[Leaplist] Floppy problem in Lenny - Debian-RichardO

Whit Hansell skipper44 at comcast.net
Wed Jul 11 21:24:26 EDT 2007


Richard F. Ostrow Jr. wrote:
<snip>
>>> Interesting... If this were a kernel that you compiled yourself, I'd
>>> recommend verifying that you have codepage 437 compiled in... but I
>>> can't
>>> imagine that anyone would release a kernel with a distro without that,
>>> and
>>> I'd tend to think you'd be running into all sorts of other problems if
>>> that were the case. I'm going to keep this possibility at the back of my
>>> mind as we try other things...
>>>       
>
> This is starting to look more like the problem, but I'd be flabberghasted
> (sp?) if that were the case. More likely it's not an msdos fs (probably
> vfat). Anyways, to knock this out if it were the case would be non-trivial
> - you'd have to compile a new kernel from sources with codepage 437
> support. Like I said, I don't believe that's the problem here, I'm just
> stating possibilities (admittedly distant) because I'm running out of
> ideas.
>
>   
Yeah, Richard.  I've got no idea even how to do a compile.  I guess I 
could try it later to see how to do it but not right now.  I'm thinking, 
if and when I have time, to grab another (used) drive I have around here 
and do a netinstall of the current Lenny on it and transfer all my files 
over and use it and see what happens w. it.  I just got it from a friend 
who had a box w. a bad Northbridge chip and a dead boot drive and I 
checked out the  "backup" drive on a PII box and it works fine.  I don't 
know.  Let's see what happens here.  Like you, I think something is 
hosed somewhere.
>>>> brightsun:/# dmesg | tail
>>>> FAT: bogus number of reserved sectors
>>>> VFS: Can't find a valid FAT filesystem on dev fd0.
>>>> FAT: bogus number of reserved sectors
>>>> VFS: Can't find a valid FAT filesystem on dev fd0.
>>>>
>>>>         
>>> Pretty clear it's not reading correctly... the question is why?
>>>
>>>
>>>       
>>>> <snip>
>>>>         
>>> What's in your /etc/fstab file for the floppy? You can get that pretty
>>> quick with a "grep fd0 /etc/fstab".
>>>
>>>
>>>       
>> brightsun:/# grep fd0 /etc/fstab
>> /dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  auto    rw,user,noauto  0       0
>> /dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  msdos   rw,user,noauto  0       0
>> /dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  ext3    rw,user,noauto  0       0
>>
>> The "auto" was the default and I added the other two, the "msdos" to see
>> if it would force a mount and the "ext3" in case I could get access to
>> the floppy drive, I could possibly, later, start using some ext3
>> formatted floppies if I wanted to do so.  Anyway, so far, nuttin's helped.
>>     
>
> Hmm... not sure what mount would do with 3 different lines of the same
> source device and the same destination mount point. Theoretically, the
> first line *should* work fine, including ext3 support if you had an ext3
> floppy.
>
>   
I wouldn't have done this but somewhere I read in a forum that it was 
possible to add those lines to the fstab file and it would not hurt, in 
case one was having problems w. the "auto" read, that the mount command 
would go thru the list and that it was not a problem.  After I put those 
lines in there was no difference in the error codes I received back so I 
didn't think there was a problem with them.   I did not add "vfat" 
because from what I had read, there are few real vfat formats out there 
anymore.  That Windows uses the msdos/fat format most recently. 
>>> Also, try the following and see if it works:
>>>
>>> "mount -t vfat /dev/fd0 /media/floppy0"
>>>
>>> Maybe the fs is incorrect?
>>>
>>>
>>>       
>> brightsun:/# mount -t vfat /dev/fd0 /media/floppy0
>> mount: /dev/fd0 is not a valid block device
>>     
>
> This really perplexes me... unless fd0 is a bad symlink to the device.
> What does an "ls -l /dev/fd0" reveal? Does it point somewhere else? Does
> the spot where it's pointing actually exist? Mine is a symlink pointing to
> "floppy/0", which would translate to /dev/floppy/0.
>
>   
brightsun:/# ls -l /dev/fd0
brw-rw---- 1 root floppy 2, 0 2007-07-10 16:01 /dev/fd0

brightsun:/dev# ls fd0
fd0

> One more thing to try is to see if the device works *at all*. Here's where
> you get to try formatting ext3... put a blank disk in there and run
> "mke2fs -j /dev/fd0" (not sure if -j would work with so little space, but
> that's what makes the difference between ext2 and ext3. If not, just take
> -j out). You should at least see the drive fire up, and if it finishes
> successfully, you should be able to mount it as an ext3 (or 2) filesystem.
>
>   
This one was done w. a floppy disk that I didn't seem to be able to 
access but I know had been formatted previously using DOS.....

brightsun:/# mke2fs -j /dev/fd0
mke2fs 1.40-WIP (14-Nov-2006)
/dev/fd0: Not enough space to build proposed filesystem while setting up 
superblock

This is using a floppy that I formatted today w. DOS on another linux 
box I have using kfloppy formatter and was successful as to what that 
program stated.  So I'm sticking this in w. DOS already formatted on it 
and now trying to put ext2 on it.

brightsun:/# mke2fs -j /dev/fd0
mke2fs 1.40-WIP (14-Nov-2006)
Filesystem label=
OS type: Linux
Block size=1024 (log=0)
Fragment size=1024 (log=0)
184 inodes, 1440 blocks
72 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user
First data block=1
Maximum filesystem blocks=1572864
1 block group
8192 blocks per group, 8192 fragments per group
184 inodes per group

Writing inode tables: done

Filesystem too small for a journal
Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done

This filesystem will be automatically checked every 32 mounts or
180 days, whichever comes first.  Use tune2fs -c or -i to override.

Then I tried to mount it ext2....

brightsun:/# mount -t ext2 /dev/fd0 /media/floppy0
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/fd0,
       missing codepage or other error
       In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try
       dmesg | tail  or so

So I ran dmesg | tail and received....

brightsun:/# dmesg | tail
DROPPED IN=eth0 OUT= MAC=ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:00:0f:3d:4f:72:96:08:00 
SRC=192.168.0.102 DST=192.168.0.255 LEN=235 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=63 
ID=0 DF PROTO=UDP SPT=138 DPT=138 LEN=215
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 0, sector 18, size 2
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 1, sector 1, size 2
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 1, sector 2, size 2
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 1, sector 3, size 2
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 1, sector 3, size 2
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 1, sector 3, size 2
end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 20
EXT2-fs error (device fd0): ext2_get_inode: unable to read inode block - 
inode=2, block=10
EXT2-fs: corrupt root inode, run e2fsck

So I tried to do another format in ext2....

brightsun:/# mke2fs -j /dev/fd0
mke2fs 1.40-WIP (14-Nov-2006)
Warning: could not erase sector 2: Attempt to write block from 
filesystem resulted in short write
Filesystem label=
OS type: Linux
Block size=1024 (log=0)
Fragment size=1024 (log=0)
184 inodes, 1440 blocks
72 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user
First data block=1
Maximum filesystem blocks=1572864
1 block group
8192 blocks per group, 8192 fragments per group
184 inodes per group

Warning: could not read block 0: Attempt to read block from filesystem 
resulted in short read
Warning: could not erase sector 0: Attempt to write block from 
filesystem resulted in short write
Writing inode tables: 0/1
Could not write 8 blocks in inode table starting at 10: Attempt to write 
block from filesystem resulted in short write


So then I tried another mount...

brightsun:/# mount -t ext2 /dev/fd0 /media/floppy0
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/fd0,
       missing codepage or other error
       In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try
       dmesg | tail  or so

brightsun:/# dmesg | tail
floppy0: data CRC error: track 0, head 0, sector 2, size 2
floppy0: data CRC error: track 0, head 0, sector 2, size 2
end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 1
floppy0: data CRC error: track 0, head 0, sector 17, size 2
floppy0: data CRC error: track 0, head 0, sector 17, size 2
end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 16
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 0, sector 3, size 2
floppy0: sector not found: track 0, head 0, sector 3, size 2
end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 2
EXT2-fs: unable to read superblock

I don't know.  This is goofy.  Richard I really appreciate all your help.

Whit



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