PMS deletes all media and disk is not mountable

[patrickb998]

Server Version#: 4.87.2
Player Version#: Roku 7.0.24.8154-127760991-Plex

I have read many linux mint forum, redit, and plex forum entries on PMS deleting media files on linux setups with external drives. Thus…

• All check boxes under Setting-Library are unchecked.
• A mount point was working (from fstab):
  #external-drive3 A 4TB Drive 22Feb2023
  UUID=32f7c065-646c-4a9d-9071-16045a3eeb26 /mnt/shared_storage ext4 defaults,nofail 0 0
• I followed the Plex Linux Permissions FAQ and set as follows (as me not sudo):
  find /mnt/shared_storage/Media -type f -exec chmod -c 644 {} “;”
  find /mnt/shared_storage/Media -type d -exec chmod -c 755 {} “;”

Everything worked fine for a week. Watched a few shows last night…then today, all media is gone from the external disk. Disk is no longer mountable! This is the second time this has happened. I followed the mount and permissions directions as previous but this time unchecked everything in Settings-Library. I thought it worked but no joy today. Previously ls -l seemed to show all directories and files reflecting correct permissions as issued.

I tried mounting the external on laptop to check for media, no joy. Unable to mount Error:
“Error mounting /dev/sda1 at /media/bresnahanp/ExtremePro1: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sda1, missing codepage or helper program, or other error”

Shall I continue to regret recently trying Plex and paying for lifetime PlexPass?

Transcoder Statistics log for last three things we watched last night then at 0204 this morning Plex Media Scanner Deep Analysis log with DEBUG entry for one movie. Then all heck breaks out with several Plex Media Scanner log files with hundreds of lines with DEBUG in them “Committing media stream changes,” “Updating media item…”

SysInfo:
Linux PBPlex2 5.15.0-67-generic #74-Ubuntu SMP Wed Feb 22 14:14:39 UTC 2023 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

System:
Kernel: 5.15.0-67-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 11.3.0 Desktop: MATE 1.26.0 wm: marco
dm: LightDM Distro: Linux Mint 21.1 Vera base: Ubuntu 22.04 jammy
Machine:
Type: Desktop Mobo: N/A model: N/A serial: UEFI: American Megatrends
v: 5.13 date: 04/18/2022

[ChuckPa]

This has nothing to do with Plex.

It unfortunately has everything to do with the Distro (Mint) you’re using.

What you’re sadly experiencing is what’s happened many times before you.

Mint will “Flake out” without warning and fail.
Mint is what corrupts filesystems. That’s the OS job, not the application.

Should you opt to switch to real Ubuntu (instead of the derivative Mint is), the problems vanish instantly and forever.

I know I sound a bit harsh but this is regrettably a common theme with those using Mint

It’s also the principle reason we urge people to switch to another distro
as well as haven’t vetted Mint

[adefaria]

@patrickb998

Disk is no longer mountable! This is the second time this has happened. I followed the mount and permissions directions

This part confused me. If the disk is no longer mountable then how did you “follow the mount and permissions”?

Maybe the disk is just corrupt. You might try SpinRitte.

[patrickb998]

Disk is “no longer” mountable. Mounted fine for each of the weeks it all worked. After something happened last night, then it became unmountable. Disk is SSD.

[patrickb998]

Lesson learned. Distros all CentOS at work and the widely used Mint at home for years with many dbs and apps (like Syncthing with external SSD), but, no joy here. Final answer: switch distro. I guess I lose.

[ChuckPa]

@patrickb998

Disk is “no longer” mountable. Mounted fine for each of the weeks it all worked. After something happened last night, then it became unmountable.

what does fsck /dev/sdX return ? is it repairable ?

/sbin/parted /dev/sdX will let you look at the partition table as well to confirm it’s intact.

[BanzaiInstitute]

I’ll add that I keep all my media on read-only shares. If I need to fiddle with media files, I do it myself with a handful of tools that I trust. I do not trust media servers to touch the files directly.

I don’t know if that would have helped OP. If @ChuckPa says Mint sucks, it sucks.

[patrickb998]

For interest, I setup a separate system w/new hardware, ubuntu cinnamon 20.04 with same permission structure. Again, 3 weeks or so all is well. Ubuntu updates run today and…all gone again. External 4TB SSD error wrong fs type bad superblock again. Liked Plex app interface and even paid lifetime pass. But, I am out for good. Ubuntu has become unbearable with snap anyway. I would never allow my team to tell a user to change OS to solve a problem. Two Jellyfin test boxes running solid for several months on Mint and Fedora. I gave it more of a go than I expected.

[ChuckPa]

@patrickb998

For interest, I setup a separate system w/new hardware, ubuntu cinnamon 20.04 with same permission structure. Again, 3 weeks or so all is well. Ubuntu updates run today and…all gone again. External 4TB SSD error wrong fs type bad superblock again

Please show your /etc/fstab contents.

Also please show df -h output.

(You can copy/paste the text from both)

External USB devices are notorious for changing drive enumeration (/dev/sdXX)
You must mount them by UUID.

Linux Tips

Using other hard drives (Windows or Linux) with PMS This How-To is written to help with Internal and External drives. It also is written to demonstrate how to cope with NTFS and EXT4 formatted drives. By logical extension, any format supported by Linux can be handled using the technique shown here. In all cases, the goal is to give user plex permission to read your media files which Linux doesn’t allow by default due to its strict security model. We will walk through the steps needed …

This isn’t about changing horses, it’s about riding the current horse better