eOS and Win 10 can't see eachother files in an External HDD formatted NTFS

Question

I bought this Seagate Expansion Drive with 2TB of space so I could backup files from both machines I have, one with Elementary OS and another with Win 10. It worked at first but weirdly it seems not to behave the same way in both machines.

Timeline is:

1 - Connected the External HDD to the Win 10 PC. It seemed all right, with Seagate's icon and everything else there.

2 - Transferred some files to it from the Win PC.

3 - Disconnected it from the Win PC.

4 - Connected to the eOS machine and it seemed everything was ok. The HDD is formated in NTFS and I've been reading about native support from Ubuntu-like OSes and Elementary didn't failed me there. I could reach everything I had transferred at first, from Win machine.

5 - Started transferring from eOS machine to it using $ cp -r /origin/ /media/username/Seagate\ Extension\ Drive/destination/.

6 - This is where I think everything went wrong. The transfer was long (up to 15 hours) and I had a power source issue that made the Notebook shutdown.

7 - Turned it back on and suddenly the Seagate External HDD wouldn't be recognized as it was before (meaning it didn't mounted or showed as it in nautilus left nav bar).

8 - Found out I had no permission to access the Seagate thru terminal with $ cd /media/username/Seagate\ Extension\ Drive/. So I figured it out that I should give my user the permission with $ sudo chown username:username and it worked in the sense that I finally could reach it, but it seemed all empty (no Win backups there).

9 - Transferred some folders to check if the opposite would be true and I wouldn't see eOS files on Win and it is. The HDD mounts and opens normally, with no sign of my files transferred to the External HDD.

10 - I've deleted these files I used to test and ran some commands to check if it's in fact mounted and it's not.

$ sudo df
Sist. Arq.     Blocos de 1K     Usado Disponível Uso% Montado em
udev                8098356         0    8098356   0% /dev
tmpfs               1627212      1876    1625336   1% /run
/dev/nvme0n1p3     95596964  17345588   73352204  20% /
tmpfs               8136048     79944    8056104   1% /dev/shm
tmpfs                  5120         4       5116   1% /run/lock
tmpfs               8136048         0    8136048   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
/dev/loop0            30592     30592          0 100% /snap/snapd/8140
/dev/loop1           165376    165376          0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/128
/dev/loop3           145152    145152          0 100% /snap/code/39
/dev/loop2            99328     99328          0 100% /snap/core/9665
/dev/loop4            30720     30720          0 100% /snap/snapd/8542
/dev/loop5            56320     56320          0 100% /snap/core18/1880
/dev/loop6           109056    109056          0 100% /snap/yakyak/74
/dev/loop7           147840    147840          0 100% /snap/code/38
/dev/loop8            97792     97792          0 100% /snap/yakyak/66
/dev/loop9            98944     98944          0 100% /snap/core/9436
/dev/loop10           56704     56704          0 100% /snap/core18/1885
/dev/loop11           49536     49536          0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1474
/dev/loop12           63616     63616          0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1506
/dev/nvme0n1p1      1934672    739664    1078684  41% /boot
/dev/nvme0n1p5    349097856 172430824  158864180  53% /home
/dev/nvme0n1p2       998480      6232     992248   1% /boot/efi
/dev/sda3         508502928  43456608  439146188  10% /home/eduardo/HDD
/dev/loop13          164096    164096          0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/116
/dev/sda2         459070460 386188352   72882108  85% /home/eduardo/windows
tmpfs               1627208        72    1627136   1% /run/user/1000

Meanwhile, fdisk tells me this: the drive format type is HPFS/NTFS/exFAT. Not sure what this means.

eduardo@Colossus:/$ sudo fdisk -l
Disco /dev/loop0: 29,8 MiB, 31272960 bytes, 61080 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop1: 161,4 MiB, 169254912 bytes, 330576 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop2: 97 MiB, 101695488 bytes, 198624 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop3: 141,6 MiB, 148512768 bytes, 290064 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop4: 29,9 MiB, 31334400 bytes, 61200 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop5: 55 MiB, 57626624 bytes, 112552 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop6: 106,4 MiB, 111546368 bytes, 217864 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop7: 144,4 MiB, 151375872 bytes, 295656 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/nvme0n1: 465,8 GiB, 500107862016 bytes, 976773168 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tipo de rótulo do disco: gpt
Identificador do disco: 0A86548C-E1A7-422E-85AA-32984E84CC56

Dispositivo       Início       Fim   Setores Tamanho Tipo
/dev/nvme0n1p1      2048   3999743   3997696    1,9G Linux sistema de arquivos
/dev/nvme0n1p2   3999744   6000639   2000896    977M Sistema EFI
/dev/nvme0n1p3   6000640 201312255 195311616   93,1G Linux sistema de arquivos
/dev/nvme0n1p4 201312256 265312255  64000000   30,5G Linux swap
/dev/nvme0n1p5 265312256 976771071 711458816  339,3G Linux sistema de arquivos


Disco /dev/sda: 931,5 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Tipo de rótulo do disco: gpt
Identificador do disco: DB83DB04-807A-4F8B-B0CF-18BBC9B4EEB3

Dispositivo    Início        Fim    Setores Tamanho Tipo
/dev/sda1          34      32767      32734     16M Microsoft reservado
/dev/sda2       32768  918173695  918140928  437,8G Microsoft dados básico
/dev/sda3   918173696 1953523711 1035350016  493,7G Linux sistema de arquivos

A partição 1 não inicia em um limite de setor físico.


Disco /dev/loop8: 95,5 MiB, 100118528 bytes, 195544 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop9: 96,5 MiB, 101191680 bytes, 197640 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop10: 55,3 MiB, 58007552 bytes, 113296 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop11: 48,3 MiB, 50642944 bytes, 98912 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop12: 62,1 MiB, 65105920 bytes, 127160 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/loop13: 160,2 MiB, 167931904 bytes, 327992 setores
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disco /dev/sdb: 1,8 TiB, 2000398933504 bytes, 3907029167 setores <--
Unidades: setor de 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Tamanho de setor (lógico/físico): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
Tamanho E/S (mínimo/ótimo): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Tipo de rótulo do disco: dos
Identificador do disco: 0xa32770f6

Dispositivo Inicializar Início        Fim    Setores Tamanho Id Tipo
/dev/sdb1                 2048 3907026943 3907024896    1,8T  7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT <--

I'm guessing that the power crash ruined the permissions and now I can't reach files in this external HDD properly but I'm not sure at all if that is right.

Is there anything I could do in order to solve this?

Thanks in advance for any insights and ideas that could lead me to a solution.

Answer 1

After some more try, I managed to solve this.

I tried to mount it manually and it showed me some error message:

$ sudo mount -t ntfs-3g -o defaults,rw,uid=1000,users /dev/sdb1 /media/eduardo
$MFTMirr does not match $MFT (record 0).
Failed to mount '/dev/sdb1': Erro de entrada/saída
NTFS is either inconsistent, or there is a hardware fault, or it's a
SoftRAID/FakeRAID hardware. In the first case run chkdsk /f on Windows
then reboot into Windows twice. The usage of the /f parameter is very
important! If the device is a SoftRAID/FakeRAID then first activate
it and mount a different device under the /dev/mapper/ directory, (e.g.
/dev/mapper/nvidia_eahaabcc1). Please see the 'dmraid' documentation
for more details.

So I went with the external HDD to windows machine to run the chkdsk /f which happened to solve the problem itself by correcting the errors caused by the power drop.

Answer 2

I wouldn't recommend, but you can partition your hard drive to have 2 partitions:

1. NTFS partition for Windows backup
2. exFat for file storage that Windows, Linux, and MacOS can use.

I recommend having a separate drive for your Windows' partition backup and backup just your linux OS snapshots onto your hard drive in a folder using TimeShift. TimeShift does not backup personal files, like photos, documents, and music. You'll need to find a solution to backup those personal file. My solution is kinda dangerous.