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external hdd disapeared

I have a hdd attached to my server. It’s sda but has 2 partitions so sda1 @16M and sda2 @3.6T It defaulted to being in the location /media/devmon so I kept that and it worked for ages. Suddenly the data is gone. I had files located here: /media/devmon/4tb_drive/kiwix/zim and that directory is now empty. But I put the drive into a Windows box, and everything was there.

When I run mount /dev/sda2 /media/devmon/ it says:


<span style="color:#323232;">The disk contains an unclean file system (0, 0).
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Metadata kept in Windows cache, refused to mount.
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Falling back to read-only mount because the NTFS partition is in an
</span><span style="color:#323232;">unsafe state. Please resume and shutdown Windows fully (no hibernation
</span><span style="color:#323232;">or fast restarting.)
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Could not mount read-write, trying read-only
</span>

I originally formatted this drive in Windows, is that the issue? Ideally I’d use btrfs or zfs not ntfs, but here we are.

How do I get access again?

abominable_panda ,

I find if I have NTFS problems, throw it back on windows, do a disk repair then come back to Linux.

Also remember to fully shut down (not sleep or hibernate) windows before removing the disk so windows doesn’t lock up anything

Edit: the error actually tells you the latter of what I mentioned… So back to windows you go for a shutdown before removal

muhyb ,

If you can access it on Windows, that’s a good thing and all you need is a disk repair there. If you cannot access it even on Windows, you’ll need file recovery (and another 4TB disk).

However, note that there is a good chance for NTFS disks to get corrupted on Linux if you unmount them without getting the notification that indicates it’s safe to remove the disk.

So I really recommend you to find a temporary disk (or buy a new one) and copy everything to it and format your disk as a Linux file system of your choice and move your files to it, before you get a real headache with NTFS (talking out of experience).

Also note that, it’s possible for NTFS disks become inaccessible if fastboot option is enabled for Windows on BIOS, if so disable it.

markus ,

@Dust0741 sometimes this can help -> in a linux console: ntfsfix -b -d /dev/sda1 oder ntfsfix -b -d /dev/sda2.

undrwater ,

I used this when my son’s computer wouldn’t boot after a Windows update. None of Microsoft’s tools would repair the disk.

I attached it to mine and ran ntfsfix on it. Success!

Dust0741 OP , 

<span style="color:#323232;">root@skynet:~# ntfsfix -b -d /dev/sda1  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Mounting volume... NTFS signature is missing.  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">FAILED  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Attempting to correct errors... NTFS signature is missing.  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">FAILED  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Failed to startup volume: Invalid argument  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">NTFS signature is missing.  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Trying the alternate boot sector  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Unrecoverable error  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Volume is corrupt. You should run chkdsk.  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">
</span><span style="color:#323232;">root@skynet:~# ntfsfix -b -d /dev/sda2  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Mounting volume... OK  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Processing of $MFT and $MFTMirr completed successfully.  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Checking the alternate boot sector... OK  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">NTFS volume version is 3.1.  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Going to un-mark the bad clusters ($BadClus)... No bad clusters...OK  
</span><span style="color:#323232;">NTFS partition /dev/sda2 was processed successfully.
</span>

turned off windows quick start ran chkdks D: and waited…then shut down and put drive back into linux and reboot. still no

any ideas? clearly not the larger partition, which is good.

ryannathans ,

Read the error and do what it says? Lol

Dust0741 OP ,

i mean i did

andho ,
@andho@akkoma.andho.xyz avatar

@Dust0741 @linux also you should disable fast boot in windows which is similar to hibernate and cause this issue.

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