Re: [gentoo-user] recovery from /var corruption?

[Volker Armin Hemmann <volkerarmin@googlemail.com>]

On Freitag 26 Februar 2010, Mark Knecht wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 26, 2010 at 9:59 AM, Volker Armin Hemmann
> 
> <volkerarmin@googlemail.com> wrote:
> > On Freitag 26 Februar 2010, Mark Knecht wrote:
> >> The machine _mostly_ crashed while running badblocks. I say mostly
> >> because the mouse is still alive but I can no longer ssh in and cannot
> >> open a terminal on my wife's desktop or get to the console.
> > 
> > because it is not crashed but waiting for the ide timeouts.
> 
> So if I let it continue running is it going to come back in the next
> hour or two? 

yes
> I am assuming the IDE timeouts are because the drive is
> having trouble, correct? That's the theory here? 

yes

> If so then unless the software can mark them bad and somehow create good 
files out of bad
> then I'm still left with a machine that is going to need serious work
> done before it's a happy box again, correct?

and with 'serious work' you mean 'replace the harddisk' ...

> 
> On the other hand, because I have reasonably good user backups
> (although no real system backups) right now if I bite the bullet and
> build the machine then when my wife gets it back it's hopefully going
> to be more reliable, wouldn't it?

yes

> 
> I'm thinking that maybe I just copy a little stuff off the box - /etc
> and the like - and then boot the machine with the Gentoo install CD or
> System Resuce CD and see what the drive is doing?

you could do that.

> 
> That doesn't cost me anything to look around, but if SMART won't turn
> on and badblocks is suggesting the drive is having trouble maybe
> running something like badblocks and actually __marking__ blocks as
> bad and then reloading Gentoo would work in the long run? (A lot of
> work though.)

you would need to save the badblocks to a file, than feed that file to mkfs. And 
you are not even save - because when a drive starts to have bad blocks the 
chance that more are popping up some is pretty high. So you might be lucky and 
the drive is able to run for a long while (even maybe mapping out bad blocks 
while testing them - so always run badblocks twice), but you have at least a 
as a good chance that the whole thing starts over in a couple of weeks.

> 
> I'm really not interested in buying new drive because the machine is
> ATA100/133 and if it's not the drive then the money is wasted for a
> new machine. The cheapest at NewEgg is about $40. Why spend the buck
> for an old Intel Centrino machine?

you could take the drive with you when you buy a new machine. Moving harddisks 
is not that hard. Or put it in an usb enclosure when you don't need it 
anymore. ide-usb enclosures are cheap.