HEXUS.lifestyle breeds hybrid NTFS/ext2 hard disk!

[Bob Crabtree]

The tale I'm about to relate leaves me totally mystified. So I write this in the hope that someone a whole lot smarter than me will be able to explain what I find totally inexplicable.

I realise that the laws of genetics let you cross an Alsatian dog with a miniature poodle or a horse with a zebra - and interbreed a whole lot of other critters that are related to one another.

But what I didn't know - and simply cannot understand - is how it has been possible for me to have created, Frankenstein-like, a hard-disk partition that appears to be a cross between two unrelated and incompatible standards - Windows NTFS and Linux ext2!

Until recently, the entire drive had been given over to an ext2-formatted partition.

However, the ext2 partition has since been deleted and a Windows NTFS partition put in its place but the files on the partition have survived all this and are now accessible under Windows!

Check out the mystifying details and PLEASE - come back here and tell me what the hell is going on!

(Pic courtesy of Bowdoin College)

[alsenior]

it is likely the the partition identifier has become corrupt.

the one for ntfs is 0x07
the one for ext2 is 0x83

so those 2 bytes have been corrupted. but Linux looks at the file system by other ways than the partition identifier but windows does not.

thats how i think i goes though I'm not entirely sure

[Bob Crabtree]

Just think about what you're spending your time on

Although I have to admit that that smiley is a pretty good likeness of me, I'm not actually sure what you think you are saying.

Care to provide a translation?

[siu99spj]

OK, that's just plain weird, but after your banana/plantain post-it episode (That still makes me laugh) I'm beginning to believe anything from you is possible.

However, one thing that might be nice to try, after you've recovered your precious recordings (Why the duplications in HD and SD, surely HD is sufficient?), is if you can write to the NTFS HDD. If that writes and reads succesfully, as you have with your TV recordings then that truly is the magical, mystical altar of a hybrid drive

Personally, I think the early part of the HDD, where all the partition gubbins and other stuff is held, has gone truly wonky. The EXT2 capable PC see's what was there because PM8 didn't delete it, just tried to change the gubbins and failed, whereas the non-EXT2 capable PC just assumes it's a normal drive (And blows a woobly when you try and use it).

Did any of that make ANY sense?

[Vroomparrot]

Have you tried booting with a knoppix (or similar) cd? What type of partition does that then see?

[Bob Crabtree]

it is likely the the partition identifier has become corrupt.

the one for ntfs is 0x07
the one for ext2 is 0x83

so those 2 bytes have been corrupted. but Linux looks at the file system by other ways than the partition identifier but windows does not.

thats how i think i goes though I'm not entirely sure

So, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that, somehow, both identifiers are there, rather than one, so that Windows sees an identifier that tells it is a Windows hard disk; and the Linux drivers see an identifier that tells it is a Linux hard disk?

But does that in anyway explain how the stuff that was there BEFORE I deleted the Linux ext2 partition and replaced it with an NTFS partition is still there and accessible?

I'm not saying it doesn't, I'm just asking a question?

[Bob Crabtree]

OK, that's just plain weird, but after your banana/plantain post-it episode (That still makes me laugh) I'm beginning to believe anything from you is possible.

Worryingly (perhaps), I still giggle when I think of it - but I was nearly choking with laughter as I thought up each pair of notes and wandered around sticking them up.

However, one thing that might be nice to try, after you've recovered your precious recordings (Why the duplications in HD and SD, surely HD is sufficient?), is if you can write to the NTFS HDD. If that writes and reads succesfully, as you have with your TV recordings then that truly is the magical, mystical altar of a hybrid drive

Well, I am planning to try out stuff like writing to the drive but won't do that not only until after I've Hoovered off what I need but also until after I've received as many hints and tips as possible and also tried to run various tools that might give me a clue about what's going on - so all such suggestions really would be most appreciated!

As for the duplication of SD and HDD versions - you need to remember the reason for my having any of these broadcast recordings in the first place.

And that was because I'd been using the drive as part of the review-testing of the Evesham iplayer - and one of the logical things to do (I thought) was to compare the image quality of similar recordings in HD and SD standards.

Oh, and I want to keep the HD recordings in the hope that I might find a suitable tool to repurpurpose them into a form that is still HD but playable on my Athlon 64 3200+ PC, which is something of a runt compared with PCs based on new-gen Intel CPUs and with new-gen graphics cards.

Personally, I think the early part of the HDD, where all the partition gubbins and other stuff is held, has gone truly wonky. The EXT2 capable PC see's what was there because PM8 didn't delete it, just tried to change the gubbins and failed, whereas the non-EXT2 capable PC just assumes it's a normal drive (And blows a woobly when you try and use it).

Did any of that make ANY sense?

I'm pretty sure that what you say - or something like it - is going to turn out to be true but for me to know what the real situation is will, I think, require the use of diagnostic tools I don't have (or, at least, might not remember I've got!).

So, like I said earlier, all such suggestions are most welcome.

[Bob Crabtree]

Have you tried booting with a knoppix (or similar) cd? What type of partition does that then see?

No, not yet - and, until I have copied off those things I want to keep, I don't think it would be wise to do anything that might make the disk unusable.

But you are right in thinking that looking at the HDD from within Knoppix or some such might be informative.

[Funkstar]

Worryingly (perhaps), I still giggle when I think of it - but I was nearly choking with laughter as I thought up each pair of notes and wandered around sticking them up.

You're not the only one. I sent that thread to a friend at the time. We still walt round places like John Lewis pointing at things saying "fridge not cooker" etc. Makes us giggle all the time

[alsenior]

So, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that, somehow, both identifiers are there, rather than one, so that Windows sees an identifier that tells it is a Windows hard disk; and the Linux drivers see an identifier that tells it is a Linux hard disk?

But does that in anyway explain how the stuff that was there BEFORE I deleted the Linux ext2 partition and replaced it with an NTFS partition is still there and accessible?

I'm not saying it doesn't, I'm just asking a question?

did you do a proper format or a quick format?

me thinks that the ext2 file records are still there and linux can see them but windows only sees the ntfs drive. but lets not get it wrong something screwed up big time to leave a conundrum like this. maybe do a feature piece when you invite file systems experts to comment on the strange drive. im no expert but what ever you used to format the drive has not done a proper job

[Fabula]

Once you've moved your data off, create a ghost image so we can have a look.

[Bob Crabtree]

You're not the only one. I sent that thread to a friend at the time. We still walt round places like John Lewis pointing at things saying "fridge not cooker" etc. Makes us giggle all the time

[Bob Crabtree]

Once you've moved your data off, create a ghost image so we can have a look.

That's a fine idea - though I'm wondering whether in fact apps such as Ghost won't in fact turn up their noses at my hybrid disk.

Oh, the other issue is that, even if these apps are willing to create an image, at what stage I create it, cos I certainly can't do it while there's close to 200GB of video on the disk.

[siu99spj]

That's a fine idea - though I'm wondering whether in fact apps such as Ghost won't in fact turn up their noses at my hybrid disk.

Ghost is known to be picky with funky drives (And yours is most definitely funkier than most ). However, Acronis has been known to be pretty resiliant and I believe the enterprise edition can do blind copies of wonky drives for data recovery purposes. Though buying the Enterprise Edition just to poke this drive does seem a little absurd.

All I know is I'm eager to here how this turns out. This is the kinda crazy thing that you don't get with consoles and why I love PCs . I remember screwing around sometime ago with a massive (at the time) 20GB HDD. Thought I'd lost all my Uni work at one point. But through the wonders of (Or lack of) the quick format, I managed to recover everything bar a single GIF. A GIF I probably shouldn't have had too if I remember rightly (Very naughty... ).

[Bob Crabtree]

Ghost is known to be picky with funky drives (And yours is most definitely funkier than most ). However, Acronis has been known to be pretty resiliant and I believe the enterprise edition can do blind copies of wonky drives for data recovery purposes. Though buying the Enterprise Edition just to poke this drive does seem a little absurd.

All I know is I'm eager to here how this turns out. This is the kinda crazy thing that you don't get with consoles and why I love PCs . I remember screwing around sometime ago with a massive (at the time) 20GB HDD. Thought I'd lost all my Uni work at one point. But through the wonders of (Or lack of) the quick format, I managed to recover everything bar a single GIF. A GIF I probably shouldn't have had too if I remember rightly (Very naughty... ).

Right now, the drive is making those same click-of-death noises it was making when the problem first arose, so I'm kind of wondering what to do - cos there's stuff on there that I haven't yet had time to copy off (though, truth is, nothing on it is critical).

I'll check again to see if it behaves any better after a reboot - perhaps some time tonight - after which I may end up coming back asking for suggestions if the noise is still there.

However, I do have Acronis and probably could get a copy of the Enterprise Edition from the company - but even that would be no use if the drive isn't seen.

Perhaps I'll just pull the drive out of its USB case and stick it inside this PC (the one that's running ext2 drivers) to see what happens.

[nordicpc]

I think what you're seeing is more about the drivers than the drive.

I did a similar thing with EXT3 drives when I was playing with Linux a lot more. I had drivers setup to access the drives in Windows XP, but I'm not sure if they are the same ones you are using. Needless to say, I formatted the drive, but until I manually removed the drive letter and driver from Windows, the drive still tried to show up.

I suppose the EXT2 FAT is housed somewhere that the NTFS format didn't touch, so the drivers are looking for an EXT2 FAT, seeing it and then giving you access to the files. Without the drivers, you get the NTFS FAT, and no files.

Neat trick though. If you could get the filesystems to keep from overlapping, you could have a good place to hide things.

Addin: the click - o -death is never a good sign in my experience. Usually I resort to freezing/heating/dropping at that point