New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

JoeKer · 2009-11-18 21:42:48

I just installed arch for the first time and followed everything very carefully. They only part that i was heasitant about was where to install the MBR. I installed it on the SDA. not sda 1 or sda2 ect.......i think that is what went wrong but dont know how to fix it.....or it might be something completely different. can someone help?

urist · 2009-11-18 22:16:18

Reboot again. I think it always "fails" to force a reboot or something.

It actually is successful, though.

Last edited by urist (2009-11-18 22:17:06)

JoeKer · 2009-11-18 22:34:57

nope, stil the same. Exact error is /dev/dsk/by-labe/root: the fsuperblock could not be read or does not describe a correct ext2 filesystem. If the device is valid and it really contains an ext2 filesystem (and not swap or ufs or something else), then the superblock is corrupt and you might want to try running e2fsck with an alternate superblock.

one question i have is that i use ext4 as the file system......and it is prompting for ext2 .....

.:B:. · 2009-11-18 23:14:22

It seems to be good practice to keep a separate /boot partition if you use ext4 for your root partition. Maybe you should try that.

This is what the Arch wiki says about Ext4 and GRUB:

Warning: Booting from an ext4 partition is not 'officially' supported by GRUB, and GRUB2 is still under development. While GRUB does currently work, the 'safe' option is to boot from an ext2 or ext3 /boot partition. CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED!

JoeKer · 2009-11-18 23:27:27

alright, that makes sense....i do have a separate boot partition.....is there a way to rewrite just the boot partition?

.:B:. · 2009-11-18 23:39:48

Define 'rewrite'? I presume you mean copy data to some temporary location, reformat, move data back, re-install GRUB?

JoeKer · 2009-11-18 23:43:41

sort of.....is there a way to take the current /boot partition, copy it, format the /boot partition to ext2 or ext3 then put all the data back on boot

.:B:. · 2009-11-18 23:50:54

Of course there is... What you need are the following commands: cp or mv, mkfs.ext{2,3} and grub-install. Make sure you adapt /etc/fstab to the changes you make. I assume that you are mildly familiar with how cp or mv work. If not, consult the manuals (man cp, man mv), they are avaiable online too.

Refer to the wiki on how to perform a GRUB reinstallation correctly.

JoeKer · 2009-11-18 23:59:33

its saying not found when i try to move everything in /boot .....any ideas?

fsckd · 2009-11-19 16:48:02

Of course, /boot must exist before you can copy it. How are you trying to access your system, assuming you can not boot into it?

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 18:08:32

fsckd wrote:

Of course, /boot must exist before you can copy it. How are you trying to access your system, assuming you can not boot into it?

right.....i did the automaticaly partition option and i am pretty sure /boot was one of them....i cannot boot into my system.....it gets stuck at checking file systems... the exact error is in one of my last posts.. any ideas?

fsckd · 2009-11-19 18:15:53

Oh oops, looks like GRUB is able to find your system. Ok, one possible solution is the have your devices located by UUID or by label. There's a link to a wiki article on it which is posted every so often.

Edit: First question, what is your grub entry? Second question, what is your fstab?

Last edited by fsckd (2009-11-19 18:20:15)

tdy · 2009-11-19 18:16:25

I don't know if this guy actually knew what he was talking about, but you can try this:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions … d.-502119/

Last edited by tdy (2009-11-19 18:17:34)

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 18:18:07

i set them up with the by-label option as /dev/disk/by-label/root, /deb/disk/by-label/root, ect but its not finding them......

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 18:23:05

tdy wrote:

I don't know if this guy actually knew what he was talking about, but you can try this:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions … d.-502119/

i didnt set any to noauto like this person.....just defaults so they all should mount at boot.....i read through the whole wiki and followed everything to a t almost and i have experience with other distros of linux which is what lead me to arch to try to build a custom OS.....i have tried a lot of things here and i am pretty sure its because everything is formatted as ext4 (grub apparently doesnt support ext4.....so i really just want to rewrite the /boot partition as ext 2 or 3 and be done with it but cant figure out how to do this.....can anyone tell me exactly what is written in boot? could i boot into a live cd and try to fix it from there? (like system rescue cd)

fsckd · 2009-11-19 18:28:42

Grub gives a different error if it can't find your partition. So I'm fairly certain grub is fine. Also you're not getting a kernel panic, so root is definitely found. My above edit came a bit late, so please post your grub menu entry and fstab.

reed9 · 2009-11-19 18:33:19

I believe I've encountered the same problem.

Does it prompt you with something like "Press Enter to continue or enter root password for maintenance"?

I just entered the root password and then

fsck /dev/sd(x)

Where /dev/sd(x) is the partition listed in the error. Had to do it twice, once for root and once for home. Then reboot.

fsckd · 2009-11-19 18:34:23

To answer your question on reformatting the boot partition, using a different linux system, mount it, perhaps on /mnt/brokenboot. Then, copy the files over to another disk by cp -rp /mnt/brokenboot /anotherdisk/. Unmount the broken boot. Format it using mke2fs. Mount it again. Copy the files back. You may need to reinstall grub afterwords.

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 18:37:25

reed9 wrote:

I believe I've encountered the same problem.
Does it prompt you with something like "Press Enter to continue or enter root password for maintenance"?
I just entered the root password and then
fsck /dev/sd(x)
Where /dev/sd(x) is the partition listed in the error. Had to do it twice, once for root and once for home. Then reboot.

yes, that is correct...and here is another thing guys, booted into rescuecd and opened gparted, my boot partition is ext2.......

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 18:43:20

fsckd wrote:

To answer your question on reformatting the boot partition, using a different linux system, mount it, perhaps on /mnt/brokenboot. Then, copy the files over to another disk by cp -rp /mnt/brokenboot /anotherdisk/. Unmount the broken boot. Format it using mke2fs. Mount it again. Copy the files back. You may need to reinstall grub afterwords.

i would do that but boot is ext2.....it ooks lke the problem is wth the superblock of root.....any ideas?

fsckd · 2009-11-19 18:51:41

JoeKer wrote:

fsckd wrote:
To answer your question on reformatting the boot partition, using a different linux system, mount it, perhaps on /mnt/brokenboot. Then, copy the files over to another disk by cp -rp /mnt/brokenboot /anotherdisk/. Unmount the broken boot. Format it using mke2fs. Mount it again. Copy the files back. You may need to reinstall grub afterwords.
i would do that but boot is ext2.....it ooks lke the problem is wth the superblock of root.....any ideas?

Then why did you write this:

JoeKer wrote:

so i really just want to rewrite the /boot partition as ext 2 or 3 and be done with it but cant figure out how to do this.....can anyone tell me exactly what is written in boot? could i boot into a live cd and try to fix it from there? (like system rescue cd)

Meh, figure out what your problem is before asking for help, and when people ask you for more info, give it.

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 19:17:39

i had not booted into a live cd at that time.......and to be honest i didnt completely understand the error i was getting. When i booted into rescuecd it showed me that there isnt anything wrong with boot but there is clearly something wrong with root (according to the error i was getting...i really want to figure this out.....i located all of the superblocks within root but i dont know if this will help as im not really sure how to point the system to a different superblock. any ideas on what to do with this info?

superblock 0, block size=4096 []

superblock 32768, block size=4096 []

superblock 163840, block size=4096 []

superblock 229376, block size=4096 []

superblock 294912, block size=4096 []

superblock 819200, block size=4096 []

superblock 884736, block size=4096 []

superblock 1605632, block size=4096 []

JoeKer · 2009-11-19 19:33:37

ok, i tried running e2fsck with a different super block and it gave the output that it file system was edited and prompted the reboot...but after the reboot im getting the same error......any ideas......i know the superblcks are there but for some reason it isnt working....maybe im not running the command correctly......

.:B:. · 2009-11-21 14:09:46

JoeKer, at this stage of the installation I think it's best you do a complete reinstall and split out /boot from the beginning. The option to use a different superblock is -b [superblock], but I guess you already figured that out.

Note that a Live CD showing your partition as okay does not mean it will boot. After all, that Live CD didn't boot from that same partition.

If you want to get this fixed, show us the contents of your /boot partition. It should contain GRUB's files and the kernel and cpio image.

JoeKer1086 · 2009-11-21 16:17:27

Yes, i agree...i will just try a fresh install...ill let you know how it goes.

Arch Linux

#1 2009-11-18 21:42:48

New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#2 2009-11-18 22:16:18

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#3 2009-11-18 22:34:57

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#4 2009-11-18 23:14:22

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#5 2009-11-18 23:27:27

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#6 2009-11-18 23:39:48

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#7 2009-11-18 23:43:41

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#8 2009-11-18 23:50:54

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#9 2009-11-18 23:59:33

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#10 2009-11-19 16:48:02

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#11 2009-11-19 18:08:32

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#12 2009-11-19 18:15:53

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#13 2009-11-19 18:16:25

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#14 2009-11-19 18:18:07

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#15 2009-11-19 18:23:05

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#16 2009-11-19 18:28:42

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#17 2009-11-19 18:33:19

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#18 2009-11-19 18:34:23

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#19 2009-11-19 18:37:25

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#20 2009-11-19 18:43:20

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#21 2009-11-19 18:51:41

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#22 2009-11-19 19:17:39

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#23 2009-11-19 19:33:37

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#24 2009-11-21 14:09:46

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

#25 2009-11-21 16:17:27

Re: New install fails at checking file system. HELP!

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