Jump to content

Recuva won't scan drive, stops with "Unable to read boot sector"


Falcon4

Recommended Posts

So I've got a friend that's having me recover pictures from a nonworking SD card, the camera says there's a filesystem error or something. I figure as long as it wasn't reformatted, all the pictures should still be there.

 

The good news is, I was right. All the pictures are still on the card. When Recuva refused to scan the drive, I let Winhex do a file-fingerprint scan on the card, and it recovered about 2.1gb of files... off a 1gb card. The files were probably well over-copied, with lots of junk data or other files at the end making them bigger. Winhex isn't exactly a recovery program. I tried a second time with a specialized digital cameraFlash data recovery tool, and it also found all the files, but wouldn't recover them because it was a trial version (pay for this? I'm the expert here, why would I pay?).

 

I don't know what caused the corruption, but I'm pretty certain the filesystem is still there (since the data is perfectly intact) but just corrupted and unusable. If I could just get Recuva to scan through the drive like I've had it do in the past, I'd have a perfect recovery! =\

 

Is Recuva only able to recover files from drives with a working filesystem? :huh:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Is Recuva only able to recover files from drives with a working filesystem? :huh:

Hello Falcon4,

Welcome to the forums!!! :D

I am not a Recuva expert but since it is the week-end, I hope this will help in your efforts.

Have you tried all the different actions ?

t2302_20081115023437.png

As a regular member I have been amazed by the many success stories I have read about Recuva.

Good luck,

:) davey

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Moderators

I'm not sure if this utility could help you get the drive "recognized" again. I've just posted this for someone with a Hard Drive not being recognized anymore.

 

It's a free Open Source program, which thankfully, I've never needed to use.

 

Test Disk:

 

TestDisk can

Fix partition table, recover deleted partition

Recover FAT32 boot sector from its backup

Rebuild FAT12/FAT16/FAT32 boot sector

Fix FAT tables

Rebuild NTFS boot sector

Recover NTFS boot sector from its backup

Fix MFT using MFT mirror

Locate ext2/ext3 Backup SuperBlock

Undelete files from FAT filesystem

Copy files from deleted FAT, NTFS and ext2/ext3 partitions.

 

Hope this helps.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...

DennisD, i'm sorry but i cant seems to make this work. Actually, my flash drive just recently had the same problem as the topic starter and i'm trying out the ways to make it work again but to no avail. sorry but i'm a noob and cant get the things to work. Basically, my flash drive says boot sector not found on the recuva and its file system seems to have been changed to RAW instead of the usual ntsc or FAT. Can u by any chance help me with this?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
DennisD, i'm sorry but i cant seems to make this work. Actually, my flash drive just recently had the same problem as the topic starter and i'm trying out the ways to make it work again but to no avail. sorry but i'm a noob and cant get the things to work. Basically, my flash drive says boot sector not found on the recuva and its file system seems to have been changed to RAW instead of the usual ntsc or FAT. Can u by any chance help me with this?

 

As usual, Recuva has trouble both with RAW files & RAW partitions. Handy Recovery, if you get the full version, will scan for, find, & recover all your data from your drive. It is well worth the money.

 

This will never be solved by Recuva until it can scan for/see RAW partitions. Recuva can only recover what it "sees" & it definitely cannot see a RAW drive!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 months later...

I'm not sure if this utility could help you get the drive "recognized" again. I've just posted this for someone with a Hard Drive not being recognized anymore.

 

It's a free Open Source program, which thankfully, I've never needed to use.

 

Test Disk:

 

 

 

Hope this helps.

 

I've got a built-in Card Reader which has zapped 3 memory cards - 2 X 16gb SDHC, and a 2gb CF card. Potentially lost a heap of irreplaceable photos. I've tried quite a few recovery programs, after buying a new external memory card reader with no success. I also tried Recuva with no success as it looks like my memory cards converted themselves to RAW format, and Recuva could not find the Boot Sector. Things were looking grim....

 

Then I found this thread, with the link above to 'TestDisk'.....Brilliant !

 

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Download

 

I've recovered 411 photo's off the CF card - took all of 15 mins, and at this stage if I get any off the SD cards it will just be a bonus - I thought I was looking at expensive 'Pro' recovery, or worse still - no photo's at all.

 

TestDisk has saved me !

 

Thanks !

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.