Harddrive corrupts issueing command "shutdown -r now" using Sorcerer Linux
 

On an install of Sorcerer Linux, when I have completed the install and all updates on a Dell 610 Laptop when I issue the command "shutdown -r now" upon reboot the system stops with fsck unable to complete sda1 unreadable, press cntrl D to continue. When I press control D it goes nowhere and I cant access the drive. Is there something that I am missing in the command? Should I umount the drive first?
Also this doesnt happen if I just press the power button and shut the laptop down. Thank you.

The fact that just pressing the power button doesn't do the same thing is quite odd.

1) How old is the hard drive?
2) What happens when you shut down with the following commands:
init 0
init 6
halt

Sorry for the length of time for reply
 

I had to rebuild the box again. The harddrive is 2 years old. When I put in init 0, the box shut down and when it rebooted came up with fsck.ext3: Unable to resolve 'UUID=be79855c-9474-423d-86df-44065892f183'
* fsck failed
* Repair file systems by running /sbin/fsck
Give root password for maintenance
(or type Control-D to continue):
When I press Control-D it says:
Kernel panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill init!

I seem to have fixed the problem. It seems to be with the update of util-linux 2.18. If I revert back to util-linux 2.17 fsck works fine and hardrive is not corrupted. I ran: augur progress util-linux 2.17

cast util-linux

which replaces the new util-linux that contains the newer fsck with the older util-linux.

Thank you Kyle Sallee for the help in tracking down and fixing the problem.