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Linux Problem

9 Comments

I’m trying to format a micro-SD to install Fedora on my Raspberry Pi 2. I’m following the instructions here.

But when I get to the part about building the swap partition, I’m getting an error message. This is the output of fdisk:

Command (m for help): p
Disk /dev/sdd: 29.7 GiB, 31914983424 bytes, 62333952 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x0002ce31

Device Boot Start End Sectors Size Id Type
/dev/sdd1 2048 264191 262144 128M b W95 FAT32
/dev/sdd2 264192 1312767 1048576 512M 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdd3 1312768 62333951 61021184 29.1G 83 Linux

Now here’s what happens when I run mkswap:

[root@new-host-5 raspberry]# mkswap /dev/sdd2
mkswap: error: swap area needs to be at least 40 KiB

I’ve tried searching for a similar issue, but am coming up empty. Anyone have any ideas?

[Update a while later]

OK, I’ve decided that it’s a bad SD. But now I’ve got a new problem; I can’t mount the W95 FAT32 boot partition:

Disk /dev/sdd: 14.5 GiB, 15560867840 bytes, 30392320 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x00000000

Device Boot Start End Sectors Size Id Type
/dev/sdd1 2048 264191 262144 128M b W95 FAT32
/dev/sdd2 264192 772095 507904 248M 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdd3 772096 30392319 29620224 14.1G 83 Linux

Command (m for help): q

[root@new-host-5 raspberry]# mount -t fat32 /dev/sdd1 /tmp/rpi/boot/
mount: unknown filesystem type ‘fat32’
[root@new-host-5 raspberry]# mount -t auto /dev/sdd1 /tmp/rpi/boot/
mount: /dev/sdd1 is write-protected, mounting read-only
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sdd1,
missing codepage or helper program, or other error

In some cases useful info is found in syslog – try
dmesg | tail or so.

It doesn’t work with “auto” or “vfat” either.

[Tuesday-morning update]

OK, not sure what the problem was, but after rebooting the machine, I managed to get it all to work. I haven’t actually tried booting the Pi, yet, though.

9 thoughts on “Linux Problem”

  1. Try mount -t msdos
    vfat and msdos filesystem drivers are subtle variations, and your kernel may have one but not the other enabled.

    1. [root@new-host-5 raspberry]# mount -t msdos /dev/sdd1 /tmp/rpi/boot/
      mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sdd1,
      missing codepage or helper program, or other error

      In some cases useful info is found in syslog – try
      dmesg | tail or so.

      1. You’ll have to make sure it is formatted before you can mount it. Just re-partitioning, either size or type won’t be sufficient.

      2. If you didn’t run mkfs or equivalent the partition didn’t get formatted. Which fits the error message you got from `mount -t msdos /dev/sdd1 /tmp/rpi/boot/’. fdisk allocates space for partitions, but does not format.

  3. Formatting is done with a mkfs or a variant (mkfs.vfat) depending upon your Linux.

  4. At this point I think I’d run a non-destructive “badblocks” command over the entire device to find bad chunks.

    badblocks -vsn /dev/sdd

  5. I just ordered a Raspberry Pi 2 from Adafruit.com (My getting out of hospice captivity gift to me.)

    They said something about needing an OS upgrade off the internet?

    Also getting this cute little keyboard.

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