw) none on /mnt/cdrom type supermount (ro,dev=/dev/scd0,fs=auto,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0) none on /mnt/floppy type supermount (rw,sync,dev=/dev/fd0,fs=auto,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0) /dev/hda1 on /mnt/win_c type ntfs (ro,iocharset=iso8859-15,umask=0) /dev/hdb2 on /mnt/win_c2 type vfat (rw,iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0) I look forward to hear from you. Best regards Andrea
gelmo70 : 06/10/03 08:13 AM : More info provided -   After another try I succeded in mounting the hdb5 of the second disk. I used the command 'mount' from the command line instead of the diskdrake. OK! I still cannot mount the hda6 partition of the first disk. Here below you will find the "mount" commands I used and the system responses: [root@localhost gelmo]# mount -t ext3 /dev/hda6 /mnt/try mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/hda6, or too many mounted file systems [root@localhost gelmo]# mount -t ext2 /dev/hda6 /mnt/try mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/hda6, or too many mounted file systems	Attachment
nexus_la : 06/10/03 03:23 PM : More info requested -   try run e2fsck /dev/hda6
gelmo70 : 06/10/03 05:09 PM : More info provided -   That's the result of the e2fsck command: [root@localhost gelmo]# e2fsck /dev/hda6 e2fsck 1.32 (09-Nov-2002) e2fsck: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read while trying to open /dev/hda6 Could this be a zero-length partition? [root@localhost gelmo]#
nexus_la : 06/10/03 06:14 PM : More info requested -   Please post result of the following command # fdisk -l /dev/hda
gelmo70 : 06/10/03 06:35 PM : More info provided -   voilà: [root@localhost gelmo]# fdisk -l /dev/hda Disk /dev/hda: 41.1 GB, 41174138880 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 5005 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/hda1 * 1 1275 10241406 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/hda2 1276 5005 29961225 f Win95 Ext'd (LBA) /dev/hda5 1276 1683 3277228 83 Linux /dev/hda6 2008 5005 24081403 83 Linux /dev/hda7 1684 1746 506016 82 Linux swap /dev/hda8 1747 2007 2096451 83 Linux Partition table entries are not in disk order [root@localhost gelmo]#
nexus_la : 06/10/03 07:34 PM : More info requested -   Try restore your partition table with fixdisktable from http://bmrc.berkeley.edu/people/chaffee/fat32.html, but you have little chance of success.
gelmo70 : 07/10/03 05:30 PM : More info provided -   This is the output of that program. Shall I choose "Yes"? I do not know exactly what the program will do. [root@localhost gelmo]# ./fixdisktable-0.3 -d -v /dev/hda Getting hard disk geometry cylinders=5005, heads=255, sectors=63 end_offset: 2147482624 FfEeSsNn NTFS partition at offset 31744, length=(17592186042506.980 MB) 18446744071707799552 Sectors: start= 62, end=36028797015054356, length=36028797015054296 Hd,Sec,Cyl: start(0,63,0) end(251,48,267105) Done searching for partitions. Nr AF Hd Sec Cyl Hd Sec Cyl Start Size ID 1 80 1 1 0 254 63 1023 63 -3909672 07 (Interpretted) 1 80 1 1 0 254 255 255 63 -3909672 07 (RAW) 1: 8001 0100 07fe ffff 3f00 0000 d857 c4ff 2: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 3: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 4: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 Do you wish to write this partition table to disk (yes/no)? n [root@localhost gelmo]#
gelmo70 : 07/10/03 05:40 PM : More info provided -   I think this might be useful too: [root@localhost gelmo]# mke2fs -n /dev/hda6 mke2fs 1.32 (09-Nov-2002) Filesystem label= OS type: Linux Block size=4096 (log=2) Fragment size=4096 (log=2) 3014656 inodes, 6020350 blocks 301017 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user First data block=0 184 block groups 32768 blocks per group, 32768 fragments per group 16384 inodes per group Superblock backups stored on blocks: 32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208, 4096000 [root@localhost gelmo]# e2fsck -b 32768 /dev/hda6 e2fsck 1.32 (09-Nov-2002) /dev/hda6: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read while reading block 511 /dev/hda6: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read reading journal superblock e2fsck: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read while checking ext3 journal for /dev/hda6 [root@localhost gelmo]#
nexus_la : 08/10/03 09:50 AM : Reply received -   You have a broken partition table or hard disk. plz run e2fsck then grep "hda" /var/log/messages
gelmo70 : 08/10/03 05:53 PM : More info provided -   Done. Please find the results in the attached file	Attachment
nexus_la : 09/10/03 10:34 AM : More info requested -   You have a hardware problem(broken harddisk drive). try recover data using #debugfs -s <superblock> /dev/hda6 <superblock> one of 32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208, 4096000 if command result: "Bad magic number in super-block while opening filesystem" try another superblock.
gelmo70 : 09/10/03 07:11 PM : More info provided -   Please find the report of the command debufs in the file here attached	Attachment
nexus_la : 10/10/03 08:27 AM : Reply received -   try use #debugfs -s 32768 -b 4096 /dev/hda6 then debugfs: ls
gelmo70 : 10/10/03 04:48 PM : More info provided -   I tried that: [root@localhost gelmo]# debugfs -s 32768 -b 4096 /dev/hda6 debugfs 1.32 (09-Nov-2002) /dev/hda6: Can't read an inode bitmap while reading inode bitmap debugfs: ls ls: Filesystem not open and then that: [root@localhost gelmo]# debugfs -s 32768 -b 4096 /dev/hda6 debugfs 1.32 (09-Nov-2002) /dev/hda6: Can't read an inode bitmap while reading inode bitmap debugfs: open -s 32768 -b 4096 /dev/hda6 /dev/hda6: Can't read an inode bitmap while reading inode bitmap debugfs: ls ls: Filesystem not open
rwira : 19/10/03 06:19 PM : Reply received -   Hi, What is the status of your incident? If it is still valid, can you sumarize what is your problem and what you have already tried. Else please close the incident. Regards
gelmo70 : 20/10/03 02:46 PM : More info provided -   The status is exactly the initial one, that is the device hda6 cannot be mounted, and you can see the description in the question text of the incident; all that I did is reported in the history of this incident. Please let me know if there is anything else that I can do or if I lost my data. Thank you
qa2 : 30/10/03 11:57 AM : Reply received -   Dear sir , we had try to find a way to help you but it seems to be that your partition is so corrupted,i think that you won't recover it properly in our scope. Maybe you will find help on Internet.You need to clear your partition if you want to use. Best Regards Christophe
gelmo70 : 31/10/03 07:23 AM : Incident closed -

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