OS-level? fsck ntfs

[Fester Bestertester]

I have a 2TB NTFS external USB drive, and one file appears to be corrupted. I suspect a disk fault, but cannot confirm or isolate. What recourse do I have?

[Snowhog]

Try installing package ntfsfix (a command line utility).

See ntfsfix - fix common errors and force Windows to check NTFS

[Fester Bestertester]

Tried that. Got back a message saying it checked alternate boot sector OK, and all was well. Subsequent boot of Win (10) didn't run chkdsk. ntfsfix doesn't have a parameter to force whatever flag forces windows to run chkdsk. Ran it anyway, and got a brief glimpse of chkdsk saying disk is corrupt, can't proceed. Where to now?

[Rod J]

In Windows try running chkdsk in a command line box/terminal. Then you will get to see what the output is. Alternatively, you can find the chkdsk report in the Windows error logging app (find it in Control Panel, admin section I think). I don't use Windows much, especially Windows 10, so I'm a bit rusty with the Windows terminology (I used to know more, but I've forgotten a lot through lack of use these days ).

[Rod J]

BTW, I've had minor problems with an external USB drive (NTFS formatted) after backing up a lot of stuff from Kubuntu. In Kubuntu everything is fine, but reading it from Windows it complains about bad file names or similar. It happens because some filenames are perfectly legal in Linux land but Windows throws a hissy fit about them.

Hopefully, in your case the corruption might be as minor as filename problems.