[Errors] FSTAB Parse Error

[brianharr]

Hi

I have Kubuntu 18.10 on Dell Optiplex 980

I attached a portable drive so I could sync my google drive files (approx 1TB) with Insync.

This was working fine for several month and I could see external drive in Dolphin as Ext Drive 1.

Then this changed to Ext Drive 11.

I tried to change back to original name but no joy.

I then used a partition manager to try and change name back.

This is where things got buggered up.

Now I cannot load Kubuntu at all

Any ideas how ro recover without having to reinstall?

Thanks

[GreyGeek]

It appears that the drive designation in /etc/fstab is no longer valid.

Messing with a portable drive using parted should not normally bother your boot drive, unless you fumble-fingered stuff and inadvertently clicked on your boot drive and executed a change before you realized it. Is that how "things got buggered up"?

Mount a LiveUSB and then from within it mount your boot drive to /media, if possible. Then look at /media/etc/fstab to see what is in it, if possible. If you can edit it then change it to what is shown for it by the command "blkid", using the UUID part. What's in fstab may be the old UUID before you "buggered" it up. Save /media/etc/fstab and try a reboot. IF the UUID in /media/ext/fstab and that shown by blkid are the same then you may have damaged the MBR of GPT, which ever applies to your system. You can use

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair

to do it.
HOWEVER, considering that you recently installed 18.04, and that it takes only 15 min to a couple hours to reinstall, depending on how many additional apps and config you need to add and adjust, it may be easier to just do a fresh install.