gutsy boot problem... might fsck

[solarin_kb]

Ok I have some serious issue with my Linux partition. I may have to fsck it (unmounted of course) but I'm not sure if there are other options present. I am hoping for some good advice on how to recover here.

I am running Ubuntu 7.10 gutsy on an HP dv9000 series notebook. It's one of those preinstalled vista machines. I felt I wanted to try ubuntu after using SUSE for so long on my desktop. I shrunk my vista partition and booted into Live gutsy. I then partitioned up and found myself on cloud 9 for a few days.

BitTorrent gave me some hassles (bad sector error/failures if I remember correctly) and I decided to restart Ubuntu. After doing so, I ended up in Error 17 hell from Grub. So I booted into LiveCD and decided to try my luck at the terminal to see what was wrong. Here are my findings:

root@ubuntu:/# /sbin/fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 120.0 GB, 120034123776 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14593 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0e045244

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 10412 83632704+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 13505 14593 8747392+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3 10413 10655 1951897+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda4 10656 13504 22884592+ 83 Linux

Partition table entries are not in disk order


root@ubuntu:/# mount /dev/sda4 /ubuntu
mount: you must specify the filesystem type
root@ubuntu:/# mount -t ext3 /dev/sda4 /ubuntu/
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sda4,
missing codepage or helper program, or other error
In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try
dmesg | tail or so


I can mount the other NTFS partitions just fine.

root@ubuntu:/# fsck.ext3 /dev/sda4
e2fsck 1.40.2 (12-Jul-2007)
Couldn't find ext2 superblock, trying backup blocks...
Superblock has an invalid ext3 journal (inode 8).
Clear<y>? no

fsck.ext3: Illegal inode number while checking ext3 journal for /dev/sda4


I have spent far too much time tonight researching possible avenues through forums like this one to no avail. Everyone appears to have slightly different issues so far. I will research more tomorrow but I am hoping someone may be able to shine some light over here for me.

Thanks.

[solarin_kb]

Something to add:


root@ubuntu:/# dumpe2fs /dev/sda4
dumpe2fs 1.40.2 (12-Jul-2007)
dumpe2fs: Bad magic number in super-block while trying to open /dev/sda4
Couldn't find valid filesystem superblock.

[Herman]

:) Hello solarin_kb,
Try looking at some of these links and see if they will be of any help to you,
Running a filesystem check on an ext3 filesystem (http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p10.htm#filesystem_check_on_an_ext3_filesystem) - from a Live CD - command line

Running a check for bad blocks on your hard disk (http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p10.htm#bad_blocks_check)

What to do if you have a bad ext3 superblock (http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p10.htm#superblock_restoration_frombackup)

How to take a look at your ext3 superblock (http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p10.htm#take_a_look_at_your_ext3_superblock)

Regards, Herman :)

[solarin_kb]

Thanks for the links. They are quality. Unfortunately, I did not get a reply for a while so I had to run fsck and it basically cleared it all into lost+found. So here I am with a newly formatted partition with everything setup how I prefer. I used dd this time to image the partition. ;)

[Herman]

I'd be buying a new hard disk if that happened to me.

[solarin_kb]

I sincerely do not believe it was a problem with the hard disk. I was getting some strange errors from bittorrent along with Nautilus (the infamous problem with too many file handles).

[Herman]

Oh, bittorrent, yes, I have read that those type of programs can be hard on file systems.
Maybe just run your file system checks much more frequently then, your file system is probably doing a lot more work than average, and may just need checking a lot more often to fix problems while they're still small.

Regards, Herman :)