• The forum software that supports hummy.tv has been upgraded to XenForo 2.3!

    Please bear with us as we continue to tweak things, and feel free to post any questions, issues or suggestions in the upgrade thread.

Data recovery advice needed

J

JoeBloggs911

Member
One of my boxes rebooted normally this morning and I started to view a recording with no problem. But when tried to use the custom firmware, it put up a large red warning that my disk had errors, was read only and needed action. What I should have done is try to copy off recordings via ftp or telnet. Instead, I rashly went into maintenance mode and ran fixdisk, which took several hours and completed with errorlevel 0.

I'm afraid to exit maintenance mode and reboot because the previous time this happened the box's native firmware insisted on formatting the drive. I'm still connected via telnet, so I wonder if it would be possible to copy off the recordings before trying to reboot. If it is possible, I'd appreciate advice on how to do it.
 
JoeBloggs911 said:
I rashly went into maintenance mode and ran fixdisk, which took several hours and completed with errorlevel 0.
Click to expand...
That's not rash, that would be the normal course of action. fix-disk does not have a history of trashing anything that wasn't already trashed.

What does the end of the fix-disk log say? IIRC errorlevel 0 is normal completion.

JoeBloggs911 said:
I'm afraid to exit maintenance mode and reboot because the previous time this happened the box's native firmware insisted on formatting the drive.
Click to expand...
That is weird. One way around it, if it happened again, could be to make your data recovery with the HDD on a PC instead of in the Humax.
 
Black Hole said:
That's not rash, that would be the normal course of action. fix-disk does not have a history of trashing anything that wasn't already trashed.

What does the end of the fix-disk log say? IIRC errorlevel 0 is normal completion.


That is weird. One way around it, if it happened again, could be to make your data recovery with the HDD on a PC instead of in the Humax.
Click to expand...
My hands shake so badly these days that it would be difficult to undo the screws to open the case , never mind delving into its delicate innards. Question remains whether it is possible to copy off the files with telnet while in maintenance mode.
 
Black Hole said:
That's not rash, that would be the normal course of action. fix-disk does not have a history of trashing anything that wasn't already trashed.

What does the end of the fix-disk log say? IIRC errorlevel 0 is normal completion.


That is weird. One way around it, if it happened again, could be to make your data recovery with the HDD on a PC instead of in the Humax.
Click to expand...

Sorry, I missed this question. Here it is:

hmx_int_stor: ***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
e2fsck: aborted

hmx_int_stor: ***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
Mon Jun 23 13:03:23 BST 2025
Insufficient memory to remove swap. Very large fix-disk log?
Removing extra swap space.

Finished
fix-disk: session terminated with exit status 0

Press return to continue:
 
JoeBloggs911 said:
Insufficient memory to remove swap. Very large fix-disk log?
Click to expand...
Are you sure that doesn't read "memory allocation failed"? No, that's not because of it being a very large log (although it probably it), it's because fix-disk has run out of memory trying to repair the file system despite having as much swap space as is practicable, and aborted.
 
Last edited:
Black Hole said:
Are you sure that doesn't read "memory allocation failed"? No, that's not because of it being a very large log (although it probably it), it's because fix-disk has run out of memory trying to repair the file system despite having as much swap space as is practicable, and aborted.
Click to expand...

Quite sure. It was cut and pasted from the end of the telnet fixdisk display
 
I took a chance and exited maintenance mode and rebooted into an apprently fully working system. But I've just started to copy all recordings to a computer hard disk just in case...
 
As usual, the question that needs answering now is "What do the SMART stats. say?".
Re-run fixdisk until you get a run with no errors. If this doesn't happen then the filesystem needs re-making (AKA formatting - the relevant command has been posted many times).
Backing up is obviously a good idea regardless, if you value the content.
 
prpr said:
As usual, the question that needs answering now is "What do the SMART stats. say?".
Re-run fixdisk until you get a run with no errors. If this doesn't happen then the filesystem needs re-making (AKA formatting - the relevant command has been posted many times).
Backing up is obviously a good idea regardless, if you value the content.
Click to expand...
There are problems still. On trying to access the box from my browser, I got:

There are filesystem problems with the hard disk onthis system.
Filesystem /mnt/hd2 on /dev/sdb2 is read-only
Go to "Disk Diagnostics"

Doing that produced the same error message, but this time with only a link to the wiki page. I've also noticed that it's not buffering the program I'm viewing. So I'm leaving bad alone until it finishes copying my recordings to external drive, which is likely to be overnight. After that I'll reformat the drive and fixdisk it until the errors goaway. If they don't, I'll give up on the drive and try to find someone who can fit a replacement.
 
Last edited:
JoeBloggs911 said:
I've also noticed that it's not buffering the program I'm viewing.
Click to expand...
Well it won't as it's read-only. This is a good thing for the health of your existing recordings.
So I'm leaving bad alone until it finishes copying my recordings to external drive
Click to expand...
A wise move.
After that I'll reformat the drive and fixdisk it until the errors go away.
Click to expand...
You shouldn't need to fixdisk after format, but Humax made a hash of the formatter, so you probably do, or use the manual command as I referred to previously, in which case you won't need to.
Fundamentally, you need to assess the physical health of the drive first, by looking at the SMART starts., as I said previously too. It may (or may not) need replacing.
 
I was in the process of saying something similar.

Changing the drive won't be simple. The mechanics are easily done, but obtaining a suitable drive is less so. You can't rely on a back-street repair shop to do it.
 
prpr said:
As usual, the question that needs answering now is "What do the SMART stats. say?".
Re-run fixdisk until you get a run with no errors. If this doesn't happen then the filesystem needs re-making (AKA formatting - the relevant command has been posted many times).
Backing up is obviously a good idea regardless, if you value the content.
Click to expand...

Another fixdisk run took many hours and ended apparently successfully, but the drive remained read-only. I tried reformatting from the Humax menu but it refused to do it with a "capacity too large" error. I've searched for filesystem remaking but couldn't find the command you mention. Is it "gptf" on the maintenance mode menu?
 
You need to select Safe mode on the Diags. page and reboot before attempting to use the Humax formatter.
If you want to use the command line formatter option, then enable Maintenance mode and select the cli option from the menu. Then:
Code: 
humax# umount /mnt/hd1
humax# umount /mnt/hd2
humax# umount /mnt/hd3
humax# mkfs.ext3 -m 0 -O sparse_super /dev/sda1
humax# mkfs.ext3 -m 0 -O sparse_super -T largefile /dev/sda2
humax# mkfs.ext3 -m 0 -O sparse_super /dev/sda3
 
prpr said:
You need to select Safe mode on the Diags. page and reboot before attempting to use the Humax formatter.
If you want to use the command line formatter option, then enable Maintenance mode and select the cli option from the menu. Then:
Code: 
humax# umount /mnt/hd1
humax# umount /mnt/hd2
humax# umount /mnt/hd3
humax# mkfs.ext3 -m 0 -O sparse_super /dev/sda1
humax# mkfs.ext3 -m 0 -O sparse_super -T largefile /dev/sda2
humax# mkfs.ext3 -m 0 -O sparse_super /dev/sda3
Click to expand...
Many thanks for your help. I took the first option and all is now working, though I've saved the other for future reference.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top