pulled drive before unmounted

[Rusty Carruth]

gparted, Under the 'Device/Attempt data rescue' dropdown can attempt to 
find things.  Don't think it can recover, but it can mount them so you 
can copy off.

Backing up a bit, first let me explain a bit about the icon (or at 
least, what I think you're talking about)

So, some systems, when they detect a mountable partition, will put an 
icon on the desktop that allows you to click (double-click?  whatever) 
it and get the partition mounted.

A partition which is already mounted is, by definition, not mountable 
(slight white lie).  So, that same system (should) remove the icon since 
the partition is not mountable.

So, that's why the icon goes away when you mount it manually.

So, don't let that distract you from the major quest, which I believe is 
to make the partition 'work normally'.

First, when you mount it from the command line, do you get a warning of 
some kind?

If not, type 'mount |less' (or, if you just mounted say /dev/sdb1, say 
'mount | grep sdb1') and find your device - does it say ro or rw 
somewhere?  RO means read-only, RW means read-write. I'm guessing your 
device will show RO and not RW.

(here's my /dev/sdb2, mounted normally:

/dev/sdb2 on /home type ext4 (rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro)

Note the rw.  Mounted 'badly' would be:

/dev/sdb2 on /home type ext4 (ro,relatime,errors=remount-ro)

Before you proceed, I highly recommend doing an image backup of the 
device.  If you have space on your hard disk, do the following unmount 
the partition (again, let's say it is /dev/sdb1), then make the image 
copy: dd if=/dev/sdb | gzip > my.device.backup.dd.gz

This uses DD (HIGHLY recommend you check out ddrescue as a better 
alternative!!!!!) to copy, bit-for-bit, everything on the device 
/dev/sdb (note the whole device, not the partition.  You can also copy 
just the partition, which may be useful for other things, by using the 
partition (/dev/sdb1) instead of the device).  By not giving dd an 'of=' 
argument it sends the data to standard output, which you then compress 
and put into the backup file.  If the worst happens and your recovery 
efforts destroy the data on the device, you can restore it.  One reason 
for ALSO saving just the partition is that you can create a partition 
somewhere on a disk and write that partition image there...

Ok, so you've got your backup.  You can try fsck and whatever else 
(someone says that 'disk drill press kit' can do wonders, I have not 
tried it myself) to try to fix the problem.  A lot depends upon what 
mount said when you mounted it manually.

Worst case, copy all the files off the device.  Make sure everything is 
there...  then either get a new drive and put the data on it, or 
reformat the old one.  I tend to keep old drives in that state laying 
around, but then if you did the image backup with dd you have, in 
effect, the original device just without the hardware...

Hopefully enough of that made sense to get you going!

On 11/7/24 09:03, Michael via PLUG-discuss wrote:
> No luck. I did that and it is just running me around by the balls. I can
> mount and view the files from the terminal but not the GUI. When I mount
> the drive the icon disappears and when I double click the icon I get the
> original error message.
>
> On Thu, Nov 7, 2024 at 8:10 AM <techlists at phpcoderusa.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi Mike,
>>
>> Have no idea what you are dealing with.
>>
>> I went to https://chatgpt.com/
>>
>> And entered "bad superblock...., missing codepage or helper program, or
>> other error".
>>
>> Chat responded with a bunch of information.  Enter at your own risk.
>>
>> Keith
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On 2024-11-07 06:03, Michael via PLUG-discuss wrote:
>>> it says '... bad superblock...., missing codepage or helper program,
>>> or other error'. it's probably the superblock and if I remember right
>>> that can be fixed. Can someone tell me how to do so?
>>>
>>> On Thu, Nov 7, 2024 at 7:55 AM Michael <bmike1 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> I screwed up. I clicked the unmount button, waited a couple of
>>>> seconds, and then pulled the drive. Well, the unmount hadn't
>>>> completed! I plugged the drive in but it won't open. OOpS! Anything
>>>> I can do to save the drive and the information on it?
>>> --
>>>
>>> :-)~MIKE~(-:
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