help! ..urgent.. formatted hd

[dolor]

I was installing Linux Mandrake 7.3 on my comp. I had two partitions so I was gonna dual-boot. Well, during the installation, I accidentally chose the wrong partition to be formatted. I formatted the one w/Windows on it, and now I'm screwed. I don't have a recent backup so, however stupid this may seem...is there ANY way I could restore windows (prolly w/the recovery cd) and get my files back. Thanks in advance.

[ns-code]

I know how you feel, been there a few times my self. Recovery CD won't do you any good. There was an unformat command in old versions of DOS, but I doubt that works on HDD, espec. if formated with Linux. It is posibile to recover data using sofisticated tehniques and the good news is there are companyes that do that. The bad news is - the prices are in thousends of US$ range. You have to ask your self if your data that important. Or you could just go back in time and...

Edit: ups, sad videh da si to ti, inace bi piso na naski. Srecno!

[dolor]

hej cao. hvala za pomoc, ali mi ta informacia ne vredi toliko para.

for the english speaking people ...the whole paying big bucks for the recovery is not an option, but thanks anyway.

[<ABX]

If you got another computer that you can use. you can pop the drive into that computer and run some data recovery software.

(if you catch me within the next 3 or 4 hours of this post i will "borrow" you some software that does this. Recovery Studio NTFS 2.0)

[email protected] (add me on msn)

[siyan]

I assume the HD has been formatted for ext2/ext3 and has Linux written to it now? In such a case there is VERY little you can do. I believe the unformat command just rewrote the FAT using raw data on the drive, but since mke2fs combined with the Linux install probably wiped a whole lot more than just the old FAT, there's no way unformat will work.

I highly doubt even a professional recovery company would be able to do all that much about it, and the Windows CD will only let you reinstall Windows.

<ABX, to run Recovery Studio he would have to install Windows, which means wiping the partition again (or at least using cfdisk from Linux) and reformatting it to NTFS, meaning any slim chance of a recovery he has would be effectively killed (but it was already). In any case I highly doubt that Recovery Studio would be able to do much.

[<ABX]

siyan read more carefully!!!!

If you got another computer that you can use. you can pop the drive into that computer and run some data recovery software.

[<ABX]

dolor i will still give you a copy of the software but your gonna have to get intouch with me in the next couple of hours b/c im gonna be gone till next weekend.

[siyan]

Originally posted by <ABX
siyan read more carefully!!!!

my bad, but its still not very likely to work....

[ns-code]

[i]

I highly doubt even a professional recovery company would be able to do all that much about it [/B]

And what do you think all those safe wipers are for (utils that write random data a few times over a file that you need to be deleted for sure) ?

[siyan]

Originally posted by ns-code
And what do you think all those safe wipers are for (utils that write random data a few times over a file that you need to be deleted for sure) ?

thats somewhat different from reformatting to a different file system.

besides, does he really have the money to pay people that talented to recover his data?

[ns-code]

They can recover evean after full format, but not after a safe wipe. Once they recovered a HDD from a lap-top that was on the bottom of a river for 3 months. What is a mear reformat in comparison to that?

But a recent backup would be cheaper for sure. (sorry dolor)

[siyan]

Originally posted by ns-code
They can recover evean after full format, but not after a safe wipe. Once they recovered a HDD from a lap-top that was on the bottom of a river for 3 months. What is a mear reformat in comparison to that?

But a recent backup would be cheaper for sure. (sorry dolor)

Its not just a full format, its a full format to a different file system, which now has had data written overtop of it (perhaps even multiple times). That complicates the situation. I'm sure there is somebody out there who can fix it, but this is probably beyond the abilities of most data-recovery techs.

And even if the drive is in the river, there is very little that would alter the magnetic characteristic of the drive plates. All you have to worry about then is physical damage to the casing and water logging. Most of the "data" would likley be intact.

[dolor]

hey. thanks to everyone who replied. sorry i couldn't reply myself, for the obvious reason

abx, i was gone all weekend too, so it didn't matter. but thanks anyways.