Truecrypt Bad Sectors - File Container

[kainekainekaine]

Hi, when using a file container in Truecrypt what happens say if part of that file container becomes corrupted with a bad sector? I.e. 80gb drive with 40gb file container and a few bad sectors appear on the file container part of the disk. Is everything lost or just the part that is corrupted. I tried searching for a long time but couldnt find anything about this, but I did find that if using an encrypted partition and backup up the headers, you only lose the part thats corrupted but couldnt find any info about file containers.

Cheers

[dantz]

File containers, encrypted partitions and encrypted devices all work the same way. If a header become corrupted because of a failing hard drive (or whatever), you can merely restore the header from a backup that you made earlier. (In the case of a failing drive you would probably want to copy the entire encrypted volume over to a healthy drive before doing anything else.) TrueCrypt Version 6 now includes "embedded backup headers", for those who can never seem to get around to manually backing up their headers.

If a sector that happens to contain pure data becomes corrupted, you will most likely lose that data, but little else. However, if sectors containing the MFT (Master File Table) or other crucial system files are damaged then in most cases you will no longer have a working filesystem when you mount the volume. At this point some data may still be recoverable, but you will need to use specialized data-recovery tools to get it.

Best practices: Always back up both your headers and your data.

[KookyMan]

Dantz got it right.

Simple version of that : If a sector gets damaged, only that sector is lost, just like a regular drive.