Re: Need Help restoring a filesystem on an external drive WD 'My Book'

["Thomas Schmitt" <scdbackup@gmx.net>]

Hi,

Bernard wrote:
> Surprise : this time, it did AUTOMOUNT the way it used to in the old days !

So there are probably unstable readbility problems with the partition table.

If you have the start address of partition 1 then you could try to
circumvent the partition table by using a loop device as proposed in
  https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2017/11/msg00905.html
  "losetup -o $(expr 262208 '*' 512) -r -f /dev/sdb"
where 262208 was the start address assumed by "TestDisk".


> I will inquire to know if I can get that hardware repaired...

Given that my local food discounter sells 1 TiB USB3 hard disks for 55 EUR
i doubt that it is economically interesting to keep the drive in operation.


> All of this raises a number of questions concerning safe storage of data.

I am heavily biased towards having multiple backups on optical media.
Although they are not overly reliable at backup writing time, once
written and verified they survive a long time.


> usb ports have become faulty after 2-3 years

DVD or BD drives are easier to replace than USB ports, i assume. :))
One could see them as sacrificial hardware for the abrasive effects
of environment and time.

Normally my drives go blind before the tray servo breaks. Some last
since more than 10 years, others died after 20 months.
But the SATA or USB sockets where they were plugged had no problems
at all.


Have a nice day :)

Thomas