Connecting a seagate external hard drive

[dimond]

My computer has stuffed up and I'm using a knoppix 5.1 boot cd to try and get some files off of it.
the external hard drive i am trying to connect is a seagate free agent drive 500gbs.
knoppix doesn't seem to even be recognizing that it is connected.

please help,
thankyou

[devils casper]

Hi and Welcome !

Plug-in External disk, open Konsole or Terminal and execute this

sudo fdisk -l
df -h

Post output here.

[dimond]

knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo fdisk -l

Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40007761920 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4864 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 4863 39062016 7 HPFS/NTFS
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/root 3.4M 22K 3.4M 1% /
/ramdisk 396M 11M 386M 3% /ramdisk
/UNIONFS 396M 11M 386M 3% /UNIONFS
/dev/hdb 697M 697M 0 100% /cdrom
/dev/cloop 2.0G 2.0G 0 100% /KNOPPIX

[dimond]

I'm not sure why but now knoppix is picking my hard drive up.
and its actually 250gig sorry. not sure if that makes a difference.
but now the problem is i cant copy files onto it.

using those commands you told me this is what comes up
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo fdisk -l

Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40007761920 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4864 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 4863 39062016 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sda: 250.0 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 1 30401 244196001 7 HPFS/NTFS
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/root 3.4M 23K 3.4M 1% /
/ramdisk 396M 19M 378M 5% /ramdisk
/UNIONFS 396M 19M 378M 5% /UNIONFS
/dev/hdb 697M 697M 0 100% /cdrom
/dev/cloop 2.0G 2.0G 0 100% /KNOPPIX
/dev/hda1 38G 30G 7.5G 80% /media/hda1
/dev/sda1 233G 68G 166G 30% /media/sda1

[devils casper]

not sure if that makes a difference.
but now the problem is i cant copy files onto it.

Knoppix doesn't support NTFS read/write out of box. You have to install ntfs-3g package for that.
If your machine has internet access then execute this

sudo apt-get install ntfs3g
sudo umount /dev/sda1
sudo mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda1 /media/sda1 -o defaults,umask=0

In case it doesn't work, try PartedMagic LiveCD. Its a Partition Manger, 30MB Size and ntfs-3g pre-installed.

[dimond]

knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo apt-get install ntfs3g
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
E: Couldn't find package ntfs3g
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo umount /dev/sda1
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda1 /media/sda1 -o
defaults,umask=0
Failed to mount '/dev/sda1': Operation not supported
Mount is denied because NTFS is unclean. Choose one of these actio
ns:
   Boot Windows and shutdown it cleanly, or if you have a removabl
e
   device then click the 'Safely Remove Hardware' icon in the Wind
ows
   taskbar notification area before disconnecting it.
Or
   Run 'ntfsfix' on Linux unless you have Vista, then mount NTFS w
ith
   the 'force' option read-write, or with the 'ro' option read-onl
y.
Or
   Mount the NTFS volume with the 'ro' option in read-only mode.
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ ntfsfix
ERROR: You must specify a device.
ntfsfix v1.13.2-WIP (libntfs 10:0:0)

Usage: ntfsfix [options] device
    Attempt to fix an NTFS partition.

    -h, --help             Display this help
    -V, --version          Display version information

For example: ntfsfix /dev/hda6

Developers' email address: linux-ntfs-dev@lists.sf.net
Linux NTFS homepage: http://www.linux-ntfs.org
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ ntfsfix /dev/sda1
Mounting volume... FAILED
Attempting to correct errors...
Processing $MFT and $MFTMirr...
Reading $MFT... OK
Reading $MFTMirr... OK
Comparing $MFTMirr to $MFT... OK
Processing of $MFT and $MFTMirr completed successfully.
Setting required flags on partition... OK
Going to empty the journal ($LogFile)... OK
NTFS volume version is 3.1.
NTFS partition /dev/sda1 was processed successfully.

I still cant copy anything to it and the error im getting is

Could not make folder /media/sda1/Assignments.

I'm downloading parted magic now so i guess I'll see how that goes...

[devils casper]

Execute

sudo mkdir /media/sda1
sudo mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda1 /media/sda1 -o defaults,umask=0,force
ls /media/sda1

[dimond]

Yay!

I eventually managed to fix it all up on sunday afternoon and i got all the files off it i wanted.
I also want to turn this machine I'm on now into a linux machine once i get my new computer. What distro (i think that's what you call them) would you recommend?
And how should i go about learning some of the linux konsole stuff?

Thank you for your help devils casper

[devils casper]

Glad to help you !!

I also want to turn this machine I'm on now into a linux machine once i get my new computer. What distro (i think that's what you call them) would you recommend?

Post your machine's specs here. RAM, HardDisk size, Graphics Card and Processor.
Check the link in my Signature too. It will get you going.

And how should i go about learning some of the linux konsole stuff?

Check linuxcommand.org.

[dimond]

My computer is a dell inspiron 2200
and its specs are :
1.4ghz intel celeron M processer
256MB RAM
40Gig hard drive
and an internal 128MB intel 915GM/GMS, 910GML express chipset video card.

From what I've heard Ubuntu would be a good place to start?