On 21-Aug-06 Adam Bower wrote:
On Mon, Aug 21, 2006 at 06:45:18PM +0100, Barry Samuels wrote:
smartd[6119]: Device: /dev/hda, 1 Currently unreadable (pending) sectors smartd[6119]: Device: /dev/hda, 1 Offline uncorrectable sectors
Do the above error messages indicate any serious (potential) problems?
My gut instinct is that the error message you've got is telling you "disk is fubar" If I were you i'd be backing up right about now "just in case" (if you can backup that is) before trying to fix the problem.
The smartctl tool should be able to tell you exactly what the disk thinks the problem is (or indeed if it thinks there is a problem in the first place).
Thanks Adam
I'm not familiar with SMART/smartd; but experience with ordinary ext2 and e2fsck whispered "Short Read" in my ear when I saw the above. Also known as "Bad blocks". In which case you have a bad block somewhere.
If that's the case, then all is not lost, since the rest of the disk is probaboly fine after the filesystem is mended.
But in any case, Adam's advice is good: mistrust your drive; it may get worse; it may fail altogether sometime. So back it up and think of maybe replacing the disk (but also think of other sources of the problem, e.g. dodgy RAM, disk controller or motherboard, since these can write corrupt data to the disk).
Also don't forget that the season of Limothrips cerealium (Cereal thrips, aka thunderflies) is only just finished. These very tiny insects are very prevalent in East Anglia, especially in wheat growing areas, and are flushed out in vast numbers by harvesting and thundery weather. They can get inside literally anything, no matter how firmly sealed you think it is!
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thysanoptera for a brief account of some hardware problems (by no means an exhaustive list ... ) that they can cause.
If you find what looks like a sprinkling of black particles on surfaces, inside picture frames, etc., then you've probably got some inside your computer too.
Good luck! Ted.
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