Data Recovery

[BiGg RiE]

Ok so I hadn't planned to get vista untill all the kinks had been worked out and it was "enthusiast Friendly"

Of course i got a copy of it so I thought to myself, what the heck I've got a spare 10gb partition on my drive why not throw vista on there to check it out.

so the install went great no problems vista booted and I liked all the flashy lights, even though it didn't look better than my xp system with the startdock suite on it and widgets gallore. So i go to boot back into my XP Pro partition and to my surprise no dual boot menu is available. So in an effort not to pop a blood vessle i hit the net for a soulution as per my usual routine when catastrophy hits. so I come upon the vista boot pro software. this doesn't work as the only windows installation it detects is the vista one. so i set it to use the old boot options and restart, thinking maybe vista just isn't seeing it. On boot i get an ntldr is missing error, i put in my xp pro disc and boot from cd. At this point i realize that my XP pro partiton is gone. No biggie as i have separate partitions for my files and programs anyway. so i reinstall windows xp pro and all goes well. but when i go to my computer in xp pro and click on my other partions it tells me that "this drive is not formated for windows do you want to format now?"

***!! MASSIVE MELTDOWN !!***

ahhhh!! What the?!?! I'm screwed no recent backups, no copies of vital files. damn it... what to do? so I start researching datarecovery software which brings me here

what software would those who know recommend for my situation, i think the data is still there on my other partitions as the drive is still partitioned in the same way i had it.

is there any hope? or should i start reformating and start from scratch? should i stick with vista at this point seeing how the install went well and since it's nothing for me to reinstall it.

has anyone else had or come across this problem?

Oh and before you guys attack me about not backing up prior to a partition level install know this... I know I messed up royally but the reiteration of that fact will not help or hurt me I simply need any and all guidance you can provide in this matter.

My main focus is getting my files off one of the partitions, i don't care about programs or settings i think total there's about 20 GB of data i'd like to recover.

The drives show as 0bytes 0bytes in relation to used & free space respectively.

Thanx in advance

~~BiGg RiE~~

And yes I have access to another system from which I can download or get all software needed.

Also none of the drive labels i had named are there anylonger, and in the disk management utility in XP Pro all partition sizes are as they were but all read as healthy and 100% free space. and no file system is displayed on any partition but the currently used xp pro partition and the vista partition which both read as NTFS
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[hq5]

GetDataBack (http://www.runtime.org/gdb.htm) or EasyRecovery Pro (http://www.ontrack.com/easyrecoveryprofessional/) is a very good Data Recovery program. I've many good experience with these 2 programs.

[BiGg RiE]

GetDataBack (http://www.runtime.org/gdb.htm) or EasyRecovery Pro (http://www.ontrack.com/easyrecoveryprofessional/) is a very good Data Recovery program. I've many good experience with these 2 programs.

Thanx for the input I'll try'em out keep ur fingers crossed.

I'll let ya know how it goes

[The Black Pumpkin]

I've never done a backup.

I can imagine people yelling at you for getting a pos psu ( ) or something like that, but not for backing up files. Sure, it's recommended, but I'm sure not everybody does it frequently. Like me.

[BiGg RiE]

I've never done a backup.

I can imagine people yelling at you for getting a pos psu ( ) or something like that, but not for backing up files. Sure, it's recommended, but I'm sure not everybody does it frequently. Like me.

Yea, and it really sucks because these were client file for graphic design and i don't have back ups of alot of them especially the more recent ones done in the last 3 months or so.

[The Black Pumpkin]

Well yeah, that's not good.

The only I lost that was really important when my windows got corrupted a couple installs ago was a list of phone numbers and my Morrowind save file.

[BiGg RiE]

Niether software worked they would scan and recognize the different partitions but after the scan in the GetDataBack app nothing was displayed on the results screen to open further

The Easy recovery pro software would show a bunch of files but when I tried to view them it was a bunch of jibberish

Each one would show the current file it was on when scanning but to no avail. the easy recovery showed like 5000 files but no directories.

Any other suggestions on this?

[bubba]

couple of things to try.

1. try to boot the drive with a linux live cd, like knoppix http://www.knoppix.org/ or slave the drive in any linux install for that matter, it may see the data where windows thinks its gone.

2. could try a bartPE disk, some of utilities available to it have data recovery.

[BiGg RiE]

couple of things to try.

1. try to boot the drive with a linux live cd, like knoppix http://www.knoppix.org/ or slave the drive in any linux install for that matter, it may see the data where windows thinks its gone.

2. could try a bartPE disk, some of utilities available to it have data recovery.

Ok I'll try the boot from Linux CD first but the link you provided links me to what I'm huessign are a few download links in different languages. But when I click the link that says "Download" it sends me to what looks like another mirror site with a bunch of language I can't read.

Can you give a different link , or provide a more detailed reference on how to download the correct file from the link you previously provided?

Thanx,

BiGg RiE

[bubba]

right click save as

http://www.kernel.org/pub/dist/knoppix/ ... -16-EN.iso

[BiGg RiE]

right click save as

http://www.kernel.org/pub/dist/knoppix/ ... -16-EN.iso

Ok I tried bartPE to no avail it still reads the disks as raw

I downloaded and burned the linux image but when I boot into it I have absolutly no idea what to do there are instruction for pressing f2&3 but i didn't read anything helpfull in those menus that come up. And I don't know how to use what looks like the Linux version of the Command Prompt.

Any instructions would be helpful.

Thanx,

BiGg RiE

edit: Ok so all i needed to do was press enter on the first screen and It booted into linux, hwever I still don't know what to do. In the OS I've never used Linux before.

[tonman23]

Not sure if you tried this but it's worth a shot.
I would try making a barts cd with ontrack on it, or if you have barts installed on a separate partition you can run it by navigating to the program files folder and launching the ontrack executable. Once you're in ontrack try doing a raw recovery, this will ignore the mft data of the partition and allow you to pull raw files out. Unfortunately the filenames will be lost but if what's important are client graphic design files, you can simply pull all photoshop, illustrator or whatever the files might be out. Hope this helps.

[BiGg RiE]

Not sure if you tried this but it's worth a shot.
I would try making a barts cd with ontrack on it, or if you have barts installed on a separate partition you can run it by navigating to the program files folder and launching the ontrack executable. Once you're in ontrack try doing a raw recovery, this will ignore the mft data of the partition and allow you to pull raw files out. Unfortunately the filenames will be lost but if what's important are client graphic design files, you can simply pull all photoshop, illustrator or whatever the files might be out. Hope this helps.

Thanx for the suggestion I'll try it and post outcome.

[BiGg RiE]

Not sure if you tried this but it's worth a shot.
I would try making a barts cd with ontrack on it, or if you have barts installed on a separate partition you can run it by navigating to the program files folder and launching the ontrack executable. Once you're in ontrack try doing a raw recovery, this will ignore the mft data of the partition and allow you to pull raw files out. Unfortunately the filenames will be lost but if what's important are client graphic design files, you can simply pull all photoshop, illustrator or whatever the files might be out. Hope this helps.

Hey I don't see an option for ontrack or see an executable in the install directory. I'm using PE Builder v3.1.10a any further suggestions?

[BiGg RiE]

Not sure if you tried this but it's worth a shot.
I would try making a barts cd with ontrack on it, or if you have barts installed on a separate partition you can run it by navigating to the program files folder and launching the ontrack executable. Once you're in ontrack try doing a raw recovery, this will ignore the mft data of the partition and allow you to pull raw files out. Unfortunately the filenames will be lost but if what's important are client graphic design files, you can simply pull all photoshop, illustrator or whatever the files might be out. Hope this helps.

Hey I don't see an option for ontrack or see an executable in the install directory. I'm using PE Builder v3.1.10a any further suggestions?

Hey I forgot that ontrack was one of the apps i tried before, so I reran the raw recovery and noticed that there are files like .avi and .exe, .bmp and what not that come up does that mean that if I buy the full version I can extract them? I didn' take this app any further because when I hit the preview file button i get that gibberish i talked about in my previous posts.

SO to clearify if I extract thos files that it finds does that mean i can recover what ever they represent and all i'll have to do is rename them to reflect exactly what they are? The files are all different sizes which reflects normal hdd save practices.

[tonman23]

Not sure if you tried this but it's worth a shot.
I would try making a barts cd with ontrack on it, or if you have barts installed on a separate partition you can run it by navigating to the program files folder and launching the ontrack executable. Once you're in ontrack try doing a raw recovery, this will ignore the mft data of the partition and allow you to pull raw files out. Unfortunately the filenames will be lost but if what's important are client graphic design files, you can simply pull all photoshop, illustrator or whatever the files might be out. Hope this helps.

Hey I don't see an option for ontrack or see an executable in the install directory. I'm using PE Builder v3.1.10a any further suggestions?

Hey I forgot that ontrack was one of the apps i tried before, so I reran the raw recovery and noticed that there are files like .avi and .exe, .bmp and what not that come up does that mean that if I buy the full version I can extract them? I didn' take this app any further because when I hit the preview file button i get that gibberish i talked about in my previous posts.

SO to clearify if I extract thos files that it finds does that mean i can recover what ever they represent and all i'll have to do is rename them to reflect exactly what they are? The files are all different sizes which reflects normal hdd save practices.

I'm not sure about the full version vs. the trial, but if it sees your raw files, you should be able to extract them. When you do a raw recovery, it categorizes all files in separate folders by type. I haven't had the trial version of it so unfortunately I can't answer your question.

Try this if you have no luck, it's freeware http://www.smartpctools.com/data_recovery/index1.html

GL

[bubba]

When you boot to the disk, and the Knoppix desktop loads, there should be some icons on the desktop. One each for the cd rom, hard drive and floppy (if you have it)

If it will see the drive there should be the icon, click on it it will open a window similar to that of windows explorer. you should then beable to browse the drive, and move the files to a thumb drive or burn to a cd.

but from what I have read all the stuff you have tried thus far hasn't you may be screwed on getting the data.

sucks, I learned my lesson on backing up few months back when I lost my video work of my sisters wedding, had to recapture it all, redo all the edits. It sucks.

[BiGg RiE]

When you boot to the disk, and the Knoppix desktop loads, there should be some icons on the desktop. One each for the cd rom, hard drive and floppy (if you have it)

If it will see the drive there should be the icon, click on it it will open a window similar to that of windows explorer. you should then beable to browse the drive, and move the files to a thumb drive or burn to a cd.

but from what I have read all the stuff you have tried thus far hasn't you may be screwed on getting the data.

sucks, I learned my lesson on backing up few months back when I lost my video work of my sisters wedding, had to recapture it all, redo all the edits. It sucks.

Ok so to clearify if it recognizes the hdd drive partition they will be on the desktop along with the icons for the other drives; cd, floppy etc.?

[BiGg RiE]

Hey I don't see an option for ontrack or see an executable in the install directory. I'm using PE Builder v3.1.10a any further suggestions?

Hey I forgot that ontrack was one of the apps i tried before, so I reran the raw recovery and noticed that there are files like .avi and .exe, .bmp and what not that come up does that mean that if I buy the full version I can extract them? I didn' take this app any further because when I hit the preview file button i get that gibberish i talked about in my previous posts.

SO to clearify if I extract thos files that it finds does that mean i can recover what ever they represent and all i'll have to do is rename them to reflect exactly what they are? The files are all different sizes which reflects normal hdd save practices.

I'm not sure about the full version vs. the trial, but if it sees your raw files, you should be able to extract them. When you do a raw recovery, it categorizes all files in separate folders by type. I haven't had the trial version of it so unfortunately I can't answer your question.

Try this if you have no luck, it's freeware http://www.smartpctools.com/data_recovery/index1.html

GL

I'll try it & post result

[BiGg RiE]

tonman i tried it the drives show up but when i click on them and click browse it says "Drive not found!"

It's not looking to good for me.

I'm going to get the full verion of onTrack software 2night and see what happens, wish me luck.