[SOLVED]: BusyBox built-in shell (ash) Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands (fsck doesn't work?)

[Sivard]

New 1TB SSD installed on January 1, 2019 with Linux Mint 19.1 w/full disk encryption. Used without incident until today.

I was listening to a YouTube video while browsing folders when I noticed an error message on the folder window about a thumbnail issue and a Fix button which prompts password. On my old PC this happened before and it would fix it right away, but this time the error kept coming back. I then noticed the YouTube video froze and that when right-clicking files, I could "copy" but not "cut" the file.

I shut down the PC and rebooted, put in encryption password and then after a series of lines about "ACPI Exception: Could not find/resolve named package element: LNK..." it displayed this:

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BusyBox v1.27.2 (Ubuntu 1:1.27.2-2ubuntu3) built-in shell (ash)
Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.

(initramfs)

Most of the search results give some variant on FSCK to fix the problem, but response is always "fsck from util-linux 2.31.1" and a return to prompt.

I also booted from the installation USB stick that I used to install it. I went to mount the SSD and it asked for password, but said unable to mount, yet I was able to look at the files on it anyway, though some of the file/folder icons had an X or Padlock on them while others didn't.

Any idea what's going on here? Fortunately I did a full back up of my files on February 1, but I download and alter files everyday so I'm hoping my new $150 SDD isn't bricked.

[philotux]

At initramfs prompt, type exit followed by enter. Do you get any error messages? If you do, please post them here. It might help those who are able to help to know what is going on.

[Sivard]

At initramfs prompt, type exit followed by enter. Do you get any error messages? If you do, please post them here. It might help those who are able to help to know what is going on.

Yes, upon exit command I get:

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/dev/mapper/mint--vg-root contains a file system with errors, check forced.
Inodes that were part of a corrupted orphan linked list found.

/dev/mapper/mint--vg-root: UNEXPECTED INCONSISTENCY; Run fsck MANUALLY.
	(i.e., without -a or -p options)
fsck exited with status code 4
The root filesystem on /dev/mapper/mint--vg-root requires a manual fsck

The fsck's that I tried were /dev/sda5 and /dev/sda5_crypt (which says doesn't exist)

[philotux]

Try:

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fsck -y  /dev/mapper/mint--vg-root

When it's done, type reboot followed by enter and see if you will boot into your Mint.

[Sivard]

Try:

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fsck -y  /dev/mapper/mint--vg-root

When it's done, type reboot followed by enter and see if you will boot into your Mint.

lol I actually tried it about 10min ago and was submitting a "resolved" reply when you posted this, although I left out the '-y' which forced me to click y+enter many times. Looks like this is the solution, thank you.

Hopefully this isn't going to be a recurring problem as I've seen similar fsck issues on SSDs say as much.

[philotux]

Hopefully this isn't going to be a recurring problem as I've seen similar fsck issues on SSDs say as much.

Whatever caused the freezing and/or the hard shutdown could have caused some corruption in the file system. Let's hope that the issue is resolved and won't come back.

Have a look at the following article for a how to shutdown/reboot Linux "gracefully":
https://www.howtogeek.com/119127/use-th ... -commands/

[BG405]

The safe way I use:
Hold CTRL & ALT, then press SysRq followed by, with a few seconds between each:
R E I S U B
to reboot, or
R E I S U O
to power off.

[mds4227]

Many thanks to philotux. I was having this same problem, although I have been booting using a super grub disk due to a previous GRUB problem helpfully solved on this forum.
I have been having system freezes due to Firefox maxing out system resources. I usually do a ctrl printscreen rseiub restart, but this time the boot initiation files must have been corrupted. Your command suggestion seems to have repaired the files.

I think it's time for a new HDD and a fresh install.