That's right, even though Mac OS X incorporates certain parts from FreeBSD's and NetBSD's implementation of Unix, it certainly doesn't have kernel support for the default file systems used by many popular Linux distributions. Luckily during Macworld 2007 Google introduced MacFUSE, a loadable kernel module for Mac OS X, that allows non-privileged users to create their own file systems without editing the kernel code. The project was based on FUSE a GPLed Linux module that provides a "bridge" to the kernel interfaces and allowing file system code to run in user space. Unfortunately neither projects supported the ext filesystem and it took until early 2008 before a guy named Alper Akcan finally introduced Fuse-ext2.
With those two software packages we can now easily access drives containing ext2 (and ext3) partitions. Here's how:
- Download the latest MacFUSE binaries (MacFUSE-2.0.3,2.dmg) from the website at: http://macfuse.googlecode.com/.
- Mount the MacFUSE-2.0.3,2.dmg volume and install the MacFUSE package by double clicking its icon (MacFUSE.pkg).
- After the installation download the latest Fuse-ext2 binaries (fuse-ext2-0.0.5.dmg) from the website at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/fuse-ext2/.
- Also mount the fuse-ext2-0.0.5.dmg volume and install the fuse-ext2 package by double clicking its icon (fuse-ext2.pkg).
- Now that both packages are installed it's time to plug in our external drive containing the ext partition(s).
- In order to mount any (or all) of them we need to find out what their device name is. This can most easily been done by launching Disk Utility from the Utilities folder under Applications. In the left column you should see your hard drive and the names of the partitions it contains.
- In our case we would like to mount disk2s1 (highlighted in the screenshot above).
- We need the Terminal application to do this, which is located under Applications.
- After you launched Terminal.app we will create a new directory which will be the mount point for the partition on the drive. Once that's done we can use the fuse-ext2 command to actually mount the drive name mentioned above to the mount point.
mkdir /Volumes/myextdrive
fuse-ext2 /dev/disk2s1 /Volumes/myextdrive
- Congratulations! Your external drive should now be visible in the Finder.
73 comments:
Wow. After hours of fumbling through old forum threads on this subject (causing lovely kernel panics), I find this and it works perfectly. Thanks!
Thanks so much for this! I've spent hours trying to find a solution.
good tutorial! but I have still some problem with 10.4.11 but probabebly you know some hints...
1. after fuse-ext2 command in terminal I get a finder error
2. after ignoring terminal command is succesful but there is no volume on the finder
3. the created folder in /Volumes will disappear
4. after restarting the finder the disk on the finder but named like disk2s1 not as the created folder
5. but the disk is accesible!!
6. but how can I eject the disk? no effect my finder command or terminal umount command...
thanks for any help!
j
Thx Tom!
Hi,
Doesn't it work for partitions in the same disk?
I have Mac OS X 10.5.8 installed on a disk, and in he same disk, in another partition, I have Linux. I can mount the partition from a Live CD, it's sda3, so I suppose the corresponding on Mac would be, disk0s3, wich indeed appears, but I can't mount it. I run the fuse-ext2 command I get no output at all, and nothing happens, ls into the mount point shows nothing there.
Any ideas?
Thanks!
For some reason the fuse-ext2 command is not recognized in terminal... I've installed everything correctly, but can't get this final command to work.
Any ideas? Thanks!
Worked great.Mounted my ext2fs fine.
I have created a .sfs file which is an encrypted ext3 volume with Puppy Linux.
Any ideas how to mount this?
Holy Fuck!
Thankyou so much, after endless BSOD's on my vista machine to back up my NAS device that shit itself, and various hair pulling I have found this, I didn't even need to use terminal, it just worked, the partitions just popped on the desktop. :D
Thanks mate.
With Leopard 10.5.8, MacFuse 2.0.3,2 and fuse-ext2-0.0.6, volumes mount on the desktop automatically when connected. Pretty sweet. Transfer speeds are slow, but it's better than booting into Linux.
Thank you, Tom.
I have Snow Leopard 10.6.2; installed MacFuse 2.0.3,2 and fuse-ext2 0.0.7: everything works fine and volumes self-mount on the desktop.
shame we cant stiky this.
I tried everything you said but i got this error:
-bash: fuse-ext2: command not found
You saved 5000+ digital photos for me. Thanks a million! I purposely put them on an ext2 formatted usb drive when switching from Ubuntu to Mac OS X. Foolishly assumed that Mac would support it natively.
Great stuff! It works brilliantly. It saved my photo's from my ext3 ubuntu hard-disk. I also assumed that the Mac would support the ext filesystems, but I was wrong. Thanks a lot.
Great!!! The device mounts on 10.5.8, but read only. Will I be able to write to this ext3 device?
If you want also write into your disk, add the option:
-o force
You saved a newbee to Macbook a tonne of time and you are awesome in your explanation. I would buy you a drink :)
This is .... BEAUTIFUL!!! Works beautifully for me when I had an issue with a NAS box that died on me but one of the disk was still working. The disks were formatted in Linux.
BTW I am on 10.6.4
And the latest version of Fuse-ext2 is 0.0.7
Trying to use this to read a hard drive pulled from an iomega NAS RAID box. The drive has 2 partitions: a small one that seems to contain the system software, and a big one. The small one mounted with the described steps, but every time I try it with the large partition, I get this in Terminal:
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: Error while trying to open /dev/disk2s2 (rc=2133571347) [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:34)]
fuse-ext2: Probe failed [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:340)]
What the hey? The large partition is the one I really need to access.
Hello community,
I'm trying to mount ext3 partition with rw access but I failed following the procedure describe in this blog.
fuse-ext2 /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/Linux/ -o force
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: Error while trying to open /dev/disk1s1 (rc=13) [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:34)]
fuse-ext2: Probe failed [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:340)]
I'm really need RW access to the disk, what can I do?
desperately... Mac OS user
Are you sure you're trying to mount an ext3 partition, and not the Linux_LVM or Swap partition? You could also try to mount it read-only...
This works perfectly! Thank you so much. After hours screwing around with CarbonCopy and SuperDuper to no avail, this did the trick. Thank you!
How do you apply the -o force thing??
For a total Terminal noob!!??
By the way, I have the drive on my desktop now 'disk1s1' and I can read it no problem but I dont understand how to do the -o force thing! ;-)
@ Mark Latham
fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/Linux/
Thanks Tom!
So ive pasted that into the Termial and I get:
fuse: bad mount point `/Volumes/Linux/': No such file or directory
@ Mark Latham
If I understand correctly you can already access your drive from the Desktop. Is there a reason you would want to use the '-o force' switch?
I want to write to it, this is a network drive Im going to use for backups - the linksys router im using re formatted the drive to ext2 (not sure why It needs to do that but it does) - now I just need to write to it while is connected to my mac because it will take forever to send 800gig over my wifi!
or is there another way to do this without using the Terminal?!
@ Mark Latham
In your case fuse-ext2 has already automatically mounted your disk on the Desktop. Unfortunately the auto mount seems to be read-only. The only way to fix this is to unmount (Right Click on the drive/Eject) and manually remount using steps 6 to 9 from my post (don't forget the mkdir command), and making sure to insert the '-o force' option when calling fuse-ext2 from the command line.
Ha, not having anyluck!
1) I Eject the disks
2) Open Termial and paste in 'mkdir /Volumes/myextdrive'
3) I get he message 'mkdir: /Volumes/myextdrive: File exists
'
4) Then i paste in 'fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/Linux/'
(in disk utility the drive is called disk1s1)
5) I get this:
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: leave [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:55)]
fuse-ext2: opts.device: /dev/disk1s1 [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:351)]
fuse-ext2: opts.mnt_point: /Volumes/disk1s1/ [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:352)]
fuse-ext2: opts.volname: [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:353)]
fuse-ext2: opts.options: force [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:354)]
fuse-ext2: parsed_options: force,allow_other,local,noappledouble,fsname=/dev/disk1s1,fstypename=ext2,volname=disk1s1 [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:355)]
fuse-ext2: mounting read-write [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:369)]
fuse: bad mount point `/Volumes/disk1s1/': No such file or directory
@ Mark Latham
In step 4 (of your steps) you would need to type:
fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/myextdrive
cool, now it says:
fuse-ext2: mounting read-write [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:369)]
Not showed up on the desktop yet...
waited a few minutes an got this! nightmare!
mark-lathams-computer:~ marklatham$ mount_fusefs: failed to mount /Volumes/myextdrive@/dev/fuse0: Socket is not connected
@ Mark Latham
Strange, make sure the drive and its filesystem are ok. You could try and execute the command using sudo (and provide the password for your username):
sudo fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/myextdrive
After that I am out of options, sorry.
No Luck, Ah well, thanks anyway!
Thanks, this works great for me, but only in combination with "sudo" privileges. For example:
sudo fuse-ext2 /dev/disk0s4 /Volumes/Ubuntu -o ro
(after which you have to provide your root password)
Thank you, worked at first try!
Gerhard
I had the same error as Rob Lewis and Luis above. My problem disk is from a bricked Lacie NAS. The small drives mounted no prob. I think my big drive is XFS. Will this tool work or is there another MacFuse solution?
There's an easy solution for the read-only problem described earlier.
See http://www.gearhack.com/Forums/DisplayComments.php?file=Computer/Mac%20OS/Read.Write_EXT2.EXT3_Volumes_on_Mac_OS_X
I'm struggling! I _think_ i have followed the instructions but I get this:
Ed-Silvesters-MacBook:~ edsilvester$ fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk1s8 /Volumes/myextdrive
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: Error while trying to open /dev/disk1s8 (rc=2133571347) [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:34)]
fuse-ext2: Probe failed [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:340)]
My steps were to paste:
mkdir /Volumes/myextdrive
and the partition I want to mount is called disk1s8 according to disk util. What am i doing wrong?
Is anyone else here using 10.6.5 ?
I just tried another mac with the same result...
fuse-ext2 /dev/disk5s8 /Volumes/myextdrive
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: Error while trying to open /dev/disk5s8 (rc=2133571347) [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:34)]
fuse-ext2: Probe failed [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:340)]
I am running 10.6.7 and have the same problem as esilvester and Rob Lewis. Can mount smaller partitions but on big one - getting "error trying to open..." and "probe failed..." No self-mounting either... I need to access data from that disk. Any additional input on the above or suggestions on data recovery soft?
I am running Mac OSX Leopard on Powerpc G4z 10.5.8 and I followed all of the directions, and I got this error message (By the way, I am trying to install ubuntu using a 4gb flash drive):fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: Error while trying to open /dev/disk2s1 (rc=2133571347) [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:34)]
fuse-ext2: Probe failed [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:340)]
Please reply! Thanks in advance!
Finally made it to work, but i cannot acces folders and files wich has accented letters in their name (like:képek). Any idea?
Thank you so much!!!
www.morad.net
This is amazing - It works even on Ext4. Though across Ext files systems there is only read support and not write - it is still something.
The instructions referenced in January at
gearhack.com
worked great for me. Now the automounter
mounts ext2 volumes read/write, such as
my ext2 SD card.
Specifically:
Need to add option "rw+" to string
OPTIONS="auto_xattr,defer_permissions"
in /System/Library/Filesystems/fuse-ext2.fs/fuse-ext2.util in start of function Mount ()
There would be
OPTIONS="auto_xattr,defer_permissions,rw+"
Credit to fsqcds there.
Thank You for the tutorial, it did help a lot, in just five minutes I had access to the ext3 partition from Mac Osx 10.5.8... I can mention that you don't need to create a directory, if you mount the partition through disk utility, it creates a shortcut on the desktop.
Once again thank you for the tutorial.
Referring to my post on mounting
read/write, above: caution!
After getting the volume mounted with
write access I edited one file using
vi and found the volume was corrupted.
In case you are running a 64bit machine and run into problems with MACfuse then take this version:
http://www.tuxera.com/mac/macfuse-core-10.5-2.1.9.dmg
Finally got it to work with Snow Leopard/LION
you need the latest version of MacFuse. Beta
http://static.caurea.org/MacFUSE/MacFUSE-2.1.7.dmg
Finally got it to work with Snow Leopard/LION.
MacFuse is not supported with 64bit kernels, but the latest Beta works.
http://static.caurea.org/MacFUSE/MacFUSE-2.1.7.dmg
xxxxxxxxxx:fuse-ext2-0.0.7 dchan$ sudo fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/Super
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: leave [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:55)]
fuse-ext2: opts.device: /dev/disk2s2 [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:351)]
fuse-ext2: opts.mnt_point: /Volumes/Super [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:352)]
fuse-ext2: opts.volname: [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:353)]
fuse-ext2: opts.options: force [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:354)]
fuse-ext2: parsed_options: force,allow_other,local,noappledouble,fsname=/dev/disk2s2,fstypename=ext2,volname=disk2s2 [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:355)]
fuse-ext2: mounting read-write [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:369)]
SUCCESS!
Thanks dude. I already had MacFUSE installed so I just needed instructions on how to mount the ext2 partition on a very old server of mine since I expect that the drive is going to fail soon. This did the job!
For those that are having issues with the "probe failed" error - I simple upgraded my version of macFUSE to 2.19, because I was using a mac pro 4,1. And then in the terminal, I added sudo to the front of the command
because the first time it still failed.
sudo fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/myextdrive
notice there is a space between the disk ID, and the directory we are mounting to as well. Hopes this helps anyone, thanks for others feedback!
Thank you, was so helpfull :D
thank you, perfect tutorial, and got the job done
I'm getting an error:
MacBook-Pro:/ ken$ fuse-ext2 /dev/disk6s1 /Volumes/sg-main
dyld: Library not loaded: /usr/local/lib/libfuse.2.dylib
Referenced from: /usr/local/bin/fuse-ext2
Reason: image not found
Trace/BPT trap: 5
Any ideas? I'm using OS X 10.7.2. Thanks.
Just to share my experience.
I am totally inept.
I seized upon this as the answer to my problems as I had a WD Mybookworld white light that I couldn't connect to properly, but which still seemed to be vaguely functioning (ie the drive still made a noise).
I thought - cool - this is it.
But in fact only 2 of the volumes on my drive were EXT2. The one with all the data on was XFS.
It turns out there's an alpha fuse-xfs for OSX as well. Sounds good right? It probably is, but my XFS had a bad 'superblock' and XFS repair software couldn't fix it.
So I wound up doing data recovery with Data Rescue 3.
This seems to have worked pretty well. You lose your folder structure when it reconstructs the files. But most of my data was tagged MP3 files, so I'm not too worried about that.
Hope this helps someone. Thanks Tom for the post anyway.
anyone had this problem:
dyld: Library not loaded: /usr/local/lib/libfuse.2.dylib
Referenced from: /usr/local/bin/fuse-ext2
Reason: image not found
Trace/BPT trap: 5
iMac-van-Mark-Pelkmans:~ Mark$ fuse-ext2 /dev/disk1s2 /Volumes/mynas
fuse-ext2: version:'0.0.7', fuse_version:'27' [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:324)]
fuse-ext2: enter [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:30)]
fuse-ext2: Error while trying to open /dev/disk1s2 (rc=2133571347) [do_probe (../../fuse-ext2/do_probe.c:34)]
fuse-ext2: Probe failed [main (../../fuse-ext2/fuse-ext2.c:340)]
What is wrong?
mark how did you fix this:
dyld: Library not loaded: /usr/local/lib/libfuse.2.dylib
Referenced from: /usr/local/bin/fuse-ext2
Reason: image not found
Trace/BPT trap: 5
averageJoe said...
In case you are running a 64bit machine and run into problems with MACfuse then take this version:
http://www.tuxera.com/mac/macfuse-core-10.5-2.1.9.dmg
working for me ...... weeeeee ty....
For Lion and Mountain Lion users, install OSXFuse instead of MacFuse. There's a checkbox during installation to install a "MacFuse Compatibility Layer". http://osxfuse.github.com/
Pure awesome. This just resolved my attempt to rescue a WD My Book World (White Light) Edition 2TB (single disk) whose sshd_config had gone bad, preventing me to log in via ssh.
As for some of the commenters above, I am also on Mountain Lion (64bit), and ended up installing OSXFuse (instead of MacFuse) along with Fuse-ext2 to be able to mount the linux raid.
Like Mark above I initially saw some errors trying to mount the disk, but they were resolved and it mounted nicely as I added sudo, and -o force to make it read/writable (as suggested by other commenters)
cd /Volumes
mkdir disk1
sudo fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk2s1 disk1
# fix /etc/sshd_config
sudo umount disk1
Thanks for the post Tom!
This works perfectly! Thank you so much. After hours screwing around with CarbonCopy and SuperDuper to no avail, this did the trick. Thank you!
Regard's,
Ben Linus.
click on my link nitrotek.nl
I have finally managed to get this to work using OSXFUSE and the hard drive mounts on the desktop...however when I go into the HD, the folders are all there, but they are empty! It also says the available space is 1tb, which is the entire HD space.
have I just deleted all the files or am I missing something?
Please help as its not my HD!
Hi. I tried this and received the following:
dyld: Library not loaded: /usr/local/lib/libfuse.2.dylib
Referenced from: /usr/local/bin/fuse-ext2
Reason: image not found
Trace/BPT trap: 5
any ideas?
Never mind. I just read the comment to use OSXFUSE and that worked.
Thank you.
Awesome advice. Fixed my problem after looking into comments.
If you are running on Mountain Lion you must sudo before using the fuse-ext2 command or you will receive a probe error.
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http://flashdrive-repair.blogspot.com
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