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**dibl** · May 31, 2009, 06:57 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Doing so for my "/" partition, it comes up with a gazillion "imode" errors or something to that effect. Finally, when it finishes, I reboot.

inode errors indicate a serious problem with your filesystem (on the hard drive).

You may have a hard drive going bad, or a faulty installation CD, or some other hardware issue -- your problem is not software, yet.

**lightheat** · May 31, 2009, 07:09 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Thanks for the response. Do you have any suggestions for how I might test the HDD? Any utilities you particularly like? I think I'll start with the Seagate ones.

**dibl** · May 31, 2009, 07:19 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Yep, your Seagate utilities should work. You need to do an extended surface test -- inode errors means the filesystem format is not surviving very many re-writes, or something like that.

For Linux, here's the method:

http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3097029.0

**lightheat** · May 31, 2009, 08:31 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Edit: SeaTools - passed both the long and short tests with no errors.

I'll try the smartmontools short test, but something tells me the long test on that won't tell me much different than the manufacturer's utility.

So if the hard drive is good, what else could be causing all these errors? Should I do a more thorough erasure with dban and start over with a different arrangement of partitions and installation parameters? (i.e. Could that be it?)

**lightheat** · May 31, 2009, 09:43 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

lol so much for that.

Code:

root:~#apt-get install smartmontools
Reading package lists... Error!
E: Could not open file /var/lib/dpkg/status - open (2 No such file or directory)
E: The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.

**Telengard** · May 31, 2009, 10:05 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Your computer's motherboard could be failing. It's only a guess, but nothing you've posted in this thread eliminates that possibility. I have experienced motherboard failure which caused file system corruption, and the things you've written here remind me of that bad experience.

**lightheat** · May 31, 2009, 10:33 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Well, that would be uh really bad :P, but given that BIOS is still operating, GRUB still loads, and Windows seems to work fine (not to mention that it was humming right along before I swapped the HDD and reinstalled things), I have a feeling it has to do with hardware incompatibilities rather than a mobo failure. And since I don't have the capabilities to swap it out or test it without shelling out major $$$ to Lenovo, I'd like to exhaust all other possibilities first. Thank you for the idea, though. (I think lol. Not exactly a comforting thought to have floating through a tech's head. ...just kidding, I do appreciate it.)

I'm tempted to try an Ubuntu disc or the 32-bit version of Kubuntu. I've been using 64-bit-- probably should've mentioned that (although the CPU is a Core 2 Duo T7300-- perfectly 64-bit compatible).

I'm secretly hoping a T61 user floats past this topic via google for similar problems, but the more ideas the better.

I'm going to flatten the HDD again tonight, and I think I'll do just a flat re-install of Kubuntu; no dual-boot, just Kubuntu. I'm sure I'll have more to update with by tomorrow afternoon. Thanks for the replies, you two. I'll be back with more later. (Haven't given up quite yet.

)

**kevinc** · Jun 01, 2009, 08:50 AM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Have you checked the MD5sum of the CD image before burning the CD? This is more reliable than the integrity check after the CD is burned.

**lightheat** · Jun 01, 2009, 09:20 AM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Originally posted by kevinc

Have you checked the MD5sum of the CD image before burning the CD? This is more reliable than the integrity check after the CD is burned.

Yes, I already have, and the SHA1 and CRC-32 hashes. They all match, every time. In addition, torrent files contain the hash of the original file, and utorrent automatically hashes the downloaded file and compares it.

Good idea, though!

Edit: Also, while checking the sum prior to burning is a good idea, checking the integrity after the burn is somewhat different, kind of like the data verification step after burning (which also passed). The image could have been perfect, but that still doesn't account for errors in the burn. I say this less for you and more for other novices like me who might read this. Still a good idea to be sure. =)

**lightheat** · Jun 01, 2009, 02:14 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Edit: I babble, so important stuff is in blue.

OK, so here's the update: I flattened the HD last night with dban. (I was curious how long dban would take on a 320 GB 7200rpm drive for the DoD short wipe (excessive, I know, but just look what I've been dealing with lol); since no google search could tell me, I'll make my contribution to say it took 6.5 hours.)

I reinstalled Kubuntu this afternoon with no special partitioning options-- just "Use the entire disk." And like magic, everything worked great. Bluetooth still crashed applying the updates, but a simple restart did the trick. I even installed the ubuntu-desktop, just 'cause I was curious. Of course, then I couldn't get rid of all the ubuntu packages once I wanted it gone, but no matter. I read that I was supposed to use "sudo apt-get autoremove," but it didn't do anything.

After farting around with everything, I formatted again (this HDD's getting quite the "break-in" period). I have a feeling that all along it really had to do with my crazy partitioning. I'm really not going to experience that big of a boost from separate partitions for everything-- I'm not running a server. The default install made only two partitions of the entire space: an ext3 primary partition for the root, and a memory-capacity-equivalent logical partition (which I thought was interesting) for the swap. That's it. I have a sneaking suspicion that it was my 100MB boot partition in particular that was causing a good deal of the problems.

Anyway, I still want my data files on different partitions from the OS files, so I created a total of 5 this time: a primary for Vista, a primary for "/", a primary for "/home", a logical for swap, and a logical for storage. Currently reinstalling everything, starting with Windows (I know there's at least one of you rolling your eyes, and I understand, but I still have to teach Vista to others and I'm just not ready to let go of MS Office).

I'll post if there are any more errors. At least I finally got some good news.

Here are some interesting links (for novices) I came across while frantically trying to fix this problem:
The perfect Linux distro
How to not have to type sudo for everything (the aliasing method)

**Telengard** · Jun 01, 2009, 02:54 PM

Re: About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Glad you got it working

**muzicman0** · Jun 01, 2009, 03:49 PM

Re: [Quasi-solved] About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

yeah, for the bluetooth crash...my system does the same thing when it updates any bluetooth file. I think it just doesn't handle changes to the bluetooth system very well...but like your last attempt, it always works fine once I reboot.

Not sure why your partitioning scheme didn't work...can you give us a rundown of what you were trying (or did I miss it in the original post...i didn't read it all)...I can say that I used to run a small boot partition with no issues. But once I moved from JFS to EXT4, I didn't need it anymore.

mm0

**muzicman0** · Jun 01, 2009, 03:51 PM

Re: [Quasi-solved] About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

ok, I went back to look at the partitioning scheme...don't see any problems...but I'm not really a linux guru.

mm0

**lightheat** · Jun 01, 2009, 04:27 PM

Re: [Quasi-solved] About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

Originally posted by muzicman0

yeah, for the bluetooth crash...my system does the same thing when it updates any bluetooth file. I think it just doesn't handle changes to the bluetooth system very well...but like your last attempt, it always works fine once I reboot.

Glad to see I'm not the only one. Not that I'm very concerned, however, as I... well... don't really use it. Bluetooth mouse in the future perhaps? :P

I can say that I used to run a small boot partition with no issues. But once I moved from JFS to EXT4, I didn't need it anymore.

If I may ask, why didn't you need it anymore? Speed improvements in ext4 rendered it obsolete or something? I'm just curious.

I went back to look at the partitioning scheme...don't see any problems...but I'm not really a linux guru.

Yeah, I didn't think there were any, either, originally. I'm sort of banking on Kubuntu working this time since it worked perfectly with a full install, but honestly, I haven't installed it yet on the newest partitions (Vista updates... lol Ubuntu can load an entire desktop on a 10mbps connection in 10 minutes, Vista updates now onto hour #2... so sad

).

We'll see... I might not be out of the woods, yet. Thanks for the response!

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[Finally Solved] About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

[Finally Solved] About to give up on Kubuntu (many, many errors)

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