Arch Linux

jlacroix

Member

Registered: 2009-08-16

Posts: 576

Perhaps Arch hates large hard drives, or mine is defective?

Hello everyone, I've been having a really strange issue for a few weeks now and need guidance. First and foremost I purchased a Seagate 1.5TB hard drive for my Arch box. There were reports of that drive having issues with Raid, however I don't use RAID so I figured I would buy it and save the money.

However I've been having a few minor issue. First of all, one out of every five boots (or so) GRUB will freeze on "Grub Loading Stage 2". When that happens, I just reset my box and it boots up fine. Every time I start my computer there is a chance it will freeze at that point.

One time when I started my computer, Arch started to complain about sectors and it took FOREVER to boot. After a restart, Arch loads up VERY fast and normal. I can't repeat this problem.

Anyway, to test this I loaded up Seagate's diagnostic tool, and I ran the quick test three times and even the long test three times. Each and every time it reports that there is nothing wrong with the drive and that SMART has never been tripped.

So if Seagate's diagnostic is saying that the drive is fine, but Arch complained at least once about sectors and every now and then freezes at "Grub Loading Stage 2" what might the problem be?

Any help would be appreciated. Sometimes the smallest problems drive me the most nuts.

perbh

Member

From: Republic of Texas

Registered: 2005-03-04

Posts: 765

Re: Perhaps Arch hates large hard drives, or mine is defective?

Your post does not tell us much!!
At least give us the partitions and filesystems you use.

Acecero

Member

Registered: 2008-06-21

Posts: 1,373

Re: Perhaps Arch hates large hard drives, or mine is defective?

So if Seagate's diagnostic is saying that the drive is fine, but Arch complained at least once about sectors and every now and then freezes at "Grub Loading Stage 2" what might the problem be?

Try restoring grub again and then see what happens.

jlacroix

Member

Registered: 2009-08-16

Posts: 576

Re: Perhaps Arch hates large hard drives, or mine is defective?

So if Seagate's diagnostic is saying that the drive is fine, but Arch complained at least once about sectors and every now and then freezes at "Grub Loading Stage 2" what might the problem be?

Try restoring grub again and then see what happens.

Thank you for the reply. I have reinstalled Grub, twice actually. Sorry for not mentioning that earlier.

Acecero

Member

Registered: 2008-06-21

Posts: 1,373

Re: Perhaps Arch hates large hard drives, or mine is defective?

When you applied the setup in the grub interface, did you get any signs of missing *stage1_5 files? That's probably be why you get stuck with those messages.

jlacroix

Member

Registered: 2009-08-16

Posts: 576

Re: Perhaps Arch hates large hard drives, or mine is defective?

When you applied the setup in the grub interface, did you get any signs of missing *stage1_5 files? That's probably be why you get stuck with those messages.

I tried it again just now so I could provide output. Please note that grub is installed on hd0,0.

    GNU GRUB  version 0.97  (640K lower / 3072K upper memory)

 [ Minimal BASH-like line editing is supported.  For the first word, TAB
   lists possible command completions.  Anywhere else TAB lists the possible
   completions of a device/filename. ]

grub> root (hd0,0)
 Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0x83

grub> setup (hd0)
 Checking if "/boot/grub/stage1" exists... no
 Checking if "/grub/stage1" exists... yes
 Checking if "/grub/stage2" exists... yes
 Checking if "/grub/e2fs_stage1_5" exists... yes
 Running "embed /grub/e2fs_stage1_5 (hd0)"... failed (this is not fatal)
 Running "embed /grub/e2fs_stage1_5 (hd0,0)"... failed (this is not fatal)
 Running "install /grub/stage1 (hd0) /grub/stage2 p /grub/menu.lst "... succeed
ed
Done.

grub>

I want to re-emphasize that it doesn't freeze at Stage 2 during boot every time, it fails around once in every five boots or so.