Can't reformat HDD - HELP!

[Ravi]

Last week I had problems recording programs and the Web-If said there were HDD issues. So I copied everything I wanted off the HDR drive and ran the FixDisk utility via telnet.

! WARNING !!

There appear to be some hardware problems with the internal hard disk on this device.

Disk realloc sector count is: 621 (was 60)
Disk pending sector count is: 1
Disk offline sector count is: 1

Eventually when Fix disk and the drive checks were happy I went back to the Hummy and tried to reformat the drive. Unfortunately it's saying the drive is too big.

I had this exact same issue last year, but can't remember or find the post on fixing it.

The Humax HDR-FOXT2 is a standard 1TB machine,

Web interface version: {1.0.16-1 Collected}
Custom firmware version: 2.22 (build 1905)
Humax Version: 1.03.12 (kernel HDR_1.03.12)

Please can someone remind me what to do. IIRC I did something to repartition the drive or change the reserved area or something.

Not sure why this keeps happening, seems to be when the drive gets to about 90%+ full.

thanks.

 

[prpr]

Reboot it and try again, although it'll probably format the disk itself at that point (not that you needed to format it in the first place after fix-disk).

 

[MontysEvilTwin]

I've had this problem a number of times, I don't know why it happens. The only way I have found of fixing it is to remove the hard drive and use a PC to reformat. I have a Windows 7 laptop which I can also boot into Ubuntu. With the hard drive connected by USB (lots of variants out there, but they all include a SATA to USB adapter and supply power) I use the disk utilities in Ubuntu to reformat the 2nd partition (the large one where the recordings are stored) in ext3 format. Then you can just reconnect to the Hummy. If you just have Windows, use disk management to format the large partition as NTFS (quick format) and then change the partition to unallocated space. When you reconnect, it will prompt you to reformat and it should now work.
Reformatting can probably be done using Telnet with the appropriate commands. This would not require removal of the disk. It would be useful to know how to do this: perhaps someone can help by listing the commands or posting a link to a reference.
However, your disk does not look healthy: there was a ten fold jump in reallocated sectors. If this continues, the disk will need replacing in the near future. It may not be worth trying to reformat this disk. Fix disk will likely have sorted out the pending sector; nothing can fix the reallocated sectors. If the unit is still functioning correctly, I would just use it until you get to a point when you have to change the drive.

 

[4ndy]

I have found that if you use device manager in windows (I used XP) and delete all the partitions on the HDD, The Humax reformats and partitions the drive when reconnected (1.03.12)

Be careful not to wipe the HDD in your PC though!

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

 

[prpr]

I've had this problem a number of times, I don't know why it happens.

As I've said before, I suspect it is because the Humax software can't unmount the partitions because of things the CF has running.

The only way I have found of fixing it is to remove the hard drive and use a PC to reformat. I have a Windows 7 laptop which I can also boot into Ubuntu. With the hard drive connected by USB (lots of variants out there, but they all include a SATA to USB adapter and supply power) I use the disk utilities in Ubuntu to reformat the 2nd partition (the large one where the recordings are stored) in ext3 format. Then you can just reconnect to the Hummy. If you just have Windows, use disk management to format the large partition as NTFS (quick format) and then change the partition to unallocated space. When you reconnect, it will prompt you to reformat and it should now work.

That's very drastic.

Reformatting can probably be done using Telnet with the appropriate commands.

Easily done in maintenance mode - just run "fdisk /dev/sda" and delete all the partitions (having read the simple help). Then save the partition table and reboot.
The Humax software will recreate everything.

 

[Ravi]

Looking at the logs - the Hummy crashed on the 24th which forced me to do a power cycle. HDD problems started from then.

Thanks - I will delete the partitions see how I go.

 

[MontysEvilTwin]

As I've said before, I suspect it is because the Humax software can't unmount the partitions because of things the CF has running.

That's very drastic.

Easily done in maintenance mode - just run "fdisk /dev/sda" and delete all the partitions (having read the simple help). Then save the partition table and reboot.
The Humax software will recreate everything.

You may well be right that the problem is custom firmware related: presumably it is due to specific packages or processes? I have had this problem in the past. I had to remove the drive to get it to reformat, I reinstalled the disk and the custom firmware packages, and had it running for a few days. It still seemed a bit sluggish, so I ran-fix disk. This seemed to take ages fixing inodes etc. and eventually fix-disk hanged. I could not get fix-disk to complete so I decided to reformat again. This time the Humax menu reformatted first time.

The method I described is drastic, with respect to the fact that you have to open the unit: needs must. It is useful to know that reformatting can be done in maintenance mode as you described.

 

[Ravi]

Also - when running Fixdisk - is there an option to get it to automatically fix errors rather than asking every time?