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I extracted two disks from a laptop after it went kaput:

  • a 2.5 SATA hdd (NTFS + ext4 data partitions),
  • a SATA M.2 (mostly ext4 partitions, this had the boot and root partitions).

Then I purchased two USB bays and installed the disks in them, but when connecting them via USB, I see no partitions (I'm running Linux). They were formatted and used in the laptop (still Linux), so I'm surprised no partition is visible. It's also suspicious that both disks are unreadable.

I think GPT was being used, and I'm no expert on GPT, but I wonder if this behavior is expected or not. My plan is to try and recover the partition table on both disks, but given they both contain some important data, I'm reluctant to perform any destructive action on them.

Is this expected behavior? If yes, what's the best way to proceed? If no, what could be the likely causes?

EDIT #1

Here some info after the very insightful comments:

  • /dev/sda is the 2.5" SATA hdd
  • /dev/sdb is the SATA M.2 sdd

ran fdisk -l on both devices:

# fdisk -l /dev/sda
fdisk: cannot open /dev/sda: Input/output error

# fdisk -l /dev/sdb
Disk /dev/sdb: 119.24 GiB, 128035676160 bytes, 250069680 sectors
Disk model: FE202x Series
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 33553920 bytes

Indeed, dmesg spits out a few errors related to sda:

[ 2248.918967] usb 2-1: reset SuperSpeed Gen 1 USB device number 2 using xhci_hcd
[ 2248.937039] scsi host3: uas_eh_device_reset_handler success
[ 2249.401881] sd 3:0:0:0: [sda] tag#27 FAILED Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE cmd_age=92s
[ 2249.401914] sd 3:0:0:0: [sda] tag#27 Sense Key : Aborted Command [current]
[ 2249.401920] sd 3:0:0:0: [sda] tag#27 Add. Sense: No additional sense information
[ 2249.401928] sd 3:0:0:0: [sda] tag#27 CDB: Read(10) 28 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 00
[ 2249.401936] blk_update_request: I/O error, dev sda, sector 0 op 0x0:(READ) flags 0x0 phys_seg 1 prio class 0
[ 2249.401950] Buffer I/O error on dev sda, logical block 0, async page read
ARDVL
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  • It's a possibility, but the failure seemed to be related with the motherboard. Also, to me it seems unlikely that both drives were affected. – ARDVL Nov 24 '21 at 13:04
  • Oh, I forgot to add that I had a 3rd drive (NVMe m.2 this time) that I tested on the external bay and I was unable to see its partitions as well. That one was not related to the computer I mentioned and had no relevant data so I formatted it. – ARDVL Nov 24 '21 at 13:06
  • Sure, but my point was that I also tested a drive that had no logical or physical damage on the same bay and no partitions were identified there as well. – ARDVL Nov 24 '21 at 13:10
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    "both disks are unreadable" – What do you mean? I/O errors? No `/dev/sdX` file? Or disks allegedly without structure but as if healthy? Compare [this question](https://unix.stackexchange.com/q/511148/108618). Note the asker there used dos partition table in MBR which is at the same place (0th sector, offset 0) regardless of the logical sector size. If you use GPT and your USB bay translates the sector size on the fly then it's no surprise the GPT cannot be found. We need precise data. What is the output of `fdisk -l /dev/sdX` for chosen disk(s)? Please [edit] the question and add this info. – Kamil Maciorowski Nov 24 '21 at 18:07
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    I vaguely recall coming across this in the past and it having to do with sector sozes on the disk not being 4k aligned or something like that. DONT PANIC - the data is still there. Edit - found https://www.klennet.com/notes/2018-04-14-usb-and-sector-size.aspx – davidgo Nov 24 '21 at 18:23
  • If a third unrelated disk didn’t show up, that sounds like an incompatibility issue with with the USB bay, rather than a problem with the disks themselves – Ramhound Nov 25 '21 at 00:41
  • the most likely root cause is that your external USB disk controller doesn't support 4K disks: [Is it possible to set the logical sector size of a USB hard disk drive?](https://superuser.com/a/699831/241386) – phuclv Nov 25 '21 at 06:29

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