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I'm formatting a new 1TB HDD with a single dos partition; sdb1.

Typing sudo e2fsck -f /dev/sdb1:

$ sudo e2fsck -f /dev/sdb1

e2fsck 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
ext2fs_open2: Bad magic number in super-block
e2fsck: Superblock invalid, trying backup blocks...
e2fsck: Bad magic number in super-block while trying to open /dev/sdb1


The superblock could not be read or does not describe a valid ext2/ext3/ext4
filesystem.  If the device is valid and it really contains an ext2/ext3/ext4
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>
 or
    e2fsck -b 32768 <device>

I have a single partition, no extended partitions. I'm not sure what this message refers to. I have tried a variety of suggestions without success.

Is there an error or does this refer only to (nonexistent) extended partitions? Should I ignore this and continue and expand the space using resize2fs?

matigo
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Norm Norton
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1 Answers1

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To format a disk as ext4 (the default for Ubuntu), you could do it like this:

sudo mkfs -t ext4 /dev/sdb1

The e2fsck command is used to check partitions for errors. As there is no valid partition to check, there is technically an error.

matigo
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