Data Recovery and Disk Utilities Forum @R-TT

Madumi wrote:Just a quick follow-up question... The recovery process seems to have gone seamlessly... If no errors are reported, can I be sure all the files have successfully been recovered?

No, unfortunately. If the file records are recoverable but the content of the file is overwritten, R-Studio may report no errors, but in fact the file cannot be recovered.

thanks for your reply.

OK, yes, I understand the problem of overwritten files. I don't know if a broken RAID0 array creates overwritten files. When I did the recovery saw that I could recover deleted files, but I only attempted to recover the directory/files that had not been deleted by me.

I guess if a broken array could delete files, I understand they could be lost without trace. I didn't see evidence that files were missing. If a broken array deleted files, would the evidence be an odd file here or there, or would it be larger scale?

thanks!

Madumi wrote:thanks for your reply.

OK, yes, I understand the problem of overwritten files. I don't know if a broken RAID0 array creates overwritten files. When I did the recovery saw that I could recover deleted files, but I only attempted to recover the directory/files that had not been deleted by me.

I guess if a broken array could delete files, I understand they could be lost without trace. I didn't see evidence that files were missing. If a broken array deleted files, would the evidence be an odd file here or there, or would it be larger scale?

thanks!

You see, R-Studio analyses the remnants of the previous file system. When it finds a valid file record it assumes that this is a valid file. But it's impossible to evaluate whether the disk sectors belonging to the file have been overwritten by some other processes.
This article explains file recovery in more detail: File Recovery Basics: How Data Recovery Works.

Alt wrote:You see, R-Studio analyses the remnants of the previous file system. When it finds a valid file record it assumes that this is a valid file. But it's impossible to evaluate whether the disk sectors belonging to the file have been overwritten by some other processes.
This article explains file recovery in more detail: File Recovery Basics: How Data Recovery Works.

Aaah, yes, thanks... What I meant to say (sorry for the mis-communication) was that I'm not worried whether the contents of the files are valid. I'm wondering whether if the folder/sub-folder structure seems correct (I can't remember any glitches), whether it's likely to have holes elsewhere in the structure in places that are harder to find (eg. 5 folders deep). i.e. if the structure seems to have overall integrity, whether I can trust that the rest of the tree retains similar integrity (even if the files themselves may have been overwritten).

thanks!

Madumi wrote: Aaah, yes, thanks... What I meant to say (sorry for the mis-communication) was that I'm not worried whether the contents of the files are valid. I'm wondering whether if the folder/sub-folder structure seems correct (I can't remember any glitches), whether it's likely to have holes elsewhere in the structure in places that are harder to find (eg. 5 folders deep). i.e. if the structure seems to have overall integrity, whether I can trust that the rest of the tree retains similar integrity (even if the files themselves may have been overwritten).

thanks!

Unfortunately, nothing can be said for sure before actual inspection.