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I have a computer with an SSD running my operating system and an HDD to store most data and work.

Up until yesterday, my hard drive appeared under /mnt/feynman as of today it is appearing as an empty file, with nothing inside. I also notice that it shows no writing privileges and I can't recall if this is normal

(base) andrew@Galileo:/mnt$ ll
total 12
drwxr-xr-x  3 root root 4096 Jan 23  2019 ./
drwxr-xr-x 24 root root 4096 Jan 23  2019 ../
drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Jan 23  2019 feynman/
(base) andrew@Galileo:/mnt$

Trying to see the disk read/write speed halts and never returns a value (within reasonable run times) and I have to force stop the check

(base) andrew@Galileo:/mnt/feynman$ sudo dd
^C0+0 records in
0+0 records out
0 bytes copied, 49.8495 s, 0.0 kB/s

(base) andrew@Galileo:/mnt/feynman$

I ran a file check on the HDD which seemed like it had good results but I don't understand most of it and so I'm not sure. It resulted in no noticeable changes.

(base) andrew@Galileo:/mnt/feynman$ sudo fsck /mnt/feynman
fsck from util-linux 2.31.1
e2fsck 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
/dev/sdb1: recovering journal
JBD2: Invalid checksum recovering block 3 in log
Journal checksum error found in /dev/sdb1
/dev/sdb1 was not cleanly unmounted, check forced.
Pass 1: Checking inodes, blocks, and sizes
Pass 2: Checking directory structure
Pass 3: Checking directory connectivity
/lost+found not found.  Create<y>? yes

Pass 4: Checking reference counts
Pass 5: Checking group summary information
Free blocks count wrong (237959002, counted=229407456).
Fix<y>? yes
Free inodes count wrong (61048534, counted=61048424).
Fix<y>? yes

/dev/sdb1: ***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
/dev/sdb1: 6552/61054976 files (0.7% non-contiguous), 14782752/244190208 blocks
(base) andrew@Galileo:/mnt/feynman$

From folder browser checking properties shows that volume is unknown

Volume of drive shows nothing

The fact that dd returns nothing makes me feel that this is a connection issue and that I should try swapping the SATA cable and see if its a wiring issue.

Are there other good checks to run? Do the shown snippets seem to suggest a hardware malfunction? Is there hope for my HDD to be recovered?

akozi
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1 Answers1

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I fixed the problem by replacing the SATA cable. I think if anyone runs into the issue and has similar test results this would be a good place to start. The fact that it showed the HDD but had no transfer speeds is possibly a good identifier that the SATA cable is broken or perhaps just got jiggled loose.

Probably also worth investing in a backup hard-drive for the future as well.

Hope this helps someone in the future, cheers.

EDIT: Also I realize that based on the solution it was not a UBUNTU issue, bu someone that runs into this in the future may falsely identify it as one as I did. I feel because of that it has merit to stay up but if requested I can delete the post.

akozi
  • 131