LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Sulis, Adam <SULISA@tc.gc.ca>
  To  : linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au
  Date: Fri, 28 Apr 2000 14:04:16 -0400

RE: Unformating a partition

The formatting wouldn't be the killer - it just erases the table. The idea
that a new filesystem was written over top of existing data (bulldozing) is
the painful one.

Although I agree that the data is likely beyond reasonable means, I'll ask
this as a discussion: Have you tried Norton Disk Doctor (what have you got
to lose?) Just answer "Yes" to the question "Are you unable to access
partitions that you were able to access before" and it should try the backup
FAT (if it exists)

The FAT has a backup kept further down the drive. If the drive wasn't fully
erased (ie zeros written to every byte), then the backup FAT may still be
intact. If so, then the map to retrieve the data would be there too. 

If a piece of a file thread was missing because of overwriting, then a
scandisk or Norton Disk Doctor would declare it truncated and deleted. If,
however, all pieces of the file thread were intact, then it could probably
be retrieved.

Make no mistake about it though... You are sailing into uncharted waters.
But since the data is probably gone, go ahead and try it. I may be totally
off the mark, but if I am I hope another member of the group will correct my
inaccuracies before anyone else risks data loss as a result.

> Adam J. Sulis, MCP, CNA
> Workstation Management, Technical Support
> Administration des postes de travail, Soutien technique
> Tel: (613) 998 0722
> sulisa@tc.gc.ca
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----------
> From: 	Darryl Ross[SMTP:dross@syc.asn.au]
> Sent: 	Friday, April 28, 2000 10:24 AM
> To: 	linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au
> Subject: 	Unformating a partition
> 
> Hey All,
> 
> I've managed to do something really stupid... (hold the comments!)
> 
> While installing Mandrake 7 the other day, I managed to change the
> partition
> type of a FAT32 partition to ext2 and format it. I want to know what tools
> are available to me to recover the data on the drive. If I had just
> formatted it, I could use DOS tools, but since I changed the type to ext2,
> and formated the drive with a different file system, I am not sure if I
> can
> recover the data.
> 
> My drives are set up like:
> 
> hda1        ext2        /boot    ~50Mb
> hda2        fat32        C:        ~3Gb
> hda3        fat32        Z:        ~3Gb    (this is the one I stuffed)
> hdb1        ext2        /           ~6Gb
> hdb2        swap                  ~100Mb
> 
> Teach me to not pay attention while partitioning drives. Anyway, the
> partition I wiped contains (well, did contain) a lot of my data files,
> including a large amount of downloaded programs, so if I can recover
> what's
> on it, I'd really be able to breath a sigh of relief..
> 
> Dazz
> 
> -- 
> LinuxSA WWW: http://www.linuxsa.org.au/  IRC: #linuxsa on irc.linux.org.au
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