1 Topic by malcoholic (edited by malcoholic 2013-05-09 07:43:25)

  • malcoholic
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Topic: GParted Live hangs on "searching /dev/sda"

Hi.
I have 3 partitions currently:
/dev/sda1 (Dell system partition FAT16)
/dev/sda2 (Windows 7 NTFS)
/dev/sda3 (Linux ext)

.. and I am trying to shrink the ext partition (/dev/sda3) so that I can expand the NTFS partition.
I'm using GParted Live: 0.16.1-1-i486, and it boots fine from USB or CD. However, GParted itself is unable to load up as it hangs on "searching /dev/sda".
Following this similar post (http://gparted-forum.surf4.info/viewtopic.php?id=16547) it seems that the problem is with the process:

dosfsck -n -v /dev/sda1

.. getting stuck on the Dell system partition. However, unlike in that previous post, killing the process does not result in GParted Live finishing searching - it just stays hung.

Booting GParted from my Linux OS on the partition I'm trying to resize runs fine, and just lists /dev/sda1 as 'diag'. Unfortunately I can't resize the partition from there as it's mounted.

Any advice on how to get GParted Live to skip this partition and carry on loading would be appreciated.

Thanks
Mal

2 Reply by gedakc

  • gedakc
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Re: GParted Live hangs on "searching /dev/sda"

Can you try defragmenting the Dell system partition using the tools in Windows?