External SSD doesn't mount and kills USB ports

Question

I'm trying to access an external SSD (USB 3.0). But Ubuntu is not able to mount it.

It shows on Nautilus, but when I click on it, I get the message "an operation is already pending".

When I do fdisk -l, it takes a lot, but eventually finds it:

The backup GPT table is corrupt, but the primary appears OK, so that will be used.
Disk /dev/sdb: 238,49 GiB, 256060514304 bytes, 500118192 sectors
Disk model: RTL9210 NVME    
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 16384 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 16384 bytes / 16384 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: #########
Device       Start       End   Sectors  Size Type
/dev/sdb1     2048   1050623   1048576  512M EFI System
/dev/sdb2  1050624 500117503 499066880  238G Linux filesystem

When I do sudo mount -t ext4 /dev/sdb2 /media/mydisk, it keeps hanging for a lot of time and finally gives the message can’t read superblock.

If I try parted, here's what happens:

$ sudo parted /dev/sdb
Warning: Error fsyncing/closing /dev/sdb1: Input/output error
Retry/Ignore? i                                                           
Warning: Error fsyncing/closing /dev/sdb2: Input/output error
Retry/Ignore? i                                                           
Error: Error initialising SCSI device /dev/sdb - No such device
Ignore/Cancel? i                                                          
Error: Could not stat device /dev/sdb - No such file or directory.
Retry/Cancel? c                                                           
Warning: Error fsyncing/closing /dev/sdb: Input/output error
Retry/Ignore? i 

and all the USB ports stop working.

Here's what happens when I try gdisk:

$ sudo gdisk /dev/sdc
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.5
Warning! Read error 5; strange behavior now likely!
Caution: invalid backup GPT header, but valid main header; regenerating
backup header from main header.
Warning! Error 5 reading partition table for CRC check!
Warning! One or more CRCs don't match. You should repair the disk!
Main header: OK
Backup header: ERROR
Main partition table: OK
Backup partition table: ERROR
Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: damaged

Caution: Found protective or hybrid MBR and corrupt GPT. Using GPT, but disk
verification and recovery are STRONGLY recommended.

Command (? for help): p
Disk /dev/sdc: 500118192 sectors, 238.5 GiB
Model: RTL9210 NVME

Sector size (logical/physical): 512/512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): ########
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
Main partition table begins at sector 2 and ends at sector 33
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 500118158
Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries
Total free space is 2669 sectors (1.3 MiB)
Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1            2048         1050623   512.0 MiB   EF00  EFI System Partition
   2         1050624       500117503   238.0 GiB   8300
Command (? for help): w
Final checks complete. About to write GPT data. THIS WILL OVERWRITE EXISTING
PARTITIONS!!
Do you want to proceed? (Y/N): Y
OK; writing new GUID partition table (GPT) to /dev/sdc.
Unable to save backup partition table! Perhaps the 'e' option on the experts'
menu will resolve this problem.
Warning! An error was reported when writing the partition table! This error
MIGHT be harmless, or the disk might be damaged! Checking it is advisable.
Command (? for help):

and the disk still doesn't work.

When I try to clone the partition with dd, I get:

$ time sudo dd if=/dev/sdc1 of=/media/N/ssd.img
dd: error reading '/dev/sdc1': Input/output error
176680+0 records in
176680+0 records out
90460160 bytes (90 MB, 86 MiB) copied, 9,92451 s, 9,1 MB/s
real    0m12,017s
user    0m0,237s
sys 0m1,429s

and all of the USB ports stop working.

When trying to mount on Windows (with speciall tools for ext4), I was able to see my files, so I guess the hardware is okay.

Answer 1

I wasn't able to recover the hardware, but I was able to copy all the data. Here's what I did:

1. On Windows, I installed a program called Linux Reader.
2. I opened Linux Reader, located my partition and created an image of it in an external HD (right click on the partition to see this options).
3. Back to Linux, I was able to recover the image with gdisk:

(Advice on steps 1 and 2: if you are able to make the image with dd on Linux, do that instead).

First, I tried to mount the image. Listing the partitions gave:

$ sudo sfdisk -d SSD.img
label: gpt
label-id: ####
device: SSD.img
unit: sectors
first-lba: 34
last-lba: 500118158
SSD.img : start=        2048, size=     1048576, (...)
SSD.img : start=     1050624, size=   499066880, (...)

The partition I want to mount starts at 1050624, so I have to give an offset of 1050624*512=537919488:

$ sudo mount -o loop,offset=537919488 SSD.img /media/ssd
mount: /media/us: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/loop19, missing codepage or helper program, or other error.

That didn't work, so I proceeded to try to recover the disk image.

I made a backup of the partition table (just in case):

$ sudo sfdisk -d SSD.img > pt.txt

Then, I ran gdisk and pressed p:

$ sudo gdisk SSD.img
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.5
Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: present
Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.
Command (? for help): p
Disk SSD.img: 500118192 sectors, 238.5 GiB
Sector size (logical): 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): ##########
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
Main partition table begins at sector 2 and ends at sector 33
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 500118158
Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries
Total free space is 2669 sectors (1.3 MiB)
Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1            2048         1050623   512.0 MiB   EF00  EFI System Partition
   2         1050624       500117503   238.0 GiB   8300

Since everything looked okay, I pressed w (please refer to gdisk manual to understand these options):

Command (? for help): w
Final checks complete. About to write GPT data. THIS WILL OVERWRITE EXISTING
PARTITIONS!!
Do you want to proceed? (Y/N): Y
OK; writing new GUID partition table (GPT) to SSD.img.
Warning: The kernel is still using the old partition table.
The new table will be used at the next reboot or after you
run partprobe(8) or kpartx(8)
The operation has completed successfully.

Then I was able to mount the image.

ADVICE: Don't do anything unless you know what you are doing. Take some time to study or call a professional. Always back up all your important data.