Ubuntu

unclean shut down can't get into Ubuntu

Asked by Neil

Help Me
I can not get into Ubuntu, (and I am having to use windows :-( )after the loading screen I get check with the message of
Unclean shutdown., checking drives;
/dev/sda 1...
it gets to 86% and then goes into another screen with a lot of writing.
Sorry I did not get it all but this is what it says
A automatic file system check(fsck) of the rootsystem failed
A manual fsck must be performed.
and somthing about in a read only mode.
then
/dev/sda 1 : unexpected inconsisency : run fsck manualy (ie., without -a or -p options)
fsck died with exit status 4
How do I fix it can I do a repair like that of XP (sorry about the windows wording).
Or will I have to reinstall?
Thank
Neil

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Tom
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Best Tom (tom6) said : 		#1

It sounds like a problem with the drive rather than with Ubuntu. Hopefully it's just a minor error, from what you have said and there are a large number of ways of trying to fix it. The first way i would try depends on getting to a boot menu (the grub-boot-loader menu) which has quite a few different Ubuntu options listed. Choose the one that has "Recovery Mode" somewhere at the end of the long line of text. Start with the fsck, check disk type option - hopefully that should fix it in which case it's probably worth running a few of the other options to while you're there. It's good to run through these about once a month to keep your system on top-form ;)

Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

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Neil (goofandfroggie) said : 		#2

It took some time and playing around but I got it. ;-)
Thanks Tom

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Tom (tom6) said : 		#3

Brilliant, nicely done. Which way worked for you in the end? Did you use the LiveCd and fsck from there?
Congrats for fixing it :)
Regards from
Tom :)

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Neil (goofandfroggie) said : 		#4

Hi
Not really sure lol
I got into the Options. again not sure how, it would not work at first but I got there anyway. I did the x server first, then the fsck it still played up at 86% then to a load of error warnings, ( I think this was after I finished banging my head on the desk lol) I clicked yes to everything . that it said to fix.
It then came up with another screen saying something about driver not working properly I think the graphic ones, as I have seen it before when I had problem installing the nVidia, clicked ok nothing seamed to happen. so ALT-CTRL-DEL the computer rebooted and well here I am happy to say using Ubuntu.

I did not know that I could use the live disc to fix the problem. How do I do that?
Thanks for your help Tom
Regards Neil

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Tom (tom6) said : 		#5

Booting up from an Ubuntu (or almost any other distro's) Cd go for the boot-menu option that says something like "don't install to hard-drive" or "try without making any changes to my the machine". For many distros (such as Ubuntu and Wolvix) it's the default option when booting from a Cd and for some it doesn't even give an option. Booting up this way should get you to a slightly slower but fully working desktop, at least for Ubuntu (and most others). This way of using the linux is called a LiveCd session.

There's a lot of advantage in using the distro you're most familiar with and Ubuntu is a great one for using on someone else's machine to show off desktop effects, eye-candy, office apps and so on. It'll probably scare a Windows user so it might be worth rebooting without the Cd just so they can see there machine behaves normally again and that Linux hasn't destroyed anything. For doing a task like fsck-ing a partition i would prefer to use a Wolvix Cub LiveCd if the machine was quite old or Wolvix Hunter on a decent machine (because Hunter has some great little games like old-school space invaders). I tend to have a few distros Cds laying around so i can help people fix things more easily - and cos it's fun to try them out :)
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=wolvix

Sorry, i talk far too much sometimes
Thanks and regards from
Tom :)