Corrupt FAT on a CD

[matelot]

First let me say it is great to be back after a long period of ill health.

Have been quite unwell for some months and, on conclusion, we decided to visit Turkey and explore some of the Ancient Civilizations. Very very interesting.

At the end of our holiday my wife (78 years old) decided to do some paragliding!! She and a friend (89 years) both had a great time doing this. At the end we bought a cd of digital jpegs (of the wife's flight) to complement the DVD supplied as part of the package.
My problem is that while trying to make a duplicate of the CD (using Nero), the system failed and when I restarted I was found that the original CD now reported a corrupt FAT and I could not read any part of it. The duplicate cd (which I thought might be rescued) was also useless.

I have tried several 'Demo' file recovery programs but the only thing that happens is that either the cd (or the dvd) drive locks up or the system locks up. Does anyone know of a way I can recover anything off this disc? Obviously it is highly unlikely that we will be able to repeat this adventure and I will be going into hospital for lung surgery in the very near future.

I am not a programmer but wonder if there is anyway of scanning the disc, copying the content to a hard drive, discarding the corrupted FAT and then re-writing a new FAT of the remainder.

Any advice, suggestions short of sending it to a commercial outlet, will be welcome. As a pensioner and having blown our savings on the Turkey trip, commercial prices are beyond me.

matelot

[Lespaul20]

I would try the CD on another drive to narrow it down to being the disk or the drive itself.


You can try this if it's the disk.
http://www.isobuster.com/

[matelot]

Originally Posted by Lespaul20 I would try the CD on another drive to narrow it down to being the disk or the drive itself. You can try this if it's the disk. http://www.isobuster.com/

Thanks for a speedy reponse LP - I have access to several computers and have tried the disc on several of them without luck.

I do not know what the 'isobuster' will do? could you explain 'cos i really don't want to damage the disc any more than what it is already.

matelot

[Lespaul20]

Assuming you can put the disk in without crashing, ISObuster will attempt to make an ISO(exact copy) of the disk. You can then burn another copy using the ISO. It's meant to recover disks that are bad so it may work.

Also, when you tried to make a copy of the original when exactly did the system fail?

[glc]

I have tried several 'Demo' file recovery programs

Have you tried "Badcopy Pro" by Jufsoft? If this can't do it, nothing can. This is the best file recovery program out there specifically for damaged removable media.

[matelot]

LP: Thanks for the info, I will try again but all previous attempts have simply resulted in the drive locking up.

GLC: I will download 'Badcopy' asap and report back. (just on my way for a(NUTHER) catscan.

matelot

[matelot]

GLC - tried Badcopy several times but the end result was a 'lock-up'.

LP - did the ISOBUSTER and that system has now been runing for 30 hours - 15% of the file extracted!!!

Now I need to find out a) how to speed up an extraction, and

b) what to do with the extraction (assuming it is NOT the jpegs I am seeking.

Am on another system right now and will download ISOBUSTER 2.2 on here to see if I can find more explanation as to what the program will do. (Hopefully it will keep on trucking for the next few days in order to reach 100% of the extraction process).

matelot

[matelot]

Correction: for LP please read GLC

: for GLC please read LP

[matelot]

Here is the latest in this subject:

Last night, after many, many hours of analyzing, ISO Buster reported that it had scanned and recovered ALL the files except 7. I think this is marvellous. Further to this report, it stated that it could probably recover the remaining 7 files if I recommenced with the disc in another drive!

Awesome! Now, it appears that to be able to 'physically' retrieve these pix, I must purchase the program at a cost of approx. $40.00 which I think is a very good buy.

Thanks for the support and tips guys, greatly appreciated.

matelot

[Gen.Ben]

That's great matelot, glad you could recover those jpegs! I'm glad to see some fellow British Columbian's on this board