How to recover files from unallocated partition?

Question

I tried installing linux mint 17 from live usb, in the process my windows partition got overwritten as a result I lost all my important files. I am not able to boot windows 7.

I used the cmd sudo fdisk-l...

Disk /dev/sda: 320.1 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads,sk /dev/sda: 320.1 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 38913 cylinders, total 625142448 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0001b31c

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1            2048    20000767     9999360   83  Linux
/dev/sda2        20002814    92200959    36099073    5  Extended
/dev/sda5        20002816    92200959    36099072   83  Linux

WARNING: GPT (GUID Partition Table) detected on '/dev/sdb'! The util fdisk doesn't support GPT. Use GNU Parted.


Disk /dev/sdb: 7803 MB, 7803174912 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 948 cylinders, total 15240576 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x25b7026a

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1   *           0     2603519     1301760    0  Empty
/dev/sdb2           74148       78691        2272   ef  EFI (FAT-12/16/32)

WARNING: GPT (GUID Partition Table) detected on '/dev/sdb1'! The util fdisk doesn't support GPT. Use GNU Parted.


Disk /dev/sdb1: 1333 MB, 1333002240 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 162 cylinders, total 2603520 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x25b7026a

     Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1p1   *           0     2603519     1301760    0  Empty
/dev/sdb1p2           74148       78691        2272   ef  EFI (FAT-12/16/32)

Its does not show any NTFS partition...

Output of df -h command

mint@mint ~ $ df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/cow            895M   88M  807M  10% /
udev            884M  8.0K  884M   1% /dev
tmpfs           179M  1.3M  178M   1% /run
/dev/sdb        1.3G  1.3G     0 100% /cdrom
/dev/loop0      1.2G  1.2G     0 100% /rofs
none            4.0K     0  4.0K   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
tmpfs           895M  4.0K  895M   1% /tmp
none            5.0M  4.0K  5.0M   1% /run/lock
none            895M   76K  895M   1% /run/shm
none            100M   44K  100M   1% /run/user
/dev/sr1         76M   76M     0 100% /media/mint/Idea Net Setter

Why are you using fdisk despite the fact the tool clearly indicates it does not support GPT partitions? This does not seem like a serious question based on that fact alone. — Ramhound, Jul 20 '14 at 06:50

Valmiky Arquissandas · Answer 1 · 2014-07-20T06:08:19.743

Do not do anything else in the disk, or you'll lose your files forever! If you have the possibility of making a full disk image of those 320 GB to somewhere else, do it, with dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/sdz (sda being the source drive and sdz being the destination).

Since not only the partition table was written, but the partitions were used, you're already in bad shape. No backups, I guess?

Give us the output of df -h to see how much might be salvageable.

I'd recommend you to boot from a Linux live CD, and run PhotoRec and The Sleuth Kit on your hard drive. It should recover a good portion of your data, but make sure you do not let them write the files over the hard drive, or you'll overwrite the data you're trying to recover. Take a look at this.

How to recover files from unallocated partition?

1 Answers1