Arch Linux

Colson P.

Member

Registered: 2019-09-21

Posts: 8

[SOLVED] Recovering Windows Failing Hard Drive Data

I have a Toshiba 500GB (laptop) hard drive with a Windows 8 OS install.  My friend had this HDD in her ASUS laptop, and the laptop suddenly stopped working on her.  I plugged the HDD into my Arch Linux desktop, and GNOME Disks said in red text that the HDD is "Likely to fail soon."  I am trying to recover the pictures on it in any way I can before it fails.

  I have tried using ddrescue-gui on my main Arch Linux computer, but it rebooted by itself partway through the recovery (leaving me with a corrupt 44GB ISO).  I have ordered a new power supply for that computer to fix the rebooting problem; the old one was at least 10 years old.  I have also tried using a separate Windows 10 desktop and Disk Drill; it was able to start recovering a couple pictures, but the recovery time was estimated at 3 days or more; I cancelled the recovery on concerns the HDD would fail from being used for that long. 

  What would be the best way to recover all the pictures and save them to my Terabyte HDD?  Would it be safer to use Windows software such as Disk Drill, or should I try again with Linux recovery software?

Failing HDD specs:
Toshiba MQ01ABD050
-Date: 7/12/2012

Laptop Specs:
Asus x501a-hpd121h

My Arch Linux Computer:
-AMD Ryzen 3 1200 processor
-16GB DDR4 Ram
-500GB Samsung EVO 970 NVME m.2 SSD
-AsRock B450m Steel Legend motherboard

Windows 10 Desktop Specs:
-AMD Phenom II X4 925 processor
-1.0TB HDD (HDD I am recovering files to)
-16GB DDR3 ram
-Asus M4A87TD/USB3 motherboard

Last edited by Colson P. (2019-10-28 16:02:08)

frostschutz

Member

Registered: 2013-11-15

Posts: 1,658

Re: [SOLVED] Recovering Windows Failing Hard Drive Data

ddrescue has a logfile/mapfile which allows resuming

jasonwryan

Anarchist

From: .nz

Registered: 2009-05-09

Posts: 30,426

Website

Re: [SOLVED] Recovering Windows Failing Hard Drive Data

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/File_recovery

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Registered Linux User #482438

Swiggles

Member

Registered: 2014-08-02

Posts: 266

Re: [SOLVED] Recovering Windows Failing Hard Drive Data

First rule of recovery of any type: Create a full disk image (using dd).
Unplug the HDD and keep it safe, do not power it up again unless you need to grab another image due to some freak accident. Perform all recovery with the produced image.

If it fails anytime soon and you have not gotten this it is all over. So stop whatever you are doing and get the image now. After this you can start looking into tools and procedures.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/File_recovery

Last edited by Swiggles (2019-09-21 21:42:09)

d_fajardo

Member

Registered: 2017-07-28

Posts: 1,687

Re: [SOLVED] Recovering Windows Failing Hard Drive Data

As Swiggles just said make a clone of the drive first. It's what all professional HD recovery services do before tackling lost files.

Colson P.

Member

Registered: 2019-09-21

Posts: 8

Re: [SOLVED] Recovering Windows Failing Hard Drive Data

Thank you all for your responses, I really appreciate it.
I started the file recovery using DDrescue-GUI several days ago with the "Set to best recovery" settings, and it had averaged about 1mB/s transfer speed up until Yesterday.  it is now in the second pass going backwards and has been stuck at 61% for the previous 30 hours.  The file transfer speed is now averaging just 4kB/s. 
[EDIT] I was able to recover several Gigabytes worth of data from the HDD, thank you all for your responses.

Last edited by Colson P. (2019-10-28 16:00:42)