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Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

 
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Daniel Olops
Occasional Contributor

HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

Hello,

We have an old server running HP-UX 10.20. It has an ~280 GB SCSI external drive attached to it, not in LVM. Its partition size was set at ~113 GB and was running fine.

I ran a extendfs to the fullest size. Only after the change I realized that HP-UX limits HFS filesystem size at 128 GB... Now I can't mount it:

# mount -F hfs /dev/dsk/c0t6d0 /var/hd_backups_large
mount: /dev/dsk/c0t6d0 on /var/hd_backups_large : Invalid argument

fsck says:

# fsck /dev/dsk/c0t6d0
** /dev/dsk/c0t6d0
BAD SUPER BLOCK: FILE SYSTEM SIZE TOO LARGE
USE -b OPTION TO FSCK TO SPECIFY LOCATION OF AN ALTERNATE
SUPER-BLOCK TO SUPPLY NEEDED INFORMATION; SEE fsck(1M).

If I specify an alternate superblock, no success either:

# fsck -b 10040 /dev/dsk/c0t6d0
Alternate super block location: 10040
** /dev/dsk/c0t6d0
BAD SUPER BLOCK: FILE SYSTEM SIZE TOO LARGE
USE -b OPTION TO FSCK TO SPECIFY LOCATION OF AN ALTERNATE
SUPER-BLOCK TO SUPPLY NEEDED INFORMATION; SEE fsck(1M).

Is there a way to reduce this HFS filesystem back to 114 GB? I couldn't find a way to do it.

Regards,

Daniel
6 REPLIES 6
Suraj K Sankari
Honored Contributor

Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

Hi,

LVM Limitation is there for 10.2 so better remove the hole FS and recreate it.

Suraj
Daniel Olops
Occasional Contributor

Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

AFAIK, if I do a newfs, all data will be lost. Is there a way to avoid it?

According to this link (http://docs.hp.com/en/5971-2383/5971-2383.pdf), HP-UX 10.20 can go up to 256 GB, altough HP didn't support it. So I think there must be a way to be able to mount this filesystem...

Regards,

Daniel
Suraj K Sankari
Honored Contributor
Solution

Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

Daniel Olops
Occasional Contributor

Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

Got it... Well, since I don't have a recent backup of that disk, I'll try to mount it on a modern machine (perhaps Linux?), and try to restore data.

Anyways, thanks for the help!

Regards,

Daniel
Bill Hassell
Honored Contributor

Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

> I ran a extendfs to the fullest size. Only after the change I realized that HP-UX limits HFS filesystem size at 128 GB... Now I can't mount it:
> # mount -F hfs /dev/dsk/c0t6d0 /var/hd_backups_large
> mount: /dev/dsk/c0t6d0 on /var/hd_backups_large : Invalid argument

Unfortunately, it appears that your version of 10.20 (ie, patches) did not have sanity and limit checking in extendfs code. fsck can't fix it because the directory values are invalid for the old HFS filesystem.

> I'll try to mount it on a modern machine (perhaps Linux?), and try to restore data.

Since it looks like it might be a separate disk, you can try to mount it on another HP-UX system (Linux may have no clue what the HFS filesystem might be) but because the pointers and directory metadata have been corrupted with unusable values, success is not very likely. You can generally assume that 15+ year old operating systems (any flavor) will be full of limitations.


Bill Hassell, sysadmin
Daniel Olops
Occasional Contributor

Re: HFS filesystem extend >128 GB, now I can't mount or fsck it

Got my data back!!! :-D

I plugged this internal harddrive onto a HP rp3410 running HP-UX 11i V3 fully patched, and tried to mount/fsck it. Same errors. Then I just gave a shot on the 'vxfsconvert' utility, as I had nowhere to run. And it succeeded! Now the filesystem is a ~280 GB VxFS and all data is there. I'll just have to re-create the volume with HFS format for it to be recognized on HP-UX 10.20.

Thanks for all answers!

Regards,

Daniel