Bad Magic Number/Header

[bmoattari]

Hi there,
I have been trying to uncompress a .cpio file which I "ftp"ed from one host to another. The process aborts with the following error message after expanding tens/hundreds of files:
"UX: cpio: HALT: Bad magic number / header"
I executed "ulimit unlimited" before starting the file uncompression.
Please help!
Thanks,
Bob

 

[cspilman]

There maybe a bad area in that cpio file. What you can do is try cpio command WITH the additional flag of -k. If it is a bad area of the cpio archive file, it will probably still report the error, but continue on through and try to finish.

If this is the case, what you can do is try to ftp the file over again (binary mode) as ftp may have "hiccuped" during file transfer causing a bad area in the file.

Have fun!
Chuck

 

[bmoattari]

Hi Chuck,
Unfortunately, I have tried this a couple of times by creating cpio files of different groups of folders. It keeps reoccuring. The uncompression process fails at exact same place and would not allow me to continue.
I have also tried "ftp"ing in binary mode, but I get same results.
Bob

 

[cspilman]

Sorry, didn't read the first post clearly. I see that it is failing on the "uncompressing" and not when issuing a cpio command because you haven't gotten that far yet.... is that correct in my understanding?

If that's the case... when is it failing? Is it at around 2GB that it fails? If so that is a a ulimit value but it's not any of the values you can change using the ulimit command. This would be an issue with the filesystem itself not being able to support files greater than 2GB. Let me know if this is the case.

Chuck