unable to read boot sector

Recuva
1

Hi, I have a 16 GB SD HC card. It was working in my computer this morning, then I pulled it out and put it in my camera and my camera wouldn't recognize it. I put it back in my computer and now my computer says it needs to be formatted. I have videos of my little girls from Christmas and Birthdays on it that I (foolishly) haven't backed up.

I'm nervous to format the card, though my husband (who admittedly knows more about this than I do) says that the only way to recover would be to format the card and then use a program like Recuva to look for the files...

When I use Recuva right now (before formatting), I get the message "unable to read boot sector."

Only other piece of information, if it is helpful, is that the card does show up in the "Disk Management" program and it says it is formatted to "RAW" (instead of NTFS or something else). It also says "Healthy", whatever that means...

Please, if you have any advice I'd appreciate it! I also tried using "Flash Memory Toolkit", but that one wouldn't see that I had a card in at all.

Thanks so much!

2

Hi Calladona, and welcome to the forum.

Have a read of this linked to post, and the final post in that thread (No 6) ...

http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=18880&view=findpost&p=120566

The post was made in 2008 about a utility called "TestDisk", and it wasn't until some time later (2010) that a poster with the same problem as yourself had success with it.

At first glance, it looks like a "Command Line" utility, but it has a structured format of giving the user choices to make.

Have a look at the thread, and the program, and come back if you have any problems with it.

Links to "TestDisk" are in the thread.

Hope that helps.

3

The suggested TestDisk may answer your needs, and HOPEFULLY will not degrade what you have,

and after several links it gets to

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

which claims

For more safety, PhotoRec uses read-only access to handle the drive or memory card you are about to recover lost data from.

Read-Only is important, otherwise you will not have a second chance for an alternative means of restoration.

the only way to recover would be to format the card and then use a program like Recuva to look for the files...

I remember like Yesterday when the most dangerous malware was an email attachment file with the single line

FORMAT C:\

This would hose the DOS computers.

I cringe at the thought of using format as the first stage for recovering a file ! !

I would suggest an essential pre-requisite to any such attempt would be to duplicate what you have before you damage it further,

and then after any damage you may be able to clone it back and try something different.

I Googled for

clone raw format

Got "about 23,900,000 results (0.13 seconds)", the first was

http://www.addictivetips.com/windows-tips/osfclone-is-self-booting-disk-cloning-tool-that-clones-raw-disk-image/

If you can clone your 16 GB SD to a HDD you have a second chance if your first recovery attempts do damage.

4

Hi Calladona, and welcome to the forum.

Have a read of this linked to post, and the final post in that thread (No 6) ...

http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=18880&view=findpost&p=120566

The post was made in 2008 about a utility called "TestDisk", and it wasn't until some time later (2010) that a poster with the same problem as yourself had success with it.

At first glance, it looks like a "Command Line" utility, but it has a structured format of giving the user choices to make.

Have a look at the thread, and the program, and come back if you have any problems with it.

Links to "TestDisk" are in the thread.

Hope that helps.

Thank you!!! I used the PhotoRec utility from that link and it worked GREAT! All my videos are back!!! Thank you so very much!

5

You're more than welcome, but don't let lightning strike twice.

Get your important stuff backed up, and don't wait until tomorrow to do it!!

:)