Re: Mistaken partition and format process



On 3/10/08, Douglas A. Tutty <dtutty@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sun, Mar 09, 2008 at 05:32:25PM +1100, hce wrote:
> I am partitioning and formating an external HDD. I made a stupid
> mistake, I called "mkfs.ext3 /dev/md0" before calling "fdisk
> /dev/md0". Now it seems that the process stopped at following last
> line "Writing inode tables: 14/1864":


/dev/md0 would be the first raid array. You have an external drive as
part of a raid array? I'm not saying that its not useful, I'm just
clarifying.

Yes.

Without running fdisk to create a partition, you've attempted to write a
filesystem on the whole device. There shouldn't be a problem with this
so I don't know what the problem is.

The process was freezed at "Writing inode tables: ...", I was afaid to
cause an encosure and external HDD damange if I kill the process. I
waited for 5 hours, the format process was still stuck at the last
line, I have no choice but kill the process before going to sleep. I
could not event kill the process, and could not event turn my PC off,
the whole system was stuck. I had to physically switched the PC power
off. It was a mess.

Anyway, now I am restarting the fdisk and mkfs.ext3. I made only one
partition for the whole 250 G, that the command "mkfs.ext3 /dev/md0"
once again stuck at last line of "Writing inode tables: ...". I can
only thought of following problems:

(a) The partition of 250 G is too big, the debian system or encolusre
or HDD is not eable to do a format on 250 G. Is it correct? If so,
what is the largest the parttion I can make in Debian 4.0 system?

(b) The enclusure or HDD is not functional properly?

(c) My command to partition and format is not correct?

Thanks Doug.


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Relevant Pages

  • Re: Mistaken partition and format process
    ... >> part of a raid array? ... > cause an encosure and external HDD damange if I kill the process. ... > The partition of 250 G is too big, ... > or HDD is not eable to do a format on 250 G. ...
    (Debian-User)
  • Re: Mistaken partition and format process
    ... part of a raid array? ... cause an encosure and external HDD damange if I kill the process. ... The partition of 250 G is too big, ... or HDD is not eable to do a format on 250 G. ...
    (Debian-User)
  • Re: Mistaken partition and format process
    ... >> part of a raid array? ... > cause an encosure and external HDD damange if I kill the process. ... > The partition of 250 G is too big, ... > or HDD is not eable to do a format on 250 G. ...
    (Debian-User)
  • Re: maximum partition size
    ... > What is the maximum partition size for an external HDD? ... I cannot even turn my debian box off. ... Should I try to format the HDD again, ...
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  • Re: debian-user-digest Digest V2003 #2558
    ... I installed Woody on a similar raid array. ... might be /dev/ataraid/d1p1 for disk 1 partition 1. ... and format it. ...
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