Arch Linux

Sloshy

Member

Registered: 2010-04-15

Posts: 56

External USB HDD for /home not mounting (not being detected)

When I used Ubuntu and Linux Mint, I had my /home partition on a separate 1TB HDD connected via USB. If I load up any LiveCD that supports ext4, it can read my drive, and in the Arch LiveCD it can mount and read my drive. When I was installing Arch on my desktop, I set it to re-use my old partition as /home, like I always do. When I finished the setup, I moved to /mnt/home (or wherever the LiveCD/USB mounts it during install) and all of my directories/files were there and read/write-able. However, once I started up my new installation, I get this error during the "Checking Filesystems" part:

The superblock 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 try running e2fsck with an alternate superblock:
     e2fsck -b 8193 <device>

I tried that command and it didn't work. I made sure that the device it didn't mount (/dev/sdc1) had the right device name in /etc/fstab and everything. How come this drive/partition can be mounted just fine in other distributions or liveCDs, but not my Arch installation? Am I missing a driver that might have been on the LiveCD?

Last edited by Sloshy (2010-04-24 05:02:39)

Sloshy

Member

Registered: 2010-04-15

Posts: 56

Re: External USB HDD for /home not mounting (not being detected)

By the way: mounting the drive with the mount command works like a charm. Why wouldn't it check correctly? It always mounted correctly on my other Linux installations.

Sloshy

Member

Registered: 2010-04-15

Posts: 56

Re: External USB HDD for /home not mounting (not being detected)

I tried setting /dev/sdc1 to not check at boot by replacing "1" with "0" in /etc/fstab in the "pass" section, but as it skips checking, it says /dev/sdc1 doesn't exist! How odd. After I logged in as root, I mounted /dev/sdc1 and it worked. I think my problem is more along the lines of "my USB HDD isn't being detected until I log in".

jasonwryan

Anarchist

From: .nz

Registered: 2009-05-09

Posts: 30,424

Website

Re: External USB HDD for /home not mounting (not being detected)

It sounds more like an auto-mounting issue to me. Have you set up you install to do that?

You could start your session with console-kit, add a udev rule etc...

(and rather than serial bumping, you might want to consider editing the OP to add additional info...)

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Arch + dwm   •   Mercurial repos  •   Surfraw

Registered Linux User #482438

chpln

Member

From: Australia

Registered: 2009-09-17

Posts: 361

Re: External USB HDD for /home not mounting (not being detected)

I'd try adding 'usb' to HOOKS in /etc/mkinitcpio.conf and rebuilding the initrd with something like:

# mkinitcpio -p kernel26

Sloshy

Member

Registered: 2010-04-15

Posts: 56

Re: External USB HDD for /home not mounting (not being detected)

I'd try adding 'usb' to HOOKS in /etc/mkinitcpio.conf and rebuilding the initrd with something like:

# mkinitcpio -p kernel26

Thanks! I tried adding it before, but I forgot to run that command. Thanks a million!