GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 605175
Gparted 0.5.0-3 & 0.4.8-7: not reading some FAT32 partitions
Last modified: 2010-01-14 17:58:00 UTC
Versions 0.5.3 and 4.8.7 of Gparted are not reading 9 out 20 fat32 partitions on my system. A brown triangle is displayed alongside these partitions and used and unused space is not displayed. The partition information message for these partitions is:- "unable to read the contents of this file system because some operations may be unavailable" The partitions remain fully accessible under XP PRO SP3, and chkdsk has not found any problems with them. Is there any information I can provide or tests that I can do? I have watched the bootup messages for versions 0.5.3, 4.8.7 and 4.5.2 but cannot see anything that appears to be wrong. If you ask me to do anything please bear in mind that I am a complete beginner with linux/ unix systems. For all other FAT32 partitions Gparted versions 0.5.3 and 4.8.7 display used and unused space. Further information:- These 9 partitions are on both internal and external hard disks. The partitions were created with either Gparted 4.5.2, or earlier, or XP disk manager, but which one has not been recorded. Gparted version 4.5.2 still works perfectly with these partitions and all FAT32 partitions. It displays used and unused space for all FAT32 partitions. I will continue to use 4.5.2. This is written after 0.5.3 has been withdrawn as the latest version of Gparted and version 4.6.1 substituted as the latest version.
Thank you for bringing this problem to our attention. In your message I assume that you are speaking about GParted Live 0.5.0-3 since GParted 0.5.3 does not exist at this time. ;-) To determine the number of used sectors, GParted uses the following command: dosfsck -v /path-to-partition where /path-to-partition is something like /dev/sda1 If this command fails for any reason then GParted will not know how much space is used and how much is free within the file system. This will result in GParted displaying a warning triangle with an exclamation point beside these partitions. Perhaps there is a problem with the version of dosfstools working with some of your fat32 file systems. To narrow down the problem, would you please try running this above listed command in a terminal and posting the results here?
(In reply to comment #1) Yes, you are right about the Gparted version number, it is 0.5.0-3 and not 0.5.3. I will have to update my notes. I can do what you ask but need to know how to get the results out of the livecd environment, as a text file, so that I can post them when back in XP. Is there a similar to dos of piping the output to a desired file eg dos command > ....path\outputfile.txt The output file could be on the main C drive (prefereably), a usb stick or if need be the I could burn gaprted to a cd-rw.
To capture the output in a file you can use redirection or piping just like in DOS. For example: dosfsck -v /dev/sda1 > myoutputfile.txt To transfer the file to a usbstick, see the following documentation for steps: http://gparted.sourceforge.net/larry/tips/save_details.htm The important section is under the title "Copying to usbstick".
(In reply to comment #3) results are :- Bug report 605175 =========================================================================== Gparted 0.5.0-3 problem - cannot read 9 out 20 fat32 partitions. This is not a problem with Gparted 4.5.2 which can read all 20 Fat32 partitions. ========================================================================== Dosfsck has been run against 3 partitions for both gparted 4.5.2.and 0.5.0-3. Gparted 4.5.2 reads all 3 partitions. gparted 0.5.0-3 only reads partiton 1. However dosfsck gives results for all 3 partitions. ========================================================================== Possibilities that I can see for the problem with gparted 0.5.0-3 are:- 1) gparted 0.5.0-3 cannot read fat32 file systems where the partition boot sector is different to its backup. ========================================================================== 1) Gparted version 4.5.2 - Partition 1 - partition is read by Gparted 4.5.2 dosfsck 3.0.1 (23 Nov 2008) dosfsck 3.0.1, 23 Nov 2008, FAT32, LFN Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem Boot sector contents: System ID "MSDOS5.0" Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk) 512 bytes per logical sector 4096 bytes per cluster 34 reserved sectors First FAT starts at byte 17408 (sector 34) 2 FATs, 32 bit entries 8281600 bytes per FAT (= 16175 sectors) Root directory start at cluster 2 (arbitrary size) Data area starts at byte 16580608 (sector 32384) 2070337 data clusters (8480100352 bytes) 63 sectors/track, 255 heads 63 hidden sectors 16595082 sectors total Checking for unused clusters. Checking free cluster summary. /dev/sda11: 972 files, 416813/2070337 clusters ************************************************************************* 2) Gparted version 4.5.2 - Partition 2 - partition is read by Gparted 4.5.2 dosfsck 3.0.1 (23 Nov 2008) dosfsck 3.0.1, 23 Nov 2008, FAT32, LFN Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem There are differences between boot sector and its backup. Differences: (offset:original/backup) 72:45/65, 73:4c/6c, 74:4f/6f, 75:43/63, 76:41/61, 77:54/74, 78:49/69 , 79:4f/6f, 80:4e/6e, 81:53/73 1) Copy original to backup 2) Copy backup to original 3) No action ? Boot sector contents: System ID "mkdosfs" Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk) 512 bytes per logical sector 4096 bytes per cluster 32 reserved sectors First FAT starts at byte 16384 (sector 32) 2 FATs, 32 bit entries 8321536 bytes per FAT (= 16253 sectors) Root directory start at cluster 2 (arbitrary size) Data area starts at byte 16659456 (sector 32538) 2080358 data clusters (8521146368 bytes) 63 sectors/track, 255 heads 0 hidden sectors 16675406 sectors total Checking for unused clusters. Checking free cluster summary. /dev/sda12: 36250 files, 1554881/2080358 clusters ************************************************************************* 3) Gparted version 4.5.2 - Partition 3 - partition is read by Gparted 4.5.2 dosfsck 3.0.1 (23 Nov 2008) dosfsck 3.0.1, 23 Nov 2008, FAT32, LFN Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem There are differences between boot sector and its backup. Differences: (offset:original/backup) 71:49/4e, 72:4e/4f, 73:53/20, 74:54/4e, 76:4c/4d, 77:4c/45, 78:53/20 , 79:4f/20, 80:46/20, 81:54/20 1) Copy original to backup 2) Copy backup to original 3) No action ? Boot sector contents: System ID "MSWIN4.1" Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk) 512 bytes per logical sector 4096 bytes per cluster 42 reserved sectors First FAT starts at byte 21504 (sector 42) 2 FATs, 32 bit entries 8329728 bytes per FAT (= 16269 sectors) Root directory start at cluster 115 (arbitrary size) Data area starts at byte 16680960 (sector 32580) 2080353 data clusters (8521125888 bytes) 63 sectors/track, 255 heads 285410853 hidden sectors 16675407 sectors total Checking for unused clusters. Checking free cluster summary. /dev/sda13: 5908 files, 1530618/2080353 clusters ************************************************************************* 4) Gparted version 0.5.0-3 - Partition 1 - partition is read by Gparted 0.5.0-3 dosfsck 3.0.6 (04 Oct 2009) dosfsck 3.0.6, 04 Oct 2009, FAT32, LFN Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem Boot sector contents: System ID "MSDOS5.0" Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk) 512 bytes per logical sector 4096 bytes per cluster 34 reserved sectors First FAT starts at byte 17408 (sector 34) 2 FATs, 32 bit entries 8281600 bytes per FAT (= 16175 sectors) Root directory start at cluster 2 (arbitrary size) Data area starts at byte 16580608 (sector 32384) 2070337 data clusters (8480100352 bytes) 63 sectors/track, 255 heads 63 hidden sectors 16595082 sectors total Checking for unused clusters. Checking free cluster summary. /dev/sda11: 972 files, 416813/2070337 clusters ************************************************************************* 5) Gparted version 0.5.0-3 - Partition 2 - partition is not read by Gparted 0.5.0-3 dosfsck 3.0.6 (04 Oct 2009) dosfsck 3.0.6, 04 Oct 2009, FAT32, LFN Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem There are differences between boot sector and its backup. Differences: (offset:original/backup) 72:45/65, 73:4c/6c, 74:4f/6f, 75:43/63, 76:41/61, 77:54/74, 78:49/69 , 79:4f/6f, 80:4e/6e, 81:53/73 1) Copy original to backup 2) Copy backup to original 3) No action ? Boot sector contents: System ID "mkdosfs" Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk) 512 bytes per logical sector 4096 bytes per cluster 32 reserved sectors First FAT starts at byte 16384 (sector 32) 2 FATs, 32 bit entries 8321536 bytes per FAT (= 16253 sectors) Root directory start at cluster 2 (arbitrary size) Data area starts at byte 16659456 (sector 32538) 2080358 data clusters (8521146368 bytes) 63 sectors/track, 255 heads 0 hidden sectors 16675406 sectors total Checking for unused clusters. Checking free cluster summary. /dev/sda12: 36250 files, 1554881/2080358 clusters ************************************************************************* 6) Gparted version 0.5.0-3 - Partition 3 - partition is not read by Gparted 0.5.0-3 dosfsck 3.0.6 (04 Oct 2009) dosfsck 3.0.6, 04 Oct 2009, FAT32, LFN Checking we can access the last sector of the filesystem There are differences between boot sector and its backup. Differences: (offset:original/backup) 71:49/4e, 72:4e/4f, 73:53/20, 74:54/4e, 76:4c/4d, 77:4c/45, 78:53/20 , 79:4f/20, 80:46/20, 81:54/20 1) Copy original to backup 2) Copy backup to original 3) No action ? Boot sector contents: System ID "MSWIN4.1" Media byte 0xf8 (hard disk) 512 bytes per logical sector 4096 bytes per cluster 42 reserved sectors First FAT starts at byte 21504 (sector 42) 2 FATs, 32 bit entries 8329728 bytes per FAT (= 16269 sectors) Root directory start at cluster 115 (arbitrary size) Data area starts at byte 16680960 (sector 32580) 2080353 data clusters (8521125888 bytes) 63 sectors/track, 255 heads 285410853 hidden sectors 16675407 sectors total Checking for unused clusters. Checking free cluster summary. /dev/sda13: 5908 files, 1530618/2080353 clusters *************************************************************************
Thank you for running these tests. It appears that both versions of dosfsck (3.0.1 and 3.0.6) report back with similar if not identical information. This leads me to believe that perhaps the return codes from these two dosfsck versions is different. Would you be able to run the following commands with each dosfsck version on one of the problem partitions? dosfsck -v /path-to-a-problem-partition echo $? I am most curious to see what return code is shown by the "echo $?" command.
(In reply to comment #4) > > Possibilities that I can see for the problem with gparted 0.5.0-3 are:- > > 1) gparted 0.5.0-3 cannot read fat32 file systems where the partition boot > sector is different to its backup. > After some investigation it would appear that this above suggestion is at the core of the problem. This problem was introduced when I removed the "-a" option from the dosfsck command while I was investigating bug #569921 - dosfsck -a delays device scan. The relevant commit which was included in GParted 0.4.7 was: http://git.gnome.org/browse/gparted/commit/?id=6fa8ad48183aca2873b325e6195bfd50eae86c3b This problem has been fixed by adding a "-n" option to dosfsck which does not write any changes to the file system, and allows non-interactive operation. The fix to this problem has been committed to GNOME git repository for inclusion in the next release of GParted (0.5.1). The relevant git commit can be viewed at the following link: http://git.gnome.org/browse/gparted/commit/?id=1155fa6dabf93f9d305f16241a122b1954852514 Closing this bug.