Trying to rescue a hard disk -- weired feedback??

[max bianco]

On Jan 18, 2008 11:59 AM, William Case <billlinux at rogers.com> wrote:

> Hi;
>
> I have never been a tech support person.  But I can see why some of them
> go crazy.
>
> On Sun, 2008-01-13 at 16:07 -0500, William Case wrote:
> > Hi;
> >
> > I have a hard disk that seems broken but I am trying to save -- or at
> > least save the data on it.
> >
> > The broken hard disk is a dual boot SCSI disk that worked.
> >       * BIOS says that the disk is present and accounted for i.e. right
> >         name and size even after swapping in and out other harddisks.
> >       * Using Fedora rescue disk, parted /dev/sda says can't read sda.
> >       * Using Fedora rescue disk, fdisk /dev/sda says can't read sda.
> >       * Using Fedora rescue disk, chroot /mnt/sysimage can't mount
> >         sysimage.
> >       * fdisk /mbr says can't fix mbr.  ( I am not sure whether this
> >         message means that nothing is wrong with the mbr or that it is
> >         beyond repair )
> >
> > I would like to do any of the following:
> >       * get the hard disk working again, or,
> >       * view the data on the disk, and/or,
> >       * rescue the data on the disk.
> >
> > What should I try next?
>
> My friend just told me that his drive 'broke' while he was trying to
> increase the size of his WindowXP partition while in Fedora using
> 'parted'.  His description "Everything was working fine then 'parted'
> burped and didn't finish moving files and the disk hasn't worked since".
>
> It sounds like he has lost all his partitions.  He can't re-install the
> Windows part.  He bought his re-furbished computer that included
> WindowsXP Pro from a reputable dealer.  He failed to get an installation
> disk.  I assume the .cab files have been stored in the Windows
> partition.
>
> As unlikely as it seems, can anyone suggest a way to find a bootable
> partition, Fedora or Windows.  If I can get to Fedora, there is a chance
> I can rescue his Fedora files, and perhaps mount the Windows partition
> to save some of his Windows files.  If not, I will tell him to phone the
> dealer and see if they can help.
>
> Although the situation is not desperate, desperate (i.e. only personal
> and household data are on his files) I am regarding this as a learning
> challenge that contains some bragging rights.  Any suggestions
> gratefully received.
>
> --
>

Assuming you can mount the drive . Try some of the data recovery tools in
the repos
testdisk has worked for me in the past, dd_rescue is another and  there are
more but my experience with data recovery is limited. Always read the man
pages before you use the tools.

-Max
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listman.redhat.com/archives/fedora-list/attachments/20080118/dc3471e2/attachment-0001.htm>