Sorry Mike I have been busy and haven't responded.  I don't have any recommendations for file recovery programs especially for Windows systems.  I normally used a Linux Live CD even on my Windows systems.  I typically boot from a live Linux CD either from the CD/DVD or from a USB stick connected to the Windows system and let Linux fix and diagnose the problems.  I typically diagnose the drive from there using fdisk, gparted, parted etc.  If the file is readable I will back it up using the Linux Live CD loaded in memory.

To be totally honest I don't run native versions of Windows anymore on my machines.  I have only Linux and Apple machines and run Windows 7 in vms on both.  I simply got tired of having to deal with Windows disk management nightmares and use it solely on vms.  I keep cloned copies of my Windows vm's and if one is acting up I simply add a new vm based off of the cloned version and delete the problem version.

Others here might find time to manage bare metal installs but I am just too busy with enterprise web application development tasks at work and home to deal with M$ problems.  Linux and Unix (apple) are just much more robust on there back end and most of the quality tools needed to diagnose disk issues come native to both platforms (just CLI commands in terminal).


On Thu, Oct 10, 2013 at 8:27 PM, mike Enriquez <mylinux@cox.net> wrote:
Wow  James,
You have a lot of good questions.
The hard drive is the original on a Windows xp home computer.  It is an emachine so it is not a high end computer.
It is the main drive for the computer. I pulled it out and have connected it to one of my win 7 64bit computers via a usb connection. 
It came prepartition off the shelf.

I plan to reuse the hard drive if I can recreate the "C" partition. I am in the middle of getting all images, text files and music off the drive before I attempt to recreate the RAW drive.
I read one fix which said to give the RAW drive a letter then run "chkdsk "X"/f  and that might fix the partitions.  I want to get all the files off the drive first.
I have tried several File recovery programs but the problem is that each program only recovers a selection of files.  What is happening is that program A gets me the first 400 files and program B gets me the
next 300 files. I cannot find a program that will recover all the JPG files at one time.
So I am stuck on what to do next, because I do not want to purchase several File Recovery Programs.
Thanks for you info.
Mike


On 10/10/2013 7:50 PM, James Dugger wrote:
Mike,  

Some questions:
Have you used SMART on your PC as a first diagnostic tool? 
Is the disk an add on to the PC?
How new is the drive? 
What brand? 
Was it or did it come pre-partitioned, and if yes was the partition used as is or re-partitioned?
Is the partitioning scheme MBR or GPT?
Are you planning on continuing to use the HDD in the M$ PC.?

I have had success with many of the latest Linux live CD's reading HDD's that were questionable or unreadable to M$ systems.  You could download Ubuntu's latest Live CD or create a bootable USB of the image plug it into the M$ PC boot Linux.  Most newest Linux distro's Live CD's will attempt to automount all discovered HDD's and read their partitions.  

Or pull the drive and plug it into one of the Linux Boxes.  If the Linux OS is new enough and has a full Desktop Environment/GUI like Gnome, or KDE etc.  Most likely the disk management system will try to automount the drive and read any existing partitions.  If it comes up immediately copy off / backup any files on the disk to the other native disks on the Linux box.

Good Luck.

James



On Thu, Oct 10, 2013 at 6:15 PM, Stephen <cryptworks@gmail.com> wrote:

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

This has been quite successful for me in the past.

On Oct 10, 2013 5:46 PM, "mike Enriquez" <mylinux@cox.net> wrote:
I have a raw hard drive.  It is a windows machine but I also have some Linux Computers. It appears that if you pull the electrical plug from your computer, it could cause your hard drive to lose hard drive partition information.
I am not sure if the same can happen to a Linux computer, so I want to find what is available just in case my files disappear on my Linux machines.
My research has found that some software claims to be able to solve lost file problems on both windows and Linux computers.

I have no idea how good these application are?

Recovering deleted files is also of interest to me.

Thanks
Mike Enriquez







On 10/10/2013 3:56 PM, Dazed_75 wrote:
Mike, we need some information to understand the question.  Is this a totally wiped drive, one with some problems, or just deleted files that you are asking about.  Tell us you motivation so people can give valid and appropriate answers (other than restore from your backups).


On Thu, Oct 10, 2013 at 3:35 PM, mike Enriquez <mylinux@cox.net> wrote:
Does anyone know of software used to recover files in Linux and Winlow systems.
I am looking for software that will work on both operating systems.
Thanks for any help.
Mike Enriquez
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