GetDataBack
Do-it-yourself Data Recovery Software
Whatever happened to your drive-
GetDataBack will recover your data if the hard drive's partition table, boot record, FAT/MFT or root directory are lost or damaged, data was lost due to a virus attack, the drive was formatted, fdisk has been run, a power failure has caused a system crash, files were lost due to a software failure, files were accidentally deleted...
Step by Step: Doing a Data Recovery with GetDataBack
Here's how you do everything right when doing a data recovery with GetDataBack:
III. Running GetDataBack
Start GetDataBack by clicking on Start>All Programs>GetDataBack.
III.I. Welcome Screen
III.I.I. Intro Screen
The only decision you'll have to make here is to pick one the data recovery scenarios. Read through the choices
carefully and then choose the one that most applies to your situation. Don't hesitate to go with the standard
options if you're not sure what happened to your drive. The standard options are the recommended settings for
most recoveries and more often than not they will produce the optimal recovery results.
Press Next.
III.II. Step 1 - Select Drive
III.II.I Step 1 Screen
On the left hand side of Step 1 you'll get a list of all the drives that are accessible in your system. Now you willselect your "problem" drive from this list. If you attached the drive as a slave drive as explained above this will bethe entry "2nd Hard Drive (HD129:)" or if you had more than one hard drive in the system already it could be the3rd, 4th or so hard drive. It shouldn't be "1st Hard Drive (HD128:) because that would mean the drive you want torecover the data from is still set up as the boot drive.
Select the drive you want to recover under Physical Drives. Choose the entry under Physical Drive over any onesunder Logical Drives - this will usually yield the best result.
There is usually no need to change any options manually in the Options tab on the right hand side. Refrain fromchanging any settings in Partial Scan - this feature is for experts only and will not improve your recovery results.
Press Next.
III.II.II Scanning the Drive
GetDataBack will now scan your drive for every available information regarding the original file system. The scanwill take some time, you should at least allow an hour of scanning for every 50 GB of drive capacity.
However - if the scan takes much longer than this, there is something wrong. It is normal if the scan is notcompleted within a couple of hours.
There are the a couple of reasons why the scan can take very long:
1. Your drive has a physical problem. If the drive has a lot of bad sectors (damaged areas on the drive'splatters that cannot be read anymore) or is otherwise damaged, the scan can take really long if it's ever going to finish.
If you get only an occasional bad sector message, but the scan is otherwise progressing, choose "Ignore"in the warning windows and let the scan finish.
But if you receive a lot of read error messages, or the scan seems to stall or is taking forever, your best bet is to stop what you are doing and to make an Image of your damaged drive first. By making an Image you will reduce the stress on the drive (which if physically damaged can fail at any moment). Once you have created the Image you can perform the data recovery for the Image instead of the drive - just select the Image you made in Step 1 of GetDataBack (Image Files). You can use GetDataBack to make an Image, the only other thing you'll need is enough space on another drive to store the Image to.Instructions on how to create an Image are on our website at http://www.runtime.org/gdbimage.htm.
2.You are scanning an external drive through the USB port. Scanning a drive through USB takes muchlonger than scanning a drive that is connected to the internal IDE-cable of your computer. In extremecases the scan can take 10 times longer, especially when using USB1. Consider taking the drive out of itscasing and attaching it directly to the IDE-cable. See chapter I.II.II. External Drives above.
III.III Step 2 - Select File System
On the left hand side of the screen you will see a list of the possible file systems GetDataBack has found. Don't confuse the file system entries with the list of files and folders you are hoping to recover - you will see those in Step 3 of the software.
Each entry represents a (possible) partition on the drive. If you had more than one partition on the drive which you need to recover (for example logical drives C:\ and D:\) you will probably have to go back and forth between Steps 2 and 3 and select the corresponding entries separately in order to recover all files.
Please note: If you had both FAT and NTFS partitions that you need to recover on the drive, you will have to run both versions of GetDataBack, GetDataBack for FAT first and then GetDataBack for NTFS or vise versa.
The file system entries are constructed by file system information GetDataBack has collected during the scan andthat the software will use to reconstruct the file system that was originally on the drive and holds the required information about the location and content of your files. By default the most accurate file system entry is automatically on top of the list, so for the moment don't be too concerned about the other entries or the entries that you get when you expand the list by selecting "Show all".
On the right a detailed description of the found file system is displayed. This information is primarily used by our tech support staff.
So select the first entry in the list and press Next.
III.III.II No entries in Step 2
If you do not see any entries in Step 2 this can be for the following reasons:
1.You didn't select the whole physical drive in Step 1 of the software.If you select only part of the drive, select only a partition or restrict the area to be scanned by doing only a partial scan, GetDataBack in some cases will not be able to reconstruct the original file system or will just
not find enough information to rebuild any file system at all.
2.You are using the wrong version of the software.GetDataBack comes in two versions. You need GetDataBack for FAT if the original file system, i.e. the file system that was on the drive when you lost your files, was FAT and GetDataBack for NTFS if the original file system was NTFS. If you are not sure which file system your files were formatted with, read chapter
"Install GetDataBack" again. You may also send our technicians a snapshot of your recovery from Step 2 -they can easily determine if you are using the wrong version. To create a snapshot click on Help>Snapshot for Support while in Step 2. This will create a small text file with detailed information about the options you chose in the software. Email this file to support@runtime.org.
3.Your drive is physically damaged and GetDataBack is unable to read enough sectors on the drive togather the required information.If you were getting a lot of error messages during the scan or you already know that your drive has aphysical problem, if might be too damaged for you to be able to recover your data with software. You might have to send your drive to a data recovery lab. Please contact our tech support - they will help you determine if this is the case.
4.You are scanning an external drive.Since you don't have error checking when scanning through USB, possible errors while reading the drive are not reported to GetDataBack. It then can happen that the software is unable to read the necessary file system information and cannot collect enough information to come up with a file system entry. It's best (and much quicker) to attach the drive directly to the internal IDE-cable. Please see above I.II.II.Special - External Drives.
III.IV. Step 3 - Recovery Tree
The screen will remind you of Windows Explorer. On the left side of the screen you see a tree of recovered directories and folders and a folder called "Lost files" created by GetDataBack, containing the files without directory information.
When you open a folder on the left side, the files in this folder are displayed on the right side.
First have a look at the left side. Does the directory tree look familiar to you? Do you see the folders that were on the drive you want to recover the data from? Does it seam that the directory structure is complete for this partition?
Now open up a folder that interests you on the left side and look on the right side. Do you see the files that you expect to be in this folder? Do you see the correct file names and does it appear that the files are all there?
Now open up a few files in order to test them. The fact that you see the folders, files, file names, the right file size etc. is a good sign, but doesn't necessarily mean that the file content is there and that those files will be usable.You will not be able to test huge files or files that need to be imported correctly into their native application, like for example Outlook PST-files.
Select files that are easy to check - for example Word documents (*.doc), pictures (*.jpg), graphics (*.gif). Open these files by double-clicking them or by using the build-in file viewer (F3). Please note: To open files by doubleclicking them (for example Word documents with MS Word) their associated application needs to be installed on the Recovery Computer.
Do the files open fine, meaning you can see the file content, the text, picture etc.?
If so, repeat the same process with a couple of more file in different folders.
If all or at least the majority of files open okay, your recovery is looking good.
In order to actually save your recovered files you will need to copy them off the "bad" drive to another location.This can be a location on the Recovery Computer's Master drive, any other drive attached to this computer, a USB drive or you can copy the files to a network destination. Make sure this location has enough free space for all the files you need. Never copy the recovered files back to a location on the drive you just recovered them from (the"bad" drive), or you will overwrite them and they will be gone forever!
You may copy either selected files and folders by tagging them on the right side or the whole thing by selecting the top entry on the left side that says [FAT] or [NTFS]. Select the files/folders/volume you need and press the copy button or Recovery>Copy on the main menu.
Do-it-yourself Data Recovery Software
Whatever happened to your drive-
GetDataBack will recover your data if the hard drive's partition table, boot record, FAT/MFT or root directory are lost or damaged, data was lost due to a virus attack, the drive was formatted, fdisk has been run, a power failure has caused a system crash, files were lost due to a software failure, files were accidentally deleted...
Step by Step: Doing a Data Recovery with GetDataBack
Here's how you do everything right when doing a data recovery with GetDataBack:
III. Running GetDataBack
Start GetDataBack by clicking on Start>All Programs>GetDataBack.
III.I. Welcome Screen
III.I.I. Intro Screen
The only decision you'll have to make here is to pick one the data recovery scenarios. Read through the choices
carefully and then choose the one that most applies to your situation. Don't hesitate to go with the standard
options if you're not sure what happened to your drive. The standard options are the recommended settings for
most recoveries and more often than not they will produce the optimal recovery results.
Press Next.
III.II. Step 1 - Select Drive
III.II.I Step 1 Screen
On the left hand side of Step 1 you'll get a list of all the drives that are accessible in your system. Now you willselect your "problem" drive from this list. If you attached the drive as a slave drive as explained above this will bethe entry "2nd Hard Drive (HD129:)" or if you had more than one hard drive in the system already it could be the3rd, 4th or so hard drive. It shouldn't be "1st Hard Drive (HD128:) because that would mean the drive you want torecover the data from is still set up as the boot drive.
Select the drive you want to recover under Physical Drives. Choose the entry under Physical Drive over any onesunder Logical Drives - this will usually yield the best result.
There is usually no need to change any options manually in the Options tab on the right hand side. Refrain fromchanging any settings in Partial Scan - this feature is for experts only and will not improve your recovery results.
Press Next.
III.II.II Scanning the Drive
GetDataBack will now scan your drive for every available information regarding the original file system. The scanwill take some time, you should at least allow an hour of scanning for every 50 GB of drive capacity.
However - if the scan takes much longer than this, there is something wrong. It is normal if the scan is notcompleted within a couple of hours.
There are the a couple of reasons why the scan can take very long:
1. Your drive has a physical problem. If the drive has a lot of bad sectors (damaged areas on the drive'splatters that cannot be read anymore) or is otherwise damaged, the scan can take really long if it's ever going to finish.
If you get only an occasional bad sector message, but the scan is otherwise progressing, choose "Ignore"in the warning windows and let the scan finish.
But if you receive a lot of read error messages, or the scan seems to stall or is taking forever, your best bet is to stop what you are doing and to make an Image of your damaged drive first. By making an Image you will reduce the stress on the drive (which if physically damaged can fail at any moment). Once you have created the Image you can perform the data recovery for the Image instead of the drive - just select the Image you made in Step 1 of GetDataBack (Image Files). You can use GetDataBack to make an Image, the only other thing you'll need is enough space on another drive to store the Image to.Instructions on how to create an Image are on our website at http://www.runtime.org/gdbimage.htm.
2.You are scanning an external drive through the USB port. Scanning a drive through USB takes muchlonger than scanning a drive that is connected to the internal IDE-cable of your computer. In extremecases the scan can take 10 times longer, especially when using USB1. Consider taking the drive out of itscasing and attaching it directly to the IDE-cable. See chapter I.II.II. External Drives above.
III.III Step 2 - Select File System
On the left hand side of the screen you will see a list of the possible file systems GetDataBack has found. Don't confuse the file system entries with the list of files and folders you are hoping to recover - you will see those in Step 3 of the software.
Each entry represents a (possible) partition on the drive. If you had more than one partition on the drive which you need to recover (for example logical drives C:\ and D:\) you will probably have to go back and forth between Steps 2 and 3 and select the corresponding entries separately in order to recover all files.
Please note: If you had both FAT and NTFS partitions that you need to recover on the drive, you will have to run both versions of GetDataBack, GetDataBack for FAT first and then GetDataBack for NTFS or vise versa.
The file system entries are constructed by file system information GetDataBack has collected during the scan andthat the software will use to reconstruct the file system that was originally on the drive and holds the required information about the location and content of your files. By default the most accurate file system entry is automatically on top of the list, so for the moment don't be too concerned about the other entries or the entries that you get when you expand the list by selecting "Show all".
On the right a detailed description of the found file system is displayed. This information is primarily used by our tech support staff.
So select the first entry in the list and press Next.
III.III.II No entries in Step 2
If you do not see any entries in Step 2 this can be for the following reasons:
1.You didn't select the whole physical drive in Step 1 of the software.If you select only part of the drive, select only a partition or restrict the area to be scanned by doing only a partial scan, GetDataBack in some cases will not be able to reconstruct the original file system or will just
not find enough information to rebuild any file system at all.
2.You are using the wrong version of the software.GetDataBack comes in two versions. You need GetDataBack for FAT if the original file system, i.e. the file system that was on the drive when you lost your files, was FAT and GetDataBack for NTFS if the original file system was NTFS. If you are not sure which file system your files were formatted with, read chapter
"Install GetDataBack" again. You may also send our technicians a snapshot of your recovery from Step 2 -they can easily determine if you are using the wrong version. To create a snapshot click on Help>Snapshot for Support while in Step 2. This will create a small text file with detailed information about the options you chose in the software. Email this file to support@runtime.org.
3.Your drive is physically damaged and GetDataBack is unable to read enough sectors on the drive togather the required information.If you were getting a lot of error messages during the scan or you already know that your drive has aphysical problem, if might be too damaged for you to be able to recover your data with software. You might have to send your drive to a data recovery lab. Please contact our tech support - they will help you determine if this is the case.
4.You are scanning an external drive.Since you don't have error checking when scanning through USB, possible errors while reading the drive are not reported to GetDataBack. It then can happen that the software is unable to read the necessary file system information and cannot collect enough information to come up with a file system entry. It's best (and much quicker) to attach the drive directly to the internal IDE-cable. Please see above I.II.II.Special - External Drives.
III.IV. Step 3 - Recovery Tree
The screen will remind you of Windows Explorer. On the left side of the screen you see a tree of recovered directories and folders and a folder called "Lost files" created by GetDataBack, containing the files without directory information.
When you open a folder on the left side, the files in this folder are displayed on the right side.
First have a look at the left side. Does the directory tree look familiar to you? Do you see the folders that were on the drive you want to recover the data from? Does it seam that the directory structure is complete for this partition?
Now open up a folder that interests you on the left side and look on the right side. Do you see the files that you expect to be in this folder? Do you see the correct file names and does it appear that the files are all there?
Now open up a few files in order to test them. The fact that you see the folders, files, file names, the right file size etc. is a good sign, but doesn't necessarily mean that the file content is there and that those files will be usable.You will not be able to test huge files or files that need to be imported correctly into their native application, like for example Outlook PST-files.
Select files that are easy to check - for example Word documents (*.doc), pictures (*.jpg), graphics (*.gif). Open these files by double-clicking them or by using the build-in file viewer (F3). Please note: To open files by doubleclicking them (for example Word documents with MS Word) their associated application needs to be installed on the Recovery Computer.
Do the files open fine, meaning you can see the file content, the text, picture etc.?
If so, repeat the same process with a couple of more file in different folders.
If all or at least the majority of files open okay, your recovery is looking good.
In order to actually save your recovered files you will need to copy them off the "bad" drive to another location.This can be a location on the Recovery Computer's Master drive, any other drive attached to this computer, a USB drive or you can copy the files to a network destination. Make sure this location has enough free space for all the files you need. Never copy the recovered files back to a location on the drive you just recovered them from (the"bad" drive), or you will overwrite them and they will be gone forever!
You may copy either selected files and folders by tagging them on the right side or the whole thing by selecting the top entry on the left side that says [FAT] or [NTFS]. Select the files/folders/volume you need and press the copy button or Recovery>Copy on the main menu.