Re: undelete for partition tables?
Deleting partitions with DOS fdisk (and most partitioning programs)
doesn't touch anything except the partition table itself. So all data in
those partitions and the file system structure itself should be
untouched - unless other steps were taken besides just deleting the
partition.
Bringing the partitions back is a matter of filling the previous values
back in so that they are the same as they were previously. In many cases
the previous values can be deduced from the remaining partitions. The
user's knowledge of approximately where they were located also helps.
Fixing the partition table can be done with either a disk editor, or
with a partitioning program that doesn't wipe out the boot sector when
it creates a partition. Win9X or DOS fdisk should NOT be used for this.
Linux fdisk could do it, but the freeware Ranish Partition Manager is
also excellent for this particular job, and it may be more convenient on
that machine since, of course, Linux has been deleted. You can find it
here:
http://www.users.intercom.com/~ranish/part/
If you need a hand, get the Ranish Partition Manager and run this
command from a DOS prompt: (type part /? for snytax)
part -d 1 -p -r > part1.txt (for the first drive)
part -d 2 -p -r > part2.txt (for the second drive, if any)
Post the contents of the text file(s) here, and also any information you
have about where the partitions were located on the drive. I, or
someone, will see what we can do from there.
Tom
"Jaldhar H. Vyas" wrote:
>
> Ok an interesting case here. I have a colleague who is at the let's say
> "Just knows enough to be dangerous" level of linux knowledge. He wanted
> to install Win98 on an unused part of his drive on a machine I had set up
> Debian on. To make a long story short, he has ended up deleting his linux
> partitions with DOS FDISK. I am hoping that deleting partitions means
> removing entries in some data structure and not actually deleting data
> from the disk. If this is the case, is there any utility, dos or linux,
> free or commercial that will enable us to restore this information? There
> is important data on this machine and naturally, he did not make a backup
> prior to beginning. :(
>
> --
> Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar@braincells.com>
>
> --
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