[drainyoo]

I have 2 questions.

1. Im trying to run fsck true the single user mode but its saying that the drive is journaled and it cant run fsck. I can type -f to override it but its that safe?

2. Is it worth having journaling on? Would my system perform any worse with it off?

Thanks.

[Millennium]

I believe that using fsck -f disables journaling, but should otherwise be safe.

To be completely sure, however, consider disabling the journaling yourself before running fsck, and then re-enabling it afterwards. You can do that like so:

sudo diskutil disableJournal <volume-path>

<do whatever fsck stuff you're interested in doing>

sudo diskutil enableJournal <volume-path>

Ahem. As to performance, it doesn't matter too much. If you tend to work on larger files, there will be a very slight slowdown, but so small that you are unlikely to notice the difference. If you tend to work on many small files, there may be a slight increase in performance, but again it will be so small that you're unlikely to notice.

[drainyoo]

Thanks Mill. Ill try that out.

[jfinete]

A journaled filesystem is already fsck'ed. If your Mac feels it needs to run fsck, it'll do so automatically at reboot.

fsck -f does not disable journaling. It mearly forces fsck to run. It's perfectly safe, but it's probably unneccessary.

[n8910]

Firstly, man <command> is your friend.

admin% man man
admin% man - format and display the on-line manual pages

Secondmore, fsck -f is indeed what you are looking for.
[ -f Force fsck to check `clean' filesystems when preening.]

Neverlast, take things slow and careful when using the command line.


cheers -

[Dr. Smoke]

Hi, drainyoo.

By the numbers:

1. Instructions for using fsck, whether on a journaled or non-journaled volume, are also found in "Using Disk Utility and fsck for file system maintenance in Mac OS X." Basically

fsck -fy

will work in either case, journaled or non-journaled.

2. Journaling is a good thing and should help reduce instances of the need to use Disk Utility > Repair Disk or fsck after problems. See: "Mac OS X: About File System Journaling."

[Chuckit]

Originally posted by Millennium:
I believe that using fsck -f disables journaling, but should otherwise be safe.

It doesn't disable journaling for me. I do it regularly, and my disk still shows up as being journaled.