EXT2 data recovery help

A forum on data recovery using the professional data recovery software R-STUDIO.
Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Sun Sep 11, 2011 4:56 pm

I can't blame anyone but myself for the dataloss. For some stupid ignorant reason I did run the following on 3 drives with data on to test write speed.

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdX bs=1000000 count=512
where X is the specific drive a,b,d

Obviously the screwed up the first superblock totally. Normally this would not be a big problem but for one drive - /dev/sdb - this seem to have caused havoc.
See all drives have (had) a EXT2 fs. The only one not recogniced by Linux as native EXT2 was /dev/sdb. This is a WD15EARS not formatted with advanced format. First sector started at 63 instead of 64 as a proper advanced format. This drive showed up as a GPT EFI partition when doing fdisk -lu on it before the dd-incident.

I have hooked it up to my XP machine with R-Studio 5.4 on and scanned it. R-Studio finds the EXT2 fs as "Recognized 14" along with 13 very small FAT partitions. The EXT fs seem to have the proper size though. Sad part is the the only files R-Studio finds are meta files. Log say "Enumeration if files for Recognized 14 failed"
OK Off to see what Extra Found Files can give. Let R-Studio work for a couple of hours, come back to the machine and R-Studio has crashed :?
Hmmmm reboot PC just to be safe and start up R-Studio again. Load the scan from file and try to enumerate the Extra found files again, this time keeping an eye on the screen. At least this time R-Studio works all the way until it's time for it to present the file browser and crash again :evil:
OK third run and now I stop the process about half way through. Now I get the browser and I can see found files. For example a bunch of MS Excel files. All with random names. When trying to open such file Excel complains but most of the document looks like it's fine.
Is this the only probable way to get the data back? Is there any way to find the proper names of the files and connect them to the files themselfs ?????

As I write this R-Studio have just finished loading up the EXT2 partition for another drive and it looks like the situation is the same on this one. "Recognized 2" the EXT2 partion found on the disk only contains Metafiles. Extra found files is totally empty :(

I'm not familer with the struckture of any file system I do know EXT2 holds file info in Inods and there are files called Inode-something on the Recogniced ## EXT2 partitions if that can help me.

Please advice

Alt
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Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2008 2:13 pm
Contact:

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Alt » Mon Sep 12, 2011 6:22 am

We need the scan info for /dev/sdb to understand what remains on the disk. May I use the e-mail you registered with to send you information on how to deliver it to us?

Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Mon Sep 12, 2011 10:01 am

Yep that works fine

Alt
Site Moderator
Posts: 3129
Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2008 2:13 pm
Contact:

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Alt » Mon Sep 12, 2011 11:20 am

Set an email to you.

Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Mon Sep 12, 2011 12:48 pm

I have tried three times to upload the scn file and the transfer times out every time. I will try to split it in several rar archives.

Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Mon Sep 12, 2011 1:31 pm

61 file split rar archive uploaded + svf with CRC checksums

Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Thu Sep 15, 2011 11:32 am

Any update on this one?

Alt
Site Moderator
Posts: 3129
Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2008 2:13 pm
Contact:

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Alt » Thu Sep 15, 2011 11:36 am

We're checking it.

Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Thu Sep 15, 2011 6:03 pm

Sorry if I come out as a nag. Just wanted to make sure the scn file I uploaded was OK.

Signify
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Sep 11, 2011 3:14 pm

Re: EXT2 data recovery help

Post by Signify » Mon Sep 26, 2011 3:01 pm

Alt do you know if your guys could get anything useful out of the .scn file?

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