USB Issues - Exit code 21 kills mounts - How to diskcheck?

[jimwg]

Greetings!

I am a tech-newbie with two problems ongoing with my Mint 9 USB install on a 8gig flash drive. I’ve successfully installed it and used it twice on two machines, however after five or six times, two things have happened: One machine no longer sees it on its boot list at all no manner how many time I reboot it, and with the other the flash drive now only signals:

Unable to mount 60 GB Filesystem
Error mounting: mount exited with exit code 21: mount: according to mtab, /dev/sda1 is already mounted on /media/E8701CFA701CD0E4

I have scoured Google for remedies with exit code 21 and how it supposedly means the HD has pre-mounted somehow and such, and everyone has ultra-techie explanations that go over this newbie’s head. I don’t expect to get a spot on solution, but just a general way to go would be really helpful!

Also, I’d like to learn to perform a FSCK and CHECKDISK on my flash drive, but Google entries say never do this without unmounting the drive first -- but don’t explain how!

Any hints or recommendations would be most appreciated!

Thanks!

Jim in NYC

[kyphi]

Hello Jim in NYC,

The easiest way to accomplish what you want is to use the Disk Utility program. It is under Accessories. That will let you mount and unmount fixed drives and USB devices as well as checking the device integrity.

You may find more useful information here using the "tune2fs" command:

http://linhost.info/2010/05/tune2fs-quick-tips/

[jimwg]

Hello Jim in NYC,

The easiest way to accomplish what you want is to use the Disk Utility program. It is under Accessories. That will let you mount and unmount fixed drives and USB devices as well as checking the device integrity.

You may find more useful information here using the "tune2fs" command:

http://linhost.info/2010/05/tune2fs-quick-tips/

Thanks for your response. Only thing is the link doesn't quite explain to newbies what is glaringly apparent to techies, like do I do this tune2fs command using a terminal in windows with the flash drive attached or boot up mint in the flash and use its terminal to run it? Is it automatic or does it require tech-tinkering to run? Is it safe to use Windows Disk Utility on a Mint flash drive?

I'm also looking around for pure flash drive blogs for info as well for remedies to my other problems, and one thing I'd like to find out is whether there's a way to recover the ever shrinking space in a persistence flash drive! To see this happen almost makes no point in having one!

Thanks for your input!

Jim in NYC

[kyphi]

Did you use the "Disk Utility" program that is already installed in LinuxMint?

If you are more comfortable working in Windows, then with the USB stick inserted, open "Run", type in "cmd" (without quotation marks)
and then type "chkdsk F: /f /r". That will change drive to the F drive (USB) and attempt to find and repair any faults.

You mentioned "persistence flash drive". If you mean a flash drive that is permanently inserted, then you may find more information looking under SSD drives where continuous data writing during use can erode the space available. There are ways to circumvent that in Linux and probably also in Windows. It follows that in an 8 GB USB drive, loss of data retention could become crippling.

The two options presented above should resolve the problems you are experiencing.

... and yes, you can use the Windows Disk Utility on your USB flash drive.

[jimwg]

Thanks! I really appreciate your off-topic expertise here! As much as I Google through Mint and Ubuntu blogs and sites, we badly need a blog purely dedicated to issues using Linux on USB flash drives! Pendrivelinux is close but it has no forum or Q&A!

Jim in NYC