Recover files from C drive after losing files from last two years

Pete, to make this meaningful, how large are the full and incremental backups you alluded to above?

 

Just a suggestion : contact R-Studio support, they are generally very helpful. Hope you can recover as much as possible.

 

Here's my last (3) snapshots...

55-sec (799mB of compressed changes)
49-sec (525mB of compressedchanges)
60-sec (1gB of compressed changes)

These are done from an SSD-based system disk to a non-descript 7200rpm spinner... and this includes snapshot verification time.

Of course Macrium uses a WARM restore (WinPE-based) process when doing a "rollback" operation. If you take out the WinPE loading time, the actual process of restoration is only a few seconds longer than the snapshot taking process (Build #541, the most recent). They appear to be getting pretty close to an extremely efficient imaging/snapshot process, if not already there as far as imagers go.

 

PV, the process above includes the following steps and they are all included in the timings above...

Loads the File Index info from the last snapshot, compares the current index on disk to the one loaded, images the file system differences then verifies that image. The whole process is pretty darn quick.

These processes are based on a single Baseline FULL image and subsequent Incrementals.

 

...and how large was you incremental 'snapshot'?

 

Not at all, AX64 has never damaged a users PC or caused a loss of data. At its worst it failed during a hot restore so a cold restore was required to set things right.

 

There are posts on Wilders to the contrary - where even a cold restore failed!

 

Well not really, after a hot restore failed I couldn't get rid of the extra menu added by AX64 to boot from the recovery environment... I used AOMEI Backupper to restore my full drive...

 

This time I followed Panagiotis' advice and scanned the entire drive (not just c partition). Results look somewhat promising based on contents of some of the recognized partitions it found, so I'm diving in and buying R-Studio.

I'm thinking of buying the one for Linux since I anticipate having more problems with the Win7 physical drive (since I use more Windows-only programs). Is there any reason NOT to consider R-Studio for Linux and install that on the second internal drive running Linux Mint? The emergency CD comes with either one and gives me the CD drive or bootable usb as alternatives. It appears both have the same functionality. Hoping for the best.

BTW, I liked RBRX but after this last beating (out of the clear blue), I'm ready to move on. Snapshot speed is not an issue for me.

I've heard a potential issue with incremental backups is if one of those is off, doesn't that affect the whole restore since the incremental backups build on each other? I'm thinking of just taking an entire image of the system every 6 months or so and backing up data (docs, photos, mp3s, email) weekly or monthly.

 

I have been following the AX64 thread closely and do not recall these. No doubt its my aging memory and I will accept your statement as correct.

 

Regarding the emergency CD, keep in mind it locks itself somehow on a given hardware, contrarily to the windows version which is not hardware bound. My advice would be to ask R-TT and explain your situation if you hesitate.

 

Damn best thing you can do! I have a stack of letters and trinkets from clients, friends, and all - saying that that technique saved them from many headaches and heartaches.

It's a time-honored method that proves itself over and over and over again. For bonus points, do it round-robin style.

 

Hmmm, the EULAs for Win and Linux and all versions of R-Studio say they are licensed per machine not per user. I did notice the hardware restriction with the CD, thanks. I think I'll go with the Linux version.

One more question:
Once I backup data from the existing drive which currently has the baseline RBRx snapshot dating to April 2013, I plan to uninstall RBRx from Windows 7 x64 with Revo Uninstall. Can anything bad happen when I uninstall the program? Will it mess up my MBR again or something like that (yeah, just a touch of RBRx-related PTSD)?

 

You are so right, Keetah, sometimes the old ways are the best ways.

Round-robin style? 'splain please.

 

The simple version, you have 5 disks holding all your backups. Every Time you do a backup you use the next disk, eventually you go through them all and come around to the first.

Kind of like wear leveling. No one disk sees high usage compared to the others..

 

Has anyone using R-Studio ever had trouble with the previewer?

I'm finding that the preview function from within R-Studio for Linux (and emergency CD) can only preview jpg files successfully. I've tested pdf, doc, docx, ppt files (all supported file types for previewer) that are intact and in known partitions on an external drive. They open fine in Linux but cannot be previewed in R-Studio.

I've contacted RTT tech support too but just curious if I'm doing something wrong here or what.

 

Sorry, I just tested R-Studio for Windows. I'll have a go and will let you know.

Edited : pdf, jpeg, doc, docx preview work fine under windows. I just had an issue with an old .ppt file.

 

Okay, I was just informed by an RTT forum moderator that only the Windows version can preview ppt/doc files. Of course, I found this out after paying $79.99 for the Linux version because I thought I had a shot at recovering the files and I assumed the previewer just wasn't working right. I don't recall seeing anything about the Linux previewer on the website. I know they won't refund my money but I'll try to get them to switch my license to the Windows version with the expanded preview abilities. No harm in asking.

Well, thank you all for your helpful advice and explanations. I'm winding this thing down and moving on. There's more to life than missing files.

UPDATE: R-Studio folks did switch my license over to a Windows version so at least I can preview doc and pdf files.

 

Interesting threads about RBRX lately. I'm glad the Scavenger tool did help someone. I didn't get to Kurtis for two hours but I was given two different versions of the Scavenger tool by HDS tech support. I also tried a third that I found through gooogle search. All three scavenger tools would not open the "shield.dat" file saying it was an "invalid system data file." For the record, I stopped using my affected drive shortly after the problem. I accessed the internet for help using a little Dell mini laptop and the Linux Mint second hard drive, hoping to avoid any further damage to the affected windows drive. It appears that, as pandlouk suggested earlier, there were too many snapshots and too much fragmentation for me to recover anything intact.

The files I tried to recover (once I paid for R-Studio), when I tried opening them, I got an error that said I should try to scan all partitions for the file. I take that to mean that for each missing file I need to scan all found partitions hoping to find all the fragments and put them together and hope the file works after that. Not going to happen, way too labor-intensive for the thousands of files that were lost.

On the bright side, I am investigating backup options, best media for long-term storage, cloud storage, etc.

@ pandlouk, I never did believe in Santa, but if he exists, he's probably with my 400 GB of data out...there...somewhere...

 

Hi, sorry I incited you to buy R-Studio. Just one thing : you just need one scan of the full surface to recover files, not a scan per file, so it should be feasable, scan may take a long time but you just need to perform it once.

Another thing : for data backup in real time and with no load on the the system, I recommend bvckup 2. And for cloudbackup, I find Cloudberry backup to be invaluable, coupled with the cloud service you want, I have chosen Amazon Glacier which is very cheap...

 

Thanks MerleOne. You didn't incite anything as far as I'm concerned. I should not have bought it if I wasn't absolutely sure about the preview feature. It's a great program. I'm amazed at how much it finds. It would have been nice if it were clearer on their website the difference in supported preview file types between Windows and Linux. The website indicates comparable features between both versions but you have to find the supported preview file types buried in the User Manual pdfs for each. I did not not notice the differences-my mistake.

I did scan the entire surface and it came up with over a dozen recognized partitions, some small some big, most green but some yellow and red. I chose the one green partition that most closely resembled the original in size but it still was smaller than the original OS partition. That's probably why the missing fragments must have been located outside of the scope of the selected green partition.

I was checking out OneDrive. They will be offering unlimited storage to Office365 subscribers rolling out this year, up from the current 1TB storage. It's $7/month but if you pay $69 up front for Office365, you save even more. thanks for the cloud suggestions. Will look into them.

 

Regarding Glacier, I think I pay around $0.5 per month for a total amount of data stored near 20-30 GB. It's almost impossible to know what the montly bill will be, it doesn't only depend on the volume stored but also on downloads/uploads volume & frequency among other factors. Glacier is cheap because your data is "frozen" there, it takes days or weeks to recover files, contrarily to Amazon S3 where recovery is fast but the price 10 times higher. Since I don't mind for a slow recovery because Cloud backup is my second backup destination, Glacier is fine with me. And Cloudberry Online Backup Desktop is a one time payment (for minor versions AFAIR). They even sometimes give free licenses on Sharewareonsale.com or Windowsdeal.com, or offer rebates on BitsduJour. And I find it very easy to use.