Fails to Boot: fsck /dev/sdk1 failed

Hagen Brown · 04-10-2008, 10:41 PM

I just rebooted one of our Linux Red Hat Enterprise servers (2.69-42.elsmp) and the boot failed with an error message: "fsck.ext3 no such file or directory while trying to open /dev/sdk1 FAILED dropping you to a shell".

During the reboot, Linux indicated an fsck had not been run for over 300? days and an automatic fsck was being initiated. It now appears the filesystem was not well. I am new to Linux and have no idea how to proceed. Any advice would be appreciated. Hagen

james.farrow · 04-11-2008, 04:50 AM

Just my two cents....
If you have a shell run the fsck manually, but type mount first to make sure that the file system(s) that you are checking are not mounted.

fsck -y /dev/sdk1

The y tells fsck to automatically fix errors. Alternatively you can boot to rescue mode and do the same thing from wothin the rescue environment.

Hagen Brown · 04-14-2008, 10:29 AM

Issue resolved: An invalid entry '/dev/sdk1' had been inserted in to fstab file. Not sure why /dev/sdk1 had been inserted but it appears the system had never been booted since fstab was updated. Perhaps /dev/sdk1 is a reference to a USB device that is no longer is connected. Hagen