[clug] HDD Recovery Services recommendations ?

[Hugh Blemings]

Hi Michael, All,

>> The first port of call will be a careful inspection with some tools
>> under Linux and not modifying anything on the drive.
>
> IIIf the drive appears as a device, run
>
> root>    smartctl --all  /dev/sdc
>
> and see if it's failing. Assuming it really is, then the GNU version
> of ddrescue is the next step. Make sure you catch every byte, this
> may be the last time that it mounts.

Ah, thanks for pointing out ddrescue, my tools of choice had been dd and 
then testdisk, ddrescue will certainly be an improvement on plain dd.

> If the data is really critical make a copy of the copy and start
> trying to run fsck against the 2nd copy keeping the master copy
> untouched. Running fsck may fix things, or may break things. Unless
> you run it against a flakey drive, then it's more likely to break
> things.

*nod*

I've always gone with the approach of copying the whole drive or, if the 
partition table is intact, the partitions I care about into a raw image 
file and manipulating that.  As you say it may be the last time the 
drive mounts, so I figure you grab as much data as you can...

> Given the amount of un-lamented cruft on drives, Murphy really has to
> have you in his sights for the critical data to be on the few KB that
> ddrescue can't get.

:)

> my $.02, michaelj

Thanks again!

Cheers,
Hugh