Mounting my EHD, editing Fstab

[Mario Vukelic]

On Sun, 2008-04-20 at 07:24 +1000, Tony Corbett wrote:
> in System/Preferences/Removal Drives and Media
> Storage tab is set to "mount removal drives when hot-plugged

Ok, so that's fine.

> here what came up after pluggingin the usb ehd:
> corbett at corbett-desktop:~$ tail -f /var/log/messages

We can find the problems in the log:

> Apr 20 07:14:14 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1676.507907] usb 4-2: new
> high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
>
> Apr 20 07:14:14 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1676.668015] usb 4-2:
> configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice

Good, the device was found by the kernel

> Apr 20 07:14:14 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1676.669259] scsi1 : SCSI
> emulation for USB Mass Storage devices

Good, the kernel initializes the common access method

> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.436881] scsi 1:0:0:0:
> Direct-Access     Maxtor   OneTouch III     0364 PQ: 0 ANSI: 4

Good, the kernel recognizes the hard disk as a Maxtor OneTouch III

> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.470032] sda: Unit Not
> Ready, sense:

> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.470041] : Current:
> sense key: Illegal Request 

Bad, we have a problem.

> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.470044]     Additional
> sense: Invalid command operation code
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.470834] SCSI device
> sda: 195371568 512-byte hdwr sectors (100030 MB)
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.471900] sda: test WP
> failed, assume Write Enabled
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.474895] sda: Unit Not
> Ready, sense:
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.474900] : Current:
> sense key: Illegal Request
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.474902]     Additional
> sense: Invalid command operation code
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.475520] SCSI device
> sda: 195371568 512-byte hdwr sectors (100030 MB)
> 
> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.476643] sda: test WP
> failed, assume Write Enabled

I don't know what's going on here. When googling the errors like "test
WP failed, assume Write Enabled" or "Current: sense key: Illegal
Request", I find questions about similar errors, but not too many and
nothing conclusive.

> Apr 20 07:14:20 corbett-desktop kernel: [ 1682.476651]
>  sda:end_request: I/O error, dev sda, sector 0
<snip>

Now these surely look like real HD errors. Are you sure that this disk
is ok? Does it work in another computer? Also, can you try to attach
another, known-working disk to this computer?