1 Topic by secctitioner12

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Topic: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

Hi,

I have a new external hard drive, Samsung 750 GB. I wanted to shrink the external HDD's partition to half its original size using GParted Live (CD, an older version). This is currently being done (resize/move, NTFS, at 16.00 MiB sector size).
The problem is: the process takes exceedingly long. It took 100 hours for the program to read the sectors, yesterday I could hardly believe my eyes when the program said it was going to take 195 hours (!) for copying. This is more than a week.
I haven't cancelled the operation because I don't want to risk any damages to the filesystem.
What would happen in this case (i.e. cancel)?

2 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

Basically, my question is: is there any way to abort the operation without damaging the external HDD?

3 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

Unfortunately external hard drives often use slower interfaces, such as USB.  The internal SATA or IDE interfaces are much, much faster.

If and only if GParted is currently in the read mode (not copy), then you should be able to cancel the operation.  After you cancel the operation, you might need to manually fix the partition table if the file system is not recognized.  We can help you with that if you save the gparted_details.htm log file and post it here.

4 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

OK, GParted has been in the copy mode for approximately 50 hours now (at 16.00 MiB block size, just like in the read mode).
I decided to persevere and let the program do its job.

5 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

In the future, if you only need to resize the partition and not move it, then the operation is considerably faster.  Moving/copying a partition takes the longest time.

6 Reply by secctitioner12 (edited by secctitioner12 2012-07-16 12:20:17)

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

That's interesting, I didn't know that the two options can be chosen independent from each other (because there is one single button "Resize/Move"). Actually, I wanted only to resize.

When I came back home yesterday, the system was down. Maybe there was some kind of overheating or power failure or the CPU/RAM crashed. I have got an older notebook computer, with only 1 GB RAM. It had been in operation with GParted live for 6 consecutive days. Actually, it should have been more than 100 hours to go for the program's copy operation. So at this point I don't know whether or not GParted shut down properly; gparted_details.htm log file will not be available.
The CD/DVD tray was still closed.

In Windows XP, Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk/Volume Management displayed the external HDD correctly with two boxes, one 350 GB NTFS as active and free from defects for the downsized partition, the other one 348 GB non-partitioned/unallocated.
GParted live (version 0.7.1 by the way) showed basically the same, with a kind of warning triangle with an exclamation point inside of it and the tag "boot" for the downsized NTFS partition. So, judging by this, everything seems to have worked out fine.

7 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

If you wish to only resize a partition, then leave the value of Free space preceding alone in the Resize/Move dialog window.  If this value is changed, then the start sector of the partition must be changed and this involves moving the partition, which takes a long time.

You can double-click on the exclamation point and GParted will display an information window with the text of any warning message.

8 Reply by class413

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

If you wish to only resize a partition, then leave the value of Free space preceding alone in the Resize/Move dialog window.  If this value is changed, then the start sector of the partition must be changed and this involves moving the partition, which takes a long time.

Just a detail to add to the above advice, to avoid "move" implied:
select align to none/nothing (or select the option that is valid for the specific partition, i.e. cylinder or MiB, if you know it).

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***

9 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

class413 wrote:

Just a detail to add to the above advice, to avoid "move" implied:
select align to none/nothing (or select the option that is valid for the specific partition, i.e. cylinder or MiB, if you know it).

This was a requirement for old versions of GParted prior due to an error in the cylinder alignment code.

The problem was reported in Bug 571151 - gparted moves partition to the left even if unneeded.

The solution involved an enhancement to ensure the resize/move feature only moved a partition start boundary if, and only if, the free space preceding value is changed.

GParted versions 0.4.4 and higher include this enhancement.  Hence the latest versions of GParted will not accidentally move a partition.

10 Reply by secctitioner12 (edited by secctitioner12 2012-07-16 12:19:35)

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

The information window for the newly created/resized 350.01 GB partition tells me the following:


       1st sector: 64
       Last sector: 734015487
       Total No. of sectors: 734015424
       
       Warning:
       ntfsresize v2.0.0 (libntfs 10:0:0)
       Device name: /dev/...
       NTFS volume version: 3.1
       Cluster size: 4096 bytes
       Current volume size: 375809634816 bytes (375810 MB)
       Current device size: 375815897088 bytes (375816 MB)
       Checking filesystem consistency ...
       Accounting clusters ...
       Cluster accounting failed at 91571510 (0x5754536): extra cluster in $Bitmap
       Cluster accounting failed at 91571511 (0x5754537): extra cluster in $Bitmap
       Cluster accounting failed at 91571512 (0x5754538): extra cluster in $Bitmap.
       Filesystem check failed! Totally 3 cluster accounting mismatches.
       
       ERROR: NTFS is inconsistent. Run chkdsk /f on Windows then reboot it TWICE!

       The usage of the /f parameter ...
   
       Unable to read the contents of the filesystem.

       The following list shows the software packages required for ntfs file system support: ntfsprogs.

11 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

If you boot into Windows and run "chkdsk /f /r" on the drive and then reboot twice, then Windows should be able to run its file checking operations.

If Windows is not shut down properly then the NTFS file system is left in an inconsistent state.

12 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

My Windows system crashes quite regularly, or at least time and again, because of the old machine (RAM, CPU). 

According to GParted, the main (built-in) HDD's program partition (NTFS) has 64 cluster accounting mismatches while both the system and data partition (NTFS) have no warning sign/messages. Also, I did the partitioning here with GParted live, some time ago.

13 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

It sounds like you could benefit from more reliable hardware.

14 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

I'm an old-fashioned purist who's gonna stick with his old machine as long as it works OK, you see.

In the meantime, I ran chkdsk on the external drive successfully, and there is no warning sign for the created/resized 350.01 GB NTFS partition any longer displayed in GParted live (as a little bit of a downside, however, is that 3 GB are marked as used now).
So, it can be assumed GParted did the partitioning job well and finished off properly, or will I never know?
Can I begin using the external HDD now? Next up is encrypting the whole partition with TrueCrypt.

15 Reply by class413

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

An encrypted partition on unreliable hardware, this is the recipe of failure with no recovery hope!

If you ran chksdk with /f parameter only, I would suggest to repeat the check with the /r parameter. It takes longer.
Look at the output of the command, in the dos window.
If you detect messages on recovering and "relocating" data to other sectors, this means that the check detected sectors in not so good condition. If the number of relocated sectors is small, eg up 2 or 3, the problem isn't very important. If this number becomes big, some dozens or more, then it is better to look for some special HD test software from the manufacturer's web page.
An old hard drive never becomes younger.

In any case, be sure to take frequently backups. An external hard drive works in more dangerous conditions than an internal one.
A member of this forum had such a drive fallen from the desk to the floor some months ago. The drive seemed to rotate, but something on the head system or the magnetic plates went wrong and data were mostly lost.

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***

16 Reply by secctitioner12 (edited by secctitioner12 2012-07-19 11:25:53)

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

Pls let me clarify the following:

   1) New external HDD (Samsung):
       I ran chkdsk with "/f /r" parameters. Took about an hour. As far as I can remember there were no problematic messages (like on recovering and "relocating" data to other sectors), instead it said
       something like "operation accomplished successfully" (not verbatim); unfortunately, I didn't take a screenshot. Maybe there is a log file left from the check anywhere on the system? Or should I
       simply run it a second time with "/f /r", just to retrieve the output of the command in the dos window?

   2) I should have mentioned that I have had my internal HDD for only two years now (Western Digital IDE, 120 GB), it is not as old as the CPU (also, I replaced the old RAM for a 1 GB
       module about two years ago). Concerning this one, as I already mentioned, one of three NTFS partitions (the program partition) has 64 cluster accounting mismatches, according to GParted live.
       It is just 10 GB in size and quite crowded. My question here would be, should I run chkdsk on that drive as well?

   3) The reason for having an external HDD is to take images/backups from all existing partitions of the internal HDD. I have done backups regularly for quite some time now, but only from the data
       partition. Now, with the new external hard drive, I just wanted to partition it, encrypt the newly created/downsized NTFS partition in order to take image backups onto it.

      That's all.

17 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

secctitioner12 wrote:

It is just 10 GB in size and quite crowded. My question here would be, should I run chkdsk on that drive as well?

My recommendation would be to make sure you have a backup of your data, and to run chckdsk /f /r on that drive as well.

18 Reply by secctitioner12 (edited by secctitioner12 2012-07-23 14:30:24)

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

I have found the CHKDSK log in Windows Event Log (remember, I ran chkdsk with "/f /r" parameters on the external HDD) (translated from German):

File system on [ .. ]: is being checked.
The type of the file system is NTFS.
The volume is labeled as [ .. ].
CHKDSK is checking file data (phase 4 of 5)...
File data check finished.
CHKDSK is checking free disk space (phase 5 of 5)...
Verification of free disk space completed.
The contents of the file “upcase” is incorrect.
Errors within the capital-letter table are being corrected.
CHKDSK has found free storage that is marked as allocated in the volume bitmap.
Windows has solved file system problems.

A total of 367001596 KB of storage space on the medium
              84 KB in 3 files
                4 KB in 9 indices
            0 KB in defective sectors
        77176 KB used by the system
        65536 KB occupied by the log file
366924332 KB available on the medium

4096 bytes in each allocation unit
A total of 91750399 allocation units on the medium
91731083 allocation units available on the medium.

So I am good to go with the new external drive, right?

19 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

secctitioner12 wrote:

So I am good to go with the new external drive, right?

You should be good to go with the external drive.  We always recommend a backup in case anything goes wrong.  Also you should know that external drives are often connected through slower interfaces like USB and could take a very long time for operations to complete.  Also any interruption between the computer and the external hard drive can cause an operation to fail.

20 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

You mean, a backup's backup? As I mentioned earlier, I had planned to use the new external HDD (Samsung) for backup purposes (i.e. backup images of my 3 "internal" partitions onto the to-be-encrypted 350.01 GB partition, "shelled out" of the total 750 GB with GParted live two weeks ago). The external Samsung medium with its newly created partition should be a safe place for backup images now.

21 Reply by gedakc

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

If the drive is for backup only, then you should be good to go.

22 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

It sounds like you could benefit from more reliable hardware.

Yeah. This is proving true right now.
The old machine doesn't boot any more, neither Windows nor Linux Live (for example, Knoppix). I tried booting GParted Live, and all I got was a screen telling me the following:


   [ 0.960865 ]    List of all partitions:
   [ 0.960914 ]    No filesystem could mount root, tried:

   [ 0.960987 ]    Kernel panic – not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block (253,0)
   [ 0.961041 ]    Pid: 1, comm: swapper Not tainted 2.6.32-5-486 #1
   [ 0.961083 ]    Call Trace:
   [ 0.961133 ]    [<c12439cc>]    ? panic + 0x38/0xde
   [ 0.961180 ]    [<c1368a16>]    ? mount_block_root + 0x1f8/0x219
   [ 0.961226 ]    [<c1368a70>]    ? mount_root + 0x39/0x4d
   [ 0.961270 ]    [<c1368b92>]    ? prepare_namespace + 0x10e/0x13e
   [ 0.961315 ]    [<c136825c>]    ? kernel_init + 0xd9/0xe2
   [ 0.961358 ]    [<c1368183>]    ? kernel_init + 0x0/0xe2
   [ 0.961406 ]    [<c1003997>]    ? kernel_thread_helper + 0x7/0x10.

The messages shown when trying to boot from Knoppix CD were similar.
Before, I had started the third attempt to encrypt the external hard drive (see previous posts) using TrueCrypt, but the task had not been completed.

23 Reply by secctitioner12

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

Actually, I just wanted to know: do these boot error messages indicate a severe hardware failure?

24 Reply by class413

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Re: Resizing new external hard drive's partition

GParted can't really test hardware. You have to use specific software for this.
Try to boot with any external device disconnected. So, you can find if the problem is in the external device or elsewhere (i.e. motherboard, ram, ... ).

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***