How Many FSCK Passes are Normal?

[Horrortaxi]

I've heard that "a few" passes with FSCK is normal, but how many is abnormal? I've been running it all morning--40-50 passes and it still says 'file system was modified'. This is the first time I've run it and the computer is about 6 months old.

[Doctor Q]

My experience is from other Unix variants, not from Mac OS X. I find that when things go right (a perfect disk), only a couple of passes are needed. When things go wrong, and actual disk repair operations are made, a couple extra passes are needed. Your results sound wrong to me, and I wonder if it is in an infinite repair loop.

You should only run fsck while booted in single-user mode. Are you?

[Powerbook G5]

I'd be more worried about doing more harm than good by running it that many times. I'd definitely look into it, since 40-50 passes is definitely not normal.

[Horrortaxi]

Yes, I was in single user mode. I finally gave up on it but I was barking up the wrong tree anyway. I was trying all the "usual voodoo" to troubleshoot a problem. Fsck was a longshot.

[Stevil15]

Here's some helpful info on fsck:

http://hcsosx.blogspot.com/2002_10_21_hcsosx_archive.html