On Wed, 15 Apr 1998, Kirk Rafferty wrote:
> I'm not sure if this would work (I don't have a system to trash :), but
> the first thing that comes to my mind is something like:
>
> # dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda5 count=1000
I wouldn't do this because, although it is guaranteed to destroy your
data, it will not do so in the sort of way that a filesystem error would
do (in which most of the data remains intact while select parts are in
error). This will cut a wide swath through the filesystem which fsck will
be more or less completely unable to cope with, whereas the rest of the
filesystem will be intact. If you do it this way, you should only do it
on an unmounted filesystem, otherwise you will panic your kernel.
> Whatever you do, unless you don't mind risking the physical hardware,
> don't do the power-cycle-many-times thing. PC power supplies aren't
> spec'd to take that kind of abuse, and you stand a good chance of
I disagree. Many if not most PC's are turned on several times a day with
no ill effects. I wouldn't recommend flipping the switch up and down like
you're playing Space Invaders, but turning the system on, letting it boot,
turning it off again, won't hurt anything. Finally, this does an
excellent job of simulating the most common cause of filesystem errors -
power failures! :)
For a better effect, open a lot of files while this is going on. Maybe
untar a big archive (bigger than the size of your RAM) and turn off the
power in the middle of it.
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