Thanks to all of you who have chimed in - trying to help me with this problem.
Ted - yes - I think it would be great if I could make a backup. But, they are too cheap here - and will Not just get me another HD - just to do a backup! So... -K- -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ted Roche Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 2010 12:37 PM On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 9:46 AM, Kurt Wendt <[email protected]> wrote: > > So - I am curious if anyone has any suggestions for me. Like good > programs that I could use to scan my HD and try to recover files. I > would prefer Free - or Trial versions - since they are too cheap here to > actually BUY SW! > Others' recommendations to boot with a liveCD are good: the last thing you want to do is to try to repair the disk in place until you have an exact copy of the disk partition. If you have a corrupted file system, any change to it could be harmful. If you toast the existing partition without a backup, you're left with nothing. If you make a backup first, you can experiment and restore it to its current condition. Knoppix or CloneZilla come with a tool called "partimage" which is great for making images of partitions. Get an inexpensive external drive (Staples has a 2 TB drive for under $99.99 this week, I think and there are other cheaper smaller options) and make a copy (or two, or three) onto there. This step will also tell you if you are dealing only with a corrupt file system or if you have failing hard drive hardware. You can use the SMART tools to run a test on the disk, but only do that after you've made a backup of the partition. Even if the disk hardware is failing, it's still possible to rescue a lot of the partition, using tools like dd_rescue. After that, you can start by mounting it under Linux and seeing what's available without going through a lot of recovery. There's a bunch of good recovery programs available under Linux. You can start with the simple fschk - file system check - and work your way up. Some of the best can be found digging around the "forensic" topics - programs designed to scan an intentionally erased disk and identify files by headers and byte patterns. There's also a program ("testdisk" and "photorec") for recovering lost photographs from trashed camera cards that I've used to find misplaced files. Depending on how valuable the missing files are to you, there are further steps you can take, but I have the impression you're strapped for budget. You may want to just grab a copy and install it on a machine at home to experiment with, while you run Windows chkdsk on the company's disk and recover what you can. -- Ted Roche _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech Searchable Archive: http://leafe.com/archives/search/profox This message: http://leafe.com/archives/byMID/profox/289ea162f5642645b5cf64d624c66a1409df1...@us-ny-mail-002.waitex.net ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
