my sheevaplug still has ubuntu 9.04 installed on it. i’ve postponed putting debian on it due to lack of time. anyways, i’ve found that ubuntu 9.04 does not like ext4 nor advanced format drives formatted for 4K sectors.

from what i’ve read, to make sure a drive is set up for 4K sectors use gparted for partitioning and choose the align to MiB option.

verification can be done by running the following:
root@emobile:/home/resinblade# fdisk -lu /dev/sdb

Note: sector size is 4096 (not 512)

Disk /dev/sdb: 3000.6 GB, 3000592977920 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 45600 cylinders, total 732566645 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 4096 = 4096 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0005807e

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 256 732566527 2930265088 83 Linux

here’s an article stating that there’s some special considerations for western digital green hdds in linux:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Advanced_Format

i wish i had known that info prior to my WD drives developing a bunch of bad sectors…
the drives lasted a a little over 2 years.