Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!oz.cis.ohio-state.edu!jgreely From: jgreely@oz.cis.ohio-state.edu (J Greely) Newsgroups: comp.sys.next Subject: Re: Optical disk problem Message-ID: Date: 3 Aug 89 15:27:10 GMT References: <5741@pt.cs.cmu.edu> Sender: news@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu Reply-To: J Greely Organization: Ohio State University Computer and Information Science Lines: 55 In-reply-to: rwb@vi.ri.cmu.edu's message of 3 Aug 89 12:12:40 GMT In article <5741@pt.cs.cmu.edu> rwb@vi.ri.cmu.edu (Bob Berger) writes: >I'm having lots of problems using the optical disks. My latest >problem occurred when I inserted a disk while I was still logging in. Yeah, that'd cause a problem. I've never done it myself, due to my native skepticism about the internals of autodiskmount, but I've managed some similar things. >Even after power cycling the machine, it insists that this disk is mounted >on volume 0. However, I cannot find a directory entry for it to use with >the unmount command in the browser. Minor confusion here. The *disk* is mounted in the drive, but the file system on the disk is not mounted in the directory hierarchy. You don't want to unmount the file system, you want to eject the disk. However, since the disk was not inserted under the Workspace, it can't be gotten rid of through it. >How can I force the system to unmount a disk I don't have a directory entry >for? Several solutions are available. The first is "ask the administrator". If you *are* the administrator, try this: 1. su to root 2. run the "df" command, to make sure that the disk is not, in fact, mounted. (look for a line containing /dev/od0a in the first column) 3. If it's mounted, use the command "umount /mnt", replacing /mnt with the name of the directory the OD is mounted on (last column, same line). 4. Very, very carefully type "disk -e /dev/rod0a". The disk command can destroy all of the information on your disk without asking, so be sure you use it correctly (it, of course, has no manual page). At this point, the disk should pop out. If it doesn't, you've got a problem, and should try the ruder method below. The rude way to get your disk back: Halt the machine. From the monitor, type "ej" (if you don't know how to get to the monitor, look it up in the Librarian). This should spit out the disk. If this doesn't work, power-cycle the machine, halt it on the way up, go to the monitor, and try "ej". If *this* doesn't work, break out the handy NeXT-issue icepick and forcibly eject the disk by hand, being careful to follow the instructions in the book (see page 233 in the Users Reference Manual). I've never had to resort to the icepick, but I have managed to lock it up so badly that I had to power-cycle to get my disk back. Note that if you eject your disk the rude way, it won't be accepted the first time you try to insert it again. Don't panic! It'll take it on the second (or worst-case third) try. -=- J Greely (jgreely@cis.ohio-state.edu; osu-cis!jgreely)