[SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

Thal3s · 2012-01-09 03:12:34

I recently installed Arch (ext4 /, var, home, and boot on separate partitions and encrypted with luks with the exception of boot) after having my dual boot (Window 7 and Ubuntu) system fail such that I couldn't boot either system. It happened out of the blue and neither the Windows nor Linux utilities could fix it. Since I've installed Arch I've had nothing but strange problems with nearly every program I've tried to install. They work fine when I install them and then they fail, usually due to a missing file after reboot. Every few reboots fsck runs and finds errors which I have to manually repair. I finally got sick of it and ran "shutdown -rF now". I returned the following error the first time (which were similar to when it ran automatically in the past):

Checking filesystems
root: Inode 1955 is in use, but has dtime set. FIXED.
root: Inode 1955 has imagic flag set.
root: UNEXPECTED INCONSISTENCY; RUN fsck MANUALLY. (i.e., without -a or -p options

So I logged in as root and ran fsck and started saying "yes" to fix the following errors:

Inode 1955 has extra size (6253) which is invalid
Inode 1955 has compression flag set on filesystem without compression support
Inode 1955, i_size is 3688385799405422183, should be 0.
Inode 1955, i_blocks is 188462675795518, should be 0.
Inode 1956 is in use, but has dtime set.
...this continued up to 1959
Inode 1960 has INDEX_FL flag set but is not a directory. Clear HTree?
Inode 1960 should not have EOFBLOCKS_FL set (size 14497405387019542068, lblk -1)

This continued on for awhile and when it finished I ran "shutdown -rF now" again. Upon reboot, the same problems occurred but with different inodes. I've repeated the process above a few times now and it seems to be endless, although I'm starting to see things like:
/usr/share/emacs/23.3/etc/charset has deleted/unused inode 1956. Clear?

I'd really love to know what's going on. I'm guessing that my hard drive has some serious, unrepairable problems. Any ideas?

Last edited by Thal3s (2012-02-20 01:25:35)

Durden · 2012-01-09 03:32:11

Has the system been slow? Any data corruption? How old is the HD?

Thal3s · 2012-01-09 03:41:41

I have only just started using Arch and it has been mostly from the command line so I can't tell if it's slow, I really have no benchmark for that. The hard drive is only about 3 years old and has had an easy life. I'm pretty sure there has been data corruption in the past, pre-Arch, but I don't recall noticing any since then. Lots of segmentation faults and missing program files. The errors above only mention the root partition but I've had the same problem with the var partition in the past.

Durden · 2012-01-09 03:44:33

I'm not a hardware expert but it sounds like HD failure. Is the system critical to keep running or can you reformat the drive to see if the problem occurs again? Do you have a backup?

skottish · 2012-01-09 03:57:49

Go to the drive manufactures website and get a copy of whatever disk utils that they have. Run that utility and it will tell you all about the drive's health and will try to repair what it can.

Thal3s · 2012-01-09 04:01:53

Fortunately all of my files are backed up. Arch has been so unstable (probably because of this problem) since I installed it I didn't even try to transfer over the files yet. The system isn't critical so I could install Arch again. However, I've had to reinstall it about a half dozen times over the last week and a half due to a variety of apparently unsolvable problems. I'm starting to see a pattern hear which is why I posted to the forum. I wanted to make sure it was the disk before going and dropping $100. I don't suppose there is any way to prove the disk is bad?

Thal3s · 2012-01-09 04:02:50

Thanks for the tip. I'll try that and report back.

headkase · 2012-01-09 04:11:46

Stop! Hammer-Time, err, I mean: check out This Link. Basically if it does turn out to be a failing hard drive (which I also think is likely) then by using the serial number on it you have a decent chance of still being within a warranty period - those may be up to five years! Use those online serial number checkers and see if you get lucky?

Durden · 2012-01-09 04:22:38

It terms of the warranty, don't mention you had Linux on it and that it's been formatted as ext4 etc. Just format it NTFS and send it back to them. Their support people will just give you the run around if you don't. Keep it simple, tell them you had windows on it and the drive failed.

NikTh · 2012-01-09 15:48:11

There is another option to see disk failure . I don't know if this works with your DE. Gnome has a good utility for HDD's . Gnome-Disk Utility. Shows S.M.A.R.T data. If something going wrong you will see a red dot (or red dots , depends from issues) .

Last edited by NikTh (2012-01-09 15:54:15)

Thal3s · 2012-02-20 01:27:47

It turns out it was a hard drive problem and I was able to send it back as it was still under warranty. Thanks to everyone for your help.

Arch Linux

#1 2012-01-09 03:12:34

[SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#2 2012-01-09 03:32:11

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#3 2012-01-09 03:41:41

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#4 2012-01-09 03:44:33

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#5 2012-01-09 03:57:49

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#6 2012-01-09 04:01:53

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#7 2012-01-09 04:02:50

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#8 2012-01-09 04:11:46

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#9 2012-01-09 04:22:38

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#10 2012-01-09 15:48:11

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

#11 2012-02-20 01:27:47

Re: [SOLVED] Unexpected Inconsistency, run fsck - Hard drive failure?

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