is it possible to recover data from a partially saved disk image
I tried to make an image copy of my dying HDD, but it was getting too big, so I aborted the mission. When I tried again, it got stuck.
The first one, with R-Drive Image, was about 150 Gb and the system didn't save it to the bin. But I do have a 32 Mb ISO copy of the second, made with HD Clone.
As the HDD died later on, I wondered if there is a way to see what's inside this 32 Mb and if there's a way to get it back. Moreover, if using a good data repair program I could recover those important 150 GB and do the same.
hard-drive data-recovery iso-image disk-image
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
add a comment |
I tried to make an image copy of my dying HDD, but it was getting too big, so I aborted the mission. When I tried again, it got stuck.
The first one, with R-Drive Image, was about 150 Gb and the system didn't save it to the bin. But I do have a 32 Mb ISO copy of the second, made with HD Clone.
As the HDD died later on, I wondered if there is a way to see what's inside this 32 Mb and if there's a way to get it back. Moreover, if using a good data repair program I could recover those important 150 GB and do the same.
hard-drive data-recovery iso-image disk-image
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
add a comment |
I tried to make an image copy of my dying HDD, but it was getting too big, so I aborted the mission. When I tried again, it got stuck.
The first one, with R-Drive Image, was about 150 Gb and the system didn't save it to the bin. But I do have a 32 Mb ISO copy of the second, made with HD Clone.
As the HDD died later on, I wondered if there is a way to see what's inside this 32 Mb and if there's a way to get it back. Moreover, if using a good data repair program I could recover those important 150 GB and do the same.
hard-drive data-recovery iso-image disk-image
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
I tried to make an image copy of my dying HDD, but it was getting too big, so I aborted the mission. When I tried again, it got stuck.
The first one, with R-Drive Image, was about 150 Gb and the system didn't save it to the bin. But I do have a 32 Mb ISO copy of the second, made with HD Clone.
As the HDD died later on, I wondered if there is a way to see what's inside this 32 Mb and if there's a way to get it back. Moreover, if using a good data repair program I could recover those important 150 GB and do the same.
hard-drive data-recovery iso-image disk-image
hard-drive data-recovery iso-image disk-image
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
asked Jan 31 at 12:40
dadodado
32
32
add a comment |
add a comment |
1 Answer
1
active
oldest
votes
Since the hard drive is toast, you can still try running TestDisk on the image file. Just tell testdisk to examine the image file. On Linux I'd just run this in a terminal
testdisk <image_file>
On Windows you might need to modify the command line, or perhaps run it from a terminal window too. The TestDisk Step By Step page has a brief section on Running TestDisk Executable that mentions using disk images.
Or if there isn't enough filesystem for TestDisk to read or repair, it's more likely PhotoRec might recover at least some files. It's run basically the same way as TestDisk above, (see PhotoRec Step By Step) just tell it to examine the image file
photorec <image_file>
That's only if your images are plain binary copies (or an Encase EWF image) and aren't compressed or formatted in some weird way by R-Drive or HD Clone, I'm not familiar with them.
If your first 150GB image hasn't been completely overwritten yet, you might possibly recover some files by using testdisk on the drive the image was deleted from, in case the image file is un-delete-able. Or run photorec on just the free space of that drive, and it might find some files, or perhaps the image itself.
- Note: Recover / copy the found files to another drive. If you tried to recover files to the same drive you're searching, you could overwrite what you're looking for.
In the future, I'd use gddrescue instead, it's quite good at skipping over the very bad sectors of a failing drive, or reading "backwards", etc, but you do need enough space for the whole disk or partition being rescued.
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
|
show 6 more comments
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Since the hard drive is toast, you can still try running TestDisk on the image file. Just tell testdisk to examine the image file. On Linux I'd just run this in a terminal
testdisk <image_file>
On Windows you might need to modify the command line, or perhaps run it from a terminal window too. The TestDisk Step By Step page has a brief section on Running TestDisk Executable that mentions using disk images.
Or if there isn't enough filesystem for TestDisk to read or repair, it's more likely PhotoRec might recover at least some files. It's run basically the same way as TestDisk above, (see PhotoRec Step By Step) just tell it to examine the image file
photorec <image_file>
That's only if your images are plain binary copies (or an Encase EWF image) and aren't compressed or formatted in some weird way by R-Drive or HD Clone, I'm not familiar with them.
If your first 150GB image hasn't been completely overwritten yet, you might possibly recover some files by using testdisk on the drive the image was deleted from, in case the image file is un-delete-able. Or run photorec on just the free space of that drive, and it might find some files, or perhaps the image itself.
- Note: Recover / copy the found files to another drive. If you tried to recover files to the same drive you're searching, you could overwrite what you're looking for.
In the future, I'd use gddrescue instead, it's quite good at skipping over the very bad sectors of a failing drive, or reading "backwards", etc, but you do need enough space for the whole disk or partition being rescued.
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
|
show 6 more comments
Since the hard drive is toast, you can still try running TestDisk on the image file. Just tell testdisk to examine the image file. On Linux I'd just run this in a terminal
testdisk <image_file>
On Windows you might need to modify the command line, or perhaps run it from a terminal window too. The TestDisk Step By Step page has a brief section on Running TestDisk Executable that mentions using disk images.
Or if there isn't enough filesystem for TestDisk to read or repair, it's more likely PhotoRec might recover at least some files. It's run basically the same way as TestDisk above, (see PhotoRec Step By Step) just tell it to examine the image file
photorec <image_file>
That's only if your images are plain binary copies (or an Encase EWF image) and aren't compressed or formatted in some weird way by R-Drive or HD Clone, I'm not familiar with them.
If your first 150GB image hasn't been completely overwritten yet, you might possibly recover some files by using testdisk on the drive the image was deleted from, in case the image file is un-delete-able. Or run photorec on just the free space of that drive, and it might find some files, or perhaps the image itself.
- Note: Recover / copy the found files to another drive. If you tried to recover files to the same drive you're searching, you could overwrite what you're looking for.
In the future, I'd use gddrescue instead, it's quite good at skipping over the very bad sectors of a failing drive, or reading "backwards", etc, but you do need enough space for the whole disk or partition being rescued.
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
|
show 6 more comments
Since the hard drive is toast, you can still try running TestDisk on the image file. Just tell testdisk to examine the image file. On Linux I'd just run this in a terminal
testdisk <image_file>
On Windows you might need to modify the command line, or perhaps run it from a terminal window too. The TestDisk Step By Step page has a brief section on Running TestDisk Executable that mentions using disk images.
Or if there isn't enough filesystem for TestDisk to read or repair, it's more likely PhotoRec might recover at least some files. It's run basically the same way as TestDisk above, (see PhotoRec Step By Step) just tell it to examine the image file
photorec <image_file>
That's only if your images are plain binary copies (or an Encase EWF image) and aren't compressed or formatted in some weird way by R-Drive or HD Clone, I'm not familiar with them.
If your first 150GB image hasn't been completely overwritten yet, you might possibly recover some files by using testdisk on the drive the image was deleted from, in case the image file is un-delete-able. Or run photorec on just the free space of that drive, and it might find some files, or perhaps the image itself.
- Note: Recover / copy the found files to another drive. If you tried to recover files to the same drive you're searching, you could overwrite what you're looking for.
In the future, I'd use gddrescue instead, it's quite good at skipping over the very bad sectors of a failing drive, or reading "backwards", etc, but you do need enough space for the whole disk or partition being rescued.
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
Since the hard drive is toast, you can still try running TestDisk on the image file. Just tell testdisk to examine the image file. On Linux I'd just run this in a terminal
testdisk <image_file>
On Windows you might need to modify the command line, or perhaps run it from a terminal window too. The TestDisk Step By Step page has a brief section on Running TestDisk Executable that mentions using disk images.
Or if there isn't enough filesystem for TestDisk to read or repair, it's more likely PhotoRec might recover at least some files. It's run basically the same way as TestDisk above, (see PhotoRec Step By Step) just tell it to examine the image file
photorec <image_file>
That's only if your images are plain binary copies (or an Encase EWF image) and aren't compressed or formatted in some weird way by R-Drive or HD Clone, I'm not familiar with them.
If your first 150GB image hasn't been completely overwritten yet, you might possibly recover some files by using testdisk on the drive the image was deleted from, in case the image file is un-delete-able. Or run photorec on just the free space of that drive, and it might find some files, or perhaps the image itself.
- Note: Recover / copy the found files to another drive. If you tried to recover files to the same drive you're searching, you could overwrite what you're looking for.
In the future, I'd use gddrescue instead, it's quite good at skipping over the very bad sectors of a failing drive, or reading "backwards", etc, but you do need enough space for the whole disk or partition being rescued.
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
edited Feb 1 at 10:55
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
answered Jan 31 at 15:16
Xen2050Xen2050
11.3k31637
11.3k31637
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
|
show 6 more comments
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
Actually, that HDD is unrepairable. I'm trying to find a way to extract data from these (or this, in case I can't recover the 150 Gb image) ISO archives, because they're the only thing left.
– dado
Jan 31 at 15:21
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
I was talking about running testdisk & photorec on the image files, not the old hard drive itself, but I'll edit the Q to make it a little more explicit. PS did you try the freezer trick to get the old hard drive to maybe read a little bit more?
– Xen2050
Feb 1 at 10:10
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
Not yet. This HDD has a very peculiar history that includes the possibility of a misconfigured firmware chip, that has another serial number or, incredibly, its loss. I'll take this Saturday to follow these directions and give a feedback.
– dado
Feb 2 at 13:18
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
I used Testdisk first and then Photorec to open the 32 Mb image. I had to try a few times, because in some occasions Testdisk didn't work, so I got different results. Basically they showed system files, icons, lots of unreadable word, txt and xml 1 Kb (or a litlle bigger) files. But, as well as their extensions, most of their size doesn't look to be real. As you mentioned, probably they are compressed or formatted in a weird way.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:04
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
Trying to recover the 150 Gb image, Testdisk opened 75 directories that contained more than 36k files, just in 3 hours, and it was expected to take more 18 hours, an estimate that kept growing. Inside them, hundreds (or thousands) of RAR, system extensions, gifs, txt, word, etc but, as far as I've seen, nothing related to the dead HDD. It "recovered" lots of files not deleted from this HDD in use and those that were attached to emails. These ones, as well as the system ones, have kept their real names. But loads of the others (mainly the word ones, I'm looking for) have numbers instead.
– dado
Feb 4 at 12:09
|
show 6 more comments
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