Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[Sylvander]

So far:

1. Used Lupu-526->Xfe to copy all folders/files...
Except:
46 files that wouldn't copy...
Such attempts [to copy the files that won't] caused Puppy to freeze...
When I'd then Ctrl+Alt+backspace, and command a reboot, then only switching off the bad HDD would cause the reboot to proceed.
Then I'd proceed until hitting the next bad file.
Both partitions [source & destination] were/are NTFS.

2. Bought a new blank 1TB external HDD.
Hoping to use ddrescue to attempt to clone the bad 750GB HDD to the good 1TB HDD.

3. Would then like to attempt to return the 750GB HDD to a functional state.

[Sylvander]

I'm no expert, so I may report incorrectly.

1. ddrescue is recovering content from the bad HDD as I type this.

2. Already completed:
(a) First step was to connect both the [USB-2.0 connected] source and destination drives.
The partition on the bad source drive was left unmounted.
The new destination drive has no partition, therefore doesn't appear on the desktop, but does show in GParted.
Source = 750GB.
Destination = 1TB.

(b) Then the following command was entered at the prompt in a terminal window:
ddrescue -f -n /dev/sdc /dev/sdd logfile
This is designed to recover only the non-problem areas of the source HDD...
And mark the problem areas, and record those in the logfile so ddrescue will attempt to recover those regions in further scans.
It took 3 hours to complete that scan...
Only 84078kB was rescued.
4 errors = total 750GB reported [all of the HDD!]

3. Second step was to run the following command:
ddrescue -d -f -r3 /dev/sdc /dev/sdd logfile
This attempts to recover from the regions marked as problem areas, and recorded in the logfile.
Periodically, the problem HDD has been causing the ddrescue scan to freeaze...
But when I repeat this command, the scan and recovery continues from the point of interruption.

4. Below is shown a screenshot of the present display with ddrescue frozen:
Note the read rate is zero.
This is much higher when ddrescue is working normally.

[Sylvander]

On the final runup to completion of cloning.

About 14 hrs to go from the time that screenshot was taken.

[Sylvander]

Cloning attempt now completed.

47616 Bytes couldn't be recovered.

750156 MB were successfully recovered ["Rescued"].

There were 93 errors.

It really slowed down at the last, as it attempted to recover the worst blocks.
It succeeded with a few of those, and failed with the remainder.
All this after 3 retries.

[Sylvander]

For information on how to use ddrescue:
See...
GNU ddrescue Manual

Particularly useful is...
6 A small tutorial with examples