Drive became "read-only"

[WHVW]

Hi All:
Seems I've had this problem/asked this before here, but I just can't find it. Nor anyplace else, for that mattter. I believe I had the answer, too, but I can't find that either.
I have an old drive that has been labelled "read-only" I have pulled off most everything of real value, but this is a real PITA because it extends to any other drive I plug in to copy data.
I can't think of any more phraseological variations to use on DDG to ask this question. It seems as if I've read about everything....except how to solve the problem.
These attributes are different than the normal (-rwxr--r--t) ones...they have 20 positions.
So my problem looks like this: --------------e----- . The bit that seems to be problematic is the 15th.
I have tried chattr, lsattr, chmod all to no avail.
The HD has LM20 on it, 64 bit.
O.K. I found my other post (it was a lot newer than I thought) but it isn't clear to me that (that) info will fix the bit

[RIH]

Was that disk previously used on a Windows system?
If so, there in lies your problem & you will need to connect it to another Windows machine, turn off fast startup/hibernation, shut down Windows & then the disk will be fine again.
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-disa ... st-startup

[WHVW]

RIH :
Thank you for answering.
I suppose it did have Windows on it at one time (it is a used drive) but I installed Mint over it, (no dual-boot, ever) and it has been a Mint drive ever since. I might have "installed-over" a couple of times, now that I think about it.

[Aztaroth]

Hope this won't be the solution of your problem, but when a disk reaches end-of-life and begins to fail, the file sytem protects itself (and your data) by deliberately becoming "read-only" to allow data transfer on a sane disk.
Check the SMART data with Gnome Disks if they are OK.

[mikeflan]

So your drive has nothing but a single EXT4 partition on it and the files on it have permissions that look like
--------------e-----
Is that correct? If so, I didn't know that was possible.

And at present you don't care too much about the data on that drive, correct?

[WHVW]

mikeflan
Yes, I can experiment with this drive. Most, if not all, of what is important is off it. I believe it is formatted EXT4. Some installs insisted on a FAT32 boot partition. I probably wasn't paying attention at the time because I generally tell it to be all EXT4. I can't tell which is which because it's now hard to access. But any and all experiments are O.K.

[mikeflan]

I suggest you go through the methods on these 2 sites and tell us where things go wrong:
https://recoverit.wondershare.com/hardd ... -disk.html
https://www.maketecheasier.com/complete ... ive-linux/