[SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

Satas · 2017-03-28 21:48:44

Hello, this is not a very specific Arch question, however I have no better idea, where to ask.

The situation is the following:

I had a SSD with an arch linux installation in BIOS Legacy mode. Lets call this SSD1. I used grub2 as a bootloader.

Now I used a second SSD (SSD2) and installed a completely new arch on this SSD2 using UEFI mode. I left a partition to copy the old system from SSD1 to be able to use them parallel.

The new system started well from SSD2 and I copied the system from SSD1 to a partition on SSD2. But did not manage to boot it while still using grub2 as the new bootloader, too.

I then quickly needed the old system so I switched to Legacy in BIOS and was able to boot from SSD1 via USB cable.

Later, I turned the system off and then from the new arch on SSD2 I installed systemd-boot and was able to boot both systems on SSD2.

But my SSD1 got broken. It is not recognized by BIOS anymore and also I cannot see it in partition manager or as a /dev/sdX entry. So it is completely unreachable to me.

How can I repair it? Are there any chances to get it work again?

Thanks for help...

When more information is needed, please ask me.

Last edited by Satas (2017-03-29 21:30:34)

Trilby · 2017-03-28 22:20:52

To start, please post the output of the following:

ls /dev/sd*
lsblk -a
findmnt -s
uname -a
pacman -Q linux

Satas · 2017-03-28 22:25:45

This output is made while the external SSD is plugged in via USB. It is not recognized.

gluon:~ $ ls /dev/sd*
/dev/sda  /dev/sda1  /dev/sda2  /dev/sda3  /dev/sda4
gluon:~ $ lsblk -a
NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0 465.8G  0 disk 
├─sda1   8:1    0   512M  0 part /boot
├─sda2   8:2    0  73.2G  0 part /
├─sda3   8:3    0  73.2G  0 part /media/SYSTEM2
└─sda4   8:4    0 318.8G  0 part /media/DATA
gluon:~ $ findmnt -s
TARGET         SOURCE                                    FSTYPE OPTIONS
/              UUID=0b8060fc-fb1d-4ece-b480-97d0fecfcf6e ext4   rw,relatime,data=ordered
/media/SYSTEM2 UUID=567064a6-f372-401e-8b15-b5654f2df3a0 ext4   discard,rw,relatime,data=ordered,errors=remount-ro
/media/DATA    UUID=53428369-ffb6-4766-8722-c25e0cc99f2a ext4   discard,noatime,auto,defaults
/boot          UUID=9852-D58D                            vfat   rw,relatime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro
/proc          proc                                      proc   nodev,noexec,nosuid
/tmp           tmpfs                                     tmpfs  nosuid,size=4G
none           /swapfile                                 swap   defaults
gluon:~ $ uname -a
Linux gluon 4.10.6-1-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Mon Mar 27 08:28:22 CEST 2017 x86_64 GNU/Linux
gluon:~ $ pacman -Q linux
linux 4.10.6-1

Last edited by Satas (2017-03-28 22:26:29)

Trilby · 2017-03-28 22:40:09

Thanks. Everything looks fine there, so the next step might be to rule out a hardware problem. Do you have access to another system you can plug the SSD into?

Alternatively, check the cables and plugs carefully - and try a different cable if you have one available. Try other usb ports, etc.

Satas · 2017-03-28 22:42:04

I have a external device where the hard drive can be taken out so I have tested the same cable and the divice with another hard drive and everything works fine.

Satas · 2017-03-28 22:52:20

And the SSD is not recognized on another laptop with arch linux.

seth · 2017-03-29 08:15:10

run "dmesg -w", plug your usb connected SSD1 and watch out for error messages.
Next thing would be to skip the USB adapter and wire the ssd via eSATA or SATA (to another box, if your main device is a notebook w/o resp. connectors or additional slots)

Satas · 2017-03-29 08:26:52

dmesg -w shows no errors at all...

seth · 2017-03-29 08:40:49

Does it show *anything* when plugging the disk? (And what)

Satas · 2017-03-29 08:42:07

No, nothing happens when I plug in the SSD.

R00KIE · 2017-03-29 09:31:10

Satas wrote:

No, nothing happens when I plug in the SSD.

Reboot without the usb ssd plugged in, then plug it in. Get the full output of dmesg and paste it here.

You should also look into how to unbrick that particular ssd. If I had to guess I would say that it got bricked(1) when power was cut off and there might be a way to get it to working again, although it may involve having access to a proper power supply and independent sata port.

(1) If a proper shutdown sequence (from the point of view of the ssd) is not followed you can end up with a corrupted mapping table and the ssd will look dead until you do whatever procedure (if any) to allow it to recover from that.

Satas · 2017-03-29 21:29:47

Hello, it works now again via USB after I plugged it into the laptop and started the old system from it.

So it was a bad shutdown sequence, I think.

Thank you all for help.

Arch Linux

#1 2017-03-28 21:48:44

[SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#2 2017-03-28 22:20:52

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#3 2017-03-28 22:25:45

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#4 2017-03-28 22:40:09

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#5 2017-03-28 22:42:04

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#6 2017-03-28 22:52:20

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#7 2017-03-29 08:15:10

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#8 2017-03-29 08:26:52

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#9 2017-03-29 08:40:49

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#10 2017-03-29 08:42:07

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#11 2017-03-29 09:31:10

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

#12 2017-03-29 21:29:47

Re: [SOLVED] Old System SSD not recognized as External Drive anymore

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