Re: Disk problems

On 3/27/26 10:30 AM, Dr Rainer Woitok wrote:
> Gretings,
>
> on my almost  ten years old laptop  device "/dev/sdb1" refers  to a disk
> `SATAIII 1 TB HDD HGST/WD / 7.200 rpm / 2,5"´ to be mounted at "/home/".
> I wasn't aware  of any problems,  but now it sometimes happens that wak-
> ing-up the system after hibernation turns into a normal boot because the
> file system check  for this device fails,  causing file  "openrc.log" to
> contain:
>
>      * Checking local filesystems  ...
>     /dev/sda3: clean, 806263/6275072 files, 8962535/25077622 blocks
>     /dev/sdb1: recovering journal
>     /dev/sdb1: clean, 173412/61054976 files, 35603500/244190385 blocks
>
> Any advice where to look for what in order to hunt this down?
>
> Sincerely,
>    Rainer
>


I'm no expert on this but I've had a drive or two go bad on me.  My 
first step, unmount /home, I'd do that in boot runlevel or single user 
mode, and force a fsck of the file system.  If it fixes anything, repeat 
the fsck.  I always use -f to force it.  If it corrects something a 
second time, I'd be thinking about getting my data off the drive and 
starting fresh with a new file system but one could carry on.  Second, 
I'd run a long selftest on the drive.  See if it reports anything.  If 
the selftest reports anything really bad, remove that drive ASAP.  Get a 
replacement drive and then reconnect the drive and try to get data off 
of it.  The longer it runs, the more likely it is to finish failing.  If 
you have a good back up process, well, you have that. :-D  How to react 
depends on the error tho.

Keep in mind, this could be a file system problem and nothing else. It 
also could be a drive problem causing the file system problem. It's best 
to check both.

To save time, one could start the selftest and then run fsck.  The 
selftest will likely take a little bit and you may be done with the fsck 
before the selftest finishes.

That's how I start.  If needed, then I come here with all the bad news 
to see what other experts think.  ;-)

Dale

:-)  :-)