RAID0 recovery?

[niciuffo]

Hello everyone,
While I was trying to install Windows 8 on a RAID0 partition, and trying different diskpart commands, I think I fu**ed up my RAID. Now in Windows it says it's got to be formatted, but I'd like to recover some data if it's possible. Does somebody know how to do this?
I tried a couple of RAID recovery software but they don't recognize my partition. Am I screwed?
Thanks for all the replies.

[JrRacinFan]

Before venturing further what EXACTLY was done to have it FUBAR?

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by JrRacinFan

Before venturing further what EXACTLY was done to have it FUBAR?

These are the commands I attempted:

C:\> Diskpart

DISKPART> list volume

DISKPART> select volume 4

DISKPART> online volume

DISKPART> attributes volume clear readonly

DISKPART> clean

DISKPART> convert gpt

DISKPART> create partition efi size=100

DISKPART> assign letter=s

DISKPART>format quick fs=FAT32

DISKPART>create partition msr size=128

DISKPART> create partition primary align=32

DISKPART>assign letter=p

DISKPART> select part 1

DISKPART> format fs=ntfs label="System" unit=512 quick compress

Here it said it couldn't format or something

DISKPART> assign letter q

DISKPART> list volume

DISKPART> exit

Of course in the end I couldn't install Windows, but I saw that the 65GB partition I created before was gone, probably merged with the 4TB RAID0.

[JrRacinFan]

I am kind of leaning towards that the data is gone at this point

 DISKPART>format quick fs=FAT32

DISKPART>create partition msr size=128

DISKPART> create partition primary align=32

DISKPART>assign letter=p

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by JrRacinFan

I am kind of leaning towards that the data is gone at this point

 DISKPART>format quick fs=FAT32

DISKPART>create partition msr size=128

DISKPART> create partition primary align=32

DISKPART>assign letter=p

Yeah I thought about it too, but didn't I only format the 65GB partition? If not not too bad, there weren't importand data there, just Steam games and downloaded junk.

EDIT: I am using a non-RAID recovery software, and it's finding 2000 files as of now, so I guess it's not formatted yet?

[JrRacinFan]

Yeah see that's where the info I need lies. What disk id's are linked to which partitions/volumes and which one is the major portion?

Originally Posted by niciuffo

DISKPART> format fs=ntfs label="System" unit=512 quick compress

that's also a problem. I've never heard of the "quick compress" flag before.

[Sinzia]

A quick format only deletes the file table, not the files themselves, so the disk doesn't know where to look for the files.

If you did a full format then you'd be pretty much hosed.

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by Sinzia

A quick format only deletes the file table, not the files themselves, so the disk doesn't know where to look for the files.

If you did a full format then you'd be pretty much hosed.

Hmm okay, and how do I restore them? With a recovery software? Can you suggest one that works, maybe freeware? (I remember the name Recuva...)

[JrRacinFan]

That changes things. Find a place to recover them to and yes Recuva does a great job for being freeware.

[niciuffo]

Recuva won't let me scan drive E:\ . It says it can't read boot sector.
Trying with EASEUS Data Recovery

[McSteel]

If you don't shy away from piracy, or have money to throw away, you'll find GetDataBack for NTFS rather useful. At this point, you've killed your MBR and your PBR, as well as your MFT, so you'll only be able to find your file via pattern matching. Meaning, the software you should use has to recognize a file's header to discern whether it's a .jpg, an .mp3 or an .avi, for example. And even then, it will be hard to recover badly fragmented files, if not impossible. Why were you doing all that in diskpart? Actually, why the hell would you convert a disk containing important files to GPT? Did no one tell you this is a destructive procedure?

As for using GetDataBack, be sure to set the options "Sustained file system damage", then use "Excessive search", "Recover lost files", "Recover deleted files", and un-check "Use valid MFT entries only".
Good luck!

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by McSteel

If you don't shy away from piracy, or have money to throw away, you'll find GetDataBack for NTFS rather useful. At this point, you've killed your MBR and your PBR, as well as your MFT, so you'll only be able to find your file via pattern matching. Meaning, the software you should use has to recognize a file's header to discern whether it's a .jpg, an .mp3 or an .avi, for example. And even then, it will be hard to recover badly fragmented files, if not impossible. Why were you doing all that in diskpart? Actually, why the hell would you convert a disk containing important files to GPT? Did no one tell you this is a destructive procedure?

As for using GetDataBack, be sure to set the options "Sustained file system damage", then use "Excessive search", "Recover lost files", "Recover deleted files", and un-check "Use valid MFT entries only".
Good luck!

I never said it had important data, it only had my Steam games (400GB+), my downloaded files and other useless stuff. In fact, all my data is in my 240Gb SSD for security, plus I have a copy of everything in Dropbox or GDrive.
I just wanted to be able to recover all this stuff cause I don't want to download it all over again. We'll see how it goes in 6-8 hours when the process finishes.
Thanks for that software though. I'll see what to do if EASEUS doesn't work by that time.
Thanks everyone for the help

[Mindweaver]

RAID (redundant array of independent disks)

But.. "RAID 0" doesn't have any redundancy. "RAID 0" should only be used for improved performance, and additional storage space. Any single drive failure destroys the array. I would cut my loses, and rebuild the array, and start over. The time you'll spend trying to recover the drive failure would be better used by rebuilding the array. Since, nothing important was on the array.

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by Mindweaver

RAID (redundant array of independent disks)

But.. "RAID 0" doesn't have any redundancy. "RAID 0" should only be used for improved performance, and additional storage space. Any single drive failure destroys the array. I would cut my loses, and rebuild the array, and start over. The time you'll spend trying to recover the drive failure would be better used by rebuilding the array. Since, nothing important was on the array.

45 minutes left
I still want to try recover as much as I can, I found a 2TB external HDD that'll do the work ^^
(Don't want to download 500-600GB eheh)
By the way, wouldn't there be a way to "rebuild" the file structure of the HDD's? Or is it impossible?

[McSteel]

It's impossible, even in theory. When you write a file to a RAID0 volume, the odd blocks will be written to one constituent drive, and the even ones to the other. When one drive fails, you lose literally 50% of file data with absolutely no way to reconstruct them. There are no hash values, parity checks, CRCs, nothing.

About your recovery attempt... Say you do manage to recover 80% of the files from the array. How will you run a Steam game if even one file is missing from it's folder? Since I don't game on Steam, does it have an option to re-download missing/corrupted parts of a game?

[DanTheBanjoman]

How is your RAID array fucked? You only touched the file system as far as I can tell. Ignore the fact that it's a RAID array and approach it as a normal disk. The OS isn't aware of an array, just a disk. What hardware lies underneath isn't relevant.

[_Zod_]

Originally Posted by Mindweaver

RAID (redundant array of independent disks)

Bingo! Raid 0 is not raid, it's JBOD. I hate that it gets tagged as a Raid option.

[McSteel]

Originally Posted by DanTheBanjoman

How is your RAID array fucked? You only touched the file system as far as I can tell. Ignore the fact that it's a RAID array and approach it as a normal disk. The OS isn't aware of an array, just a disk. What hardware lies underneath isn't relevant.

Yes, but all traces of a file table are gone, and so is any partitioning info. It's a disk with files physically sitting on it, but no index of their position, length and names. Perhaps if he's super lucky, a capable software can find $MFT intact on the disk, and use it to restore everything else. But that requires quite the amount of dumb luck...

[Aquinus]

Originally Posted by _Zod_

Bingo! Raid 0 is not raid, it's JBOD. I hate that it gets tagged as a Raid option.

That's incorrect. Get your facts straight. JBOD concatenates disks, it doesn't stripe them like RAID-0 does. RAID-0 and JBOD do two very different things. The only thing they have in common is that they don't offer redundancy.

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by McSteel

It's impossible, even in theory. When you write a file to a RAID0 volume, the odd blocks will be written to one constituent drive, and the even ones to the other. When one drive fails, you lose literally 50% of file data with absolutely no way to reconstruct them. There are no hash values, parity checks, CRCs, nothing.

About your recovery attempt... Say you do manage to recover 80% of the files from the array. How will you run a Steam game if even one file is missing from it's folder? Since I don't game on Steam, does it have an option to re-download missing/corrupted parts of a game?

Yeah, Steam has the option to check game integrity and re-download corrupted files... by the way GetDataBack didn't work, it scanned the entire array (took about 5 hours), found TWO system files, and when I selected one of them it crashed Now I'm trying with EASEUS, if that fails, I guess I'll format it.

[McSteel]

You could also try Active@ Partition Recovery, but it's likely that the $MFT was damaged. I believe that APR is capable of finding MFT backup and using it, as well as recognizing files via header signature and $Bitmap record, if present and undamaged...

If your D/L speed is upwards of say 15-20 Mbps, it might actually be quicker to just re-download everything.

[niciuffo]

Originally Posted by McSteel

You could also try Active@ Partition Recovery, but it's likely that the $MFT was damaged. I believe that APR is capable of finding MFT backup and using it, as well as recognizing files via header signature and $Bitmap record, if present and undamaged...

If your D/L speed is upwards of say 15-20 Mbps, it might actually be quicker to just re-download everything.

EASEUS just finished scanning, but it found a bunch of meaningless files. There are like 3000 rar files (1.rar,2.rar...3000.rar), and there is a .doc of 2.4GB LOL.
I'm gonna try that software and let the pc running tonight, and if that doesn't work, full format
By the way I have a 20Mbps so yeah it shouldn't take THAT much...

[Aquinus]

If two applications are providing either nothing or gibberish, it's very likely that you won't be recovering much of anything.

[niciuffo]

I formatted today.
Thanks for all your help, you can close this thread now

[brandonwh64]

Yea even thought raid 0 is fast, it is a complete disaster if one drive dies. I am just waiting on the day when one of my drives die but I backup all important things to my 1TB black drive.