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View Full Version : [SOLVED] Unbootable: Best fstab approach?



RMOP
December 9th, 2011, 07:26 AM
I made a single entry to my fstab on my nicely configured 11.04 machine...and now it doesn't boot into Ubuntu anymore. I was careful, only adding an auto-mount line for an NTFS Data drive, "knew what I was doing," but something went amiss.

I've never needed root access to an unbootable Ubuntu machine before.

I have three options, as I see it:

1) boot to Live CD and get root access to fstab and either edit it or replace it with a known-good backup copy. Never done that, but it seems to entail basic hand work via terminal.

2) boot to Windows and try ext2fsd to mount my Ubuntu partition w (supposedly) W/R access

http://www.ext2fsd.com/?page_id=7

3) boot to OSX and try mounting this drive on that system using a trial version of Paragon's extFS for MAC.

http://www.paragon-software.com/home/extfs-mac/

Nice to have options, I suppose, but having never used any of the above, I'd appreciate knowing which is likely to get me quickest and safest access to my fstab. Obviously, I need W/R access to fix things.

Thoughts, please? Many thanks.

nothingspecial
December 9th, 2011, 08:31 AM
I'd do it from the live cd.

RMOP
December 9th, 2011, 06:35 PM
I'd do it from the live cd.

Did. The only painful part was wading through the awful Unity menu to find Terminal.

Thanks.