GUID partition table recovery - HFS+ and FAT32

How to use TestDisk to recover lost partition
Forum rules
When asking for technical support:
- Search for posts on the same topic before posting a new question.
- Give clear, specific information in the title of your post.
- Include as many details as you can, MOST POSTS WILL GET ONLY ONE OR TWO ANSWERS.
- Post a follow up with a "Thank you" or "This worked!"
- When you learn something, use that knowledge to HELP ANOTHER USER LATER.
Before posting, please read https://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk.pdf
Locked
Message
Author
nckdc
Posts: 1
Joined: 04 Aug 2014, 13:24

GUID partition table recovery - HFS+ and FAT32

#1 Post by nckdc »

Hi. I'm new to the board and english is not my native language so accept my apologies in advance for any writing issues.

I have an external 2000 GB/ 1862 GiB HDD that I use primarily on my Mac. I can't remember exactly, but I'm sure that it had a GUID partition table. I had 2 HFS+ partitions: MiniPro (its size was something like 1460 or 1480 GB) and MiniPro Virtual Instruments (500 GB). It also had a FAT32 partition in case I should use it to take some files to a Windows machine (7 or 8 GB I think, can't remember very well now).

I had never connected the HDD to Windows, I did so a few weeks ago and it was fatal... Windows asked me to initialize the drive, I declined (obviously) but when i reconnected the drive to my Mac it was "not readable". I found testdisk when looking for a solution and it looks brilliant.

I'm running testdisk on Linux right now, I connected the HDD through a USB 3.0 port to accelerate the process (normally it is connected via FW800 on my MBP).

I have the quick search results but I don't dare to go any further (rewrite the partition table) without a little bit of expert advice. I had also the deep search results (took 24 hs to complete) but yesterday a power shortage made me loose the results and I accidentally overwrote the log file when I ran testdisk again this morning.

Now I'm running again the deep search, but I will paste here what I got so far, maybe you can tell me if I got enough information to attempt a partition recovery or I must wait till the deep search completion again.

Code: Select all

TestDisk 6.14, Data Recovery Utility, July 2013
Christophe GRENIER <grenier@cgsecurity.org>
http://www.cgsecurity.org

  TestDisk is free software, and
comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY.

Select a media (use Arrow keys, then press Enter):
>Disk /dev/sda - 500 GB / 465 GiB - ST500DM002-1BD142
 Disk /dev/sdb - 2000 GB / 1863 GiB - ASMT 2105


>[Proceed ]  [  Quit  ]
                                        nicolas@nicolas-lenovo:~$ 
Note: Disk capacity must be correctly detected for a successful recovery.
If a disk listed above has incorrect size, check HD jumper settings, BIOS
detection, and install the latest OS patches and disk drivers.
I selected EFI GPT as suggested.

Code: Select all

TestDisk 6.14, Data Recovery Utility, July 2013
Christophe GRENIER <grenier@cgsecurity.org>
http://www.cgsecurity.org

Disk /dev/sdb - 2000 GB / 1863 GiB - ASMT 2105

Please select the partition table type, press Enter when done.
 [Intel  ] Intel/PC partition
>[EFI GPT] EFI GPT partition map (Mac i386, some x86_64...)
 [Humax  ] Humax partition table
 [Mac    ] Apple partition map
 [None   ] Non partitioned media
 [Sun    ] Sun Solaris partition
 [XBox   ] XBox partition
 [Return ] Return to disk selection


Hint: EFI GPT partition table type has been detected.
Note: Do NOT select 'None' for media with only a single partition. It's very
rare for a drive to be 'Non-partitioned'.

Code: Select all

TestDisk 6.14, Data Recovery Utility, July 2013
Christophe GRENIER <grenier@cgsecurity.org>
http://www.cgsecurity.org

Disk /dev/sdb - 2000 GB / 1863 GiB - ASMT 2105
     CHS 1907729 64 32 - sector size=512

>[ Analyse  ] Analyse current partition structure and search for lost partitions
 [ Advanced ] Filesystem Utils
 [ Geometry ] Change disk geometry
 [ Options  ] Modify options
 [ Quit     ] Return to disk selection

Note: Correct disk geometry is required for a successful recovery. 'Analyse'
process may give some warnings if it thinks the logical geometry is mismatched.

Code: Select all

TestDisk 6.14, Data Recovery Utility, July 2013
Christophe GRENIER <grenier@cgsecurity.org>
http://www.cgsecurity.org

Disk /dev/sdb - 2000 GB / 1863 GiB - CHS 1907729 64 32
Current partition structure:
     Partition                  Start        End    Size in sectors

Trying alternate GPT
 1 P EFI System                    40     409639     409600 [EFI System Partitio
 2 P Mac HFS                   409640 2914710007 2914300368 [MiniPro]
 3 P Mac HFS               2914972152 3891534655  976562504 [Untitled]
check_FAT: Unusual media descriptor (0xf0!=0xf8)
Warning: number of heads/cylinder mismatches 255 (FAT) != 64 (HD)
 4 P MS Data               3891798016 3907028991   15230976 [Untitled] [MINIPRO
FAT]


                P=Primary  D=Deleted
>[Quick Search]  [ Backup ]
                            Try to locate partition
Here are the Quick Search results:

Code: Select all

TestDisk 6.14, Data Recovery Utility, July 2013
Christophe GRENIER <grenier@cgsecurity.org>
http://www.cgsecurity.org

Disk /dev/sdb - 2000 GB / 1863 GiB - CHS 1907729 64 32
     Partition               Start        End    Size in sectors
>P EFI System                    40     409639     409600 [EFI]
 P Mac HFS                   409640 2914710007 2914300368
 P Mac HFS               2914972152 3891534655  976562504
 P MS Data               3891798016 3907028991   15230976 [MINIPRO FAT]


Structure: Ok.  Use Up/Down Arrow keys to select partition.
Use Left/Right Arrow keys to CHANGE partition characteristics:
                P=Primary  D=Deleted
Keys A: add partition, L: load backup, T: change type, P: list files,
     Enter: to continue
FAT32, blocksize=512, 209 MB / 200 MiB
So that's what I have to this moment. Can you please tell me if I can attempt to recover my partitions with this information or a Deep search must be performed?

Thanks in advance,

Nicolas.

Locked