I am using Linux on my notebook. My notebook recently fall on ground and now I am trying to save as much data from my damaged hdd as possible. I can boot notebook from Linux live CD.
Long story short: one ext4 partition is not mountable, but I can try to repair it by fsck.ext4. I also can try to first try to recover bad blocks on hdd (probably by SpinRite). What sould I do first?
In full details:
Here is my drive:
# fdisk -l
Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00000080
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 3824 30716248+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 3825 19449 125507812+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda3 19450 19457 64260 83 Linux
Let' forget /dev/sda1 NTFS partition, not that important. Third partition /dev/sda3 is just /boot, not important either. Second /dev/sda2 is physical space for LVM (see bellow).
Logical group /dev/group1/arch is encrypted by dm-crypt LUKS, I am unable to open it and data there are probably lost. Logical groups /dev/group1/data and /dev/group1/data2 are ext4 volumes. I can mount /dev/group1/data2 (mount -t ext4 -o ro,noload /dev/group1/data2 /mnt/data2) and backup data on external drive. But I can not mount /dev/group1/data:
# mount -t ext4 -o ro,noload /dev/group1/data /x/data
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/mapper/group1-data,
missing codepage or helper program, or other error
In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try
dmesg | tail or so
fsck does not work:
# fsck.ext4 -n /dev/group1/data
e2fsck 1.41.11 (14-Mar-2010)
fsck.ext4: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read while trying to open /dev/group1/data
Could this be a zero-length partition?
dumpe2fs does not finds superblock either:
# dumpe2fs /dev/group1/data
dumpe2fs 1.41.11 (14-Mar-2010)
dumpe2fs: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read while trying to open /dev/group1/data
Couldn't find valid filesystem superblock.
Only thing I can do is try to find where superblock usually is:
# mkfs.ext4 -n /dev/group1/data
mke2fs 1.41.11 (14-Mar-2010)
Filesystem label=
OS type: Linux
Block size=4096 (log=2)
Fragment size=4096 (log=2)
Stride=0 blocks, Stripe width=0 blocks
5242880 inodes, 20971520 blocks
1048576 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user
First data block=0
Maximum filesystem blocks=0
640 block groups
32768 blocks per group, 32768 fragments per group
8192 inodes per group
Superblock backups stored on blocks:
32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208,
4096000, 7962624, 11239424, 20480000
…and start fsck using one of this superblocks:
# fsck.ext4 -n -b 229376 /dev/group1/data
e2fsck 1.41.11 (14-Mar-2010)
One or more block group descriptor checksums are invalid. Fix? no
Group descriptor 0 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 1 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 2 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 3 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 4 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 5 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
...
Group descriptor 637 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 638 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
Group descriptor 639 checksum is invalid. IGNORED.
/dev/group1/data contains a file system with errors, check forced.
Resize inode not valid. Recreate? no
Pass 1: Checking inodes, blocks, and sizes
...here I pressed Ctrl-C...
So – it displays a lots of errors, but it seems it will try to repair (if I use fsck.ext4 -y instead fsck.ext4 -n of course).
Other options – frind of mine has SpinRite 6 boot CD, which is told to be on of the best programs to repair bad blocks.
So my QUESTION is – should I
- try first SpinRite to repair bad blocks and then fsck.ext4 -y (or even better dump whole raw partitition to one big file on external hdd, make copy, mount copy as loopback and then try fckk.ext4 -y)
- try firt fsck.ext4 -y with hope than afterwards ome data will be readable, backup this data on external hdd (and then try eventually SpinRite) ?
- or do something else?
Thanks a lot for any hint.
LVM structure:
# pvdisplay
--- Physical volume ---
PV Name /dev/sda2
VG Name group1
PV Size 119.69 GiB / not usable 2.22 MiB
Allocatable yes (but full)
PE Size 4.00 MiB
Total PE 30641
Free PE 0
Allocated PE 30641
PV UUID 0k3Zl5-Q7BD-rb8J-9jTZ-2uii-GSGd-B339JB
# vgdisplay
--- Volume group ---
VG Name group1
System ID
Format lvm2
Metadata Areas 1
Metadata Sequence No 10
VG Access read/write
VG Status resizable
MAX LV 0
Cur LV 4
Open LV 1
Max PV 0
Cur PV 1
Act PV 1
VG Size 119.69 GiB
PE Size 4.00 MiB
Total PE 30641
Alloc PE / Size 30641 / 119.69 GiB
Free PE / Size 0 / 0
VG UUID kKhvri-OVpL-uhCP-T4an-qXIJ-4XL0-kn9Ifi
# lvdisplay
--- Logical volume ---
LV Name /dev/group1/swap
VG Name group1
LV UUID wpDink-01q0-peLc-29at-5kgP-YO3a-8bNrb7
LV Write Access read/write
LV Status available
# open 0
LV Size 1.50 GiB
Current LE 384
Segments 1
Allocation contiguous
Read ahead sectors auto
- currently set to 256
Block device 252:0
--- Logical volume ---
LV Name /dev/group1/arch
VG Name group1
LV UUID S1TZkr-y62z-dOuc-D38G-nuCH-1ilc-y2jqMa
LV Write Access read/write
LV Status available
# open 0
LV Size 15.00 GiB
Current LE 3840
Segments 1
Allocation contiguous
Read ahead sectors auto
- currently set to 256
Block device 252:1
--- Logical volume ---
LV Name /dev/group1/data
VG Name group1
LV UUID 2R4LNv-sHPh-E7ES-goIF-5nUz-tQyj-GOiwvC
LV Write Access read/write
LV Status available
# open 0
LV Size 80.00 GiB
Current LE 20480
Segments 1
Allocation contiguous
Read ahead sectors auto
- currently set to 256
Block device 252:2
--- Logical volume ---
LV Name /dev/group1/data2
VG Name group1
LV UUID 4VqpZj-uOBi-OAIZ-1IXA-G6mj-Qgfb-c6RYqw
LV Write Access read/write
LV Status available
# open 1
LV Size 23.19 GiB
Current LE 5937
Segments 1
Allocation inherit
Read ahead sectors auto
- currently set to 256
Block device 252:3
Best Answer
The first thing I would do is use ddrescue from a liveCD to make a backup image of the drive. If there's physical damage to the drive, there's a chance that there's a finite amount of time until it fails completely. Then, make a copy of that image to work on.
From there, I have no suggestions that you haven't tried. Others smarter than me will have to help you there.