Recover files from formatted NTFS/BTRFS partitions

Question

I have a system that was recently reformatted/reinstalled.

However, somebody forgot to check the backups...sigh. Backup drive is a write-off (faked flash drive capacity)

Anyhow, there were two partitions on the harddisk that we're concerned about, one NTFS 30Gb, and one BTRFS 30Gb.

I assume the BTRFS partition is a write-off, since there's no few recovery tools for BTRFS.

With the NTFS drive, the original partition was formatted (in the Windows 7 installer), and Windows installed on top, so the first 15Gb are essentially gone.

I've just made a image of the partition as it currently stands, using dcfldd. I assume that's enough to do a recovery from, as opposed to the whole drive, since I just did a reformat, and re-used the same partition?

Any advice on particular tools to re-enact the recovery? Basically, I'd like to scrub it for any files at all that I can pull.

Opensource tool that work under *nix are preferred, but quite frankly, right now, I'll take anything...lol.

Thanks, Victor

Answer 1

I used http://www.piriform.com/recuva last time I had to recover files from Windows.

There's also a tool called ntfsundelete for linux. I haven't tested it, though.

Answer 2

For NTFS, how about TestDisk and/or PhotoRec?

Answer 3

Try TestDisk, made by the same guys as PhotoRec.

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

Answer 4

I've been using GetDataBack both FAT and NTFS for lost partitions or overriden partitions, it saved my life many times!

http://www.runtime.org/data-recovery-software.htm

Hope this help!

Alex.