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"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>TestDisk - testdisk</title><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" /><link rel=home title="HomePage" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/index.php?pagename=HomePage" /><link rel=help title="HowToUseWiki" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/index.php?pagename=HowToUseWiki" /><link rel=copyright title="GNU General Public License" href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html#SEC1" /><link rel=author title="The TestDisk Programming Team" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk.html" /><link rel=stylesheet type="text/css" charset="iso-8859-1" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/themes/Sidebar/sidebar.css" /><link rel="alternate stylesheet" type="text/css" charset="iso-8859-1" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/themes/default/phpwiki.css" title="PhpWiki" /><link rel="alternate stylesheet" type="text/css" charset="iso-8859-1" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/themes/default/phpwiki-printer.css" title="Printer" /><link rel="alternate stylesheet" type="text/css" charset="iso-8859-1" href="http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/themes/default/phpwiki-modern.css" title="Modern" /></head><body><div id=header><h1>testdisk</h1></div><div class=wikitext><p class="tightenable top"><b>TestDisk Data Recovery Utility</b></p><p class=tightenable><img src="testdisklogo2.gif" alt="testdisklogo2.gif" class="inlineimage" /> TestDisk Documentation <img src="testdisklogo-clear-100.gif" alt="testdisklogo-clear-100.gif" class="inlineimage" /></p><p class=tightenable>Documentation by Christophe Grenier, Simone Brandt and Daniel B. Sedory</p><p class=tightenable>TestDisk, <a href="http://www.cgsecurity.org" class="namedurl"><span style="white-space: nowrap"><img src="themes/default/images/http.png" alt="" class="linkicon" border="0" />http://www.cgsecurity.org</span></a>, is OpenSource software and is licensed under the GNU Public License, <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html" class="namedurl"><span style="white-space: nowrap"><img src="themes/default/images/http.png" alt="" class="linkicon" border="0" />http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html</span></a>.</p><p class=tightenable><b>TestDisk</b> was primarily designed to help <b>recover lost partitions</b> and/or <b>make non-booting disks bootable again</b> <i>when</i> these symptoms
are caused by <i>faulty software</i>, certain types of <i>viruses</i> or <i>human error</i> (such as <i>accidentally</i> erasing your Partition Table).</p><p class=tightenable><b>TestDisk</b> can <b><i>run</i></b> under <b>DOS</b> (either <i>real</i> or in a Win9x DOS-box), <b>Windows</b> (NT 4/2000/XP/2003), <b>Linux</b> or <b>FreeBSD</b>.
<b><i>But</i></b> TestDisk will <b><i>find</i></b> lost partitions for all of these types:</p><ul><li class="tightenable bottom">BeFS ( BeOS )</li><li class="tightenable top bottom">DOS/Windows FAT12, FAT16 and FAT32</li><li class="tightenable top bottom">Ext2 and Ext3 ( Linux)</li><li class="tightenable top bottom">Linux Swap (versions 1 and 2)</li><li class="tightenable top bottom">Netware</li><li class="tightenable top bottom">NTFS ( Windows NT/2K/XP )</li><li class="tightenable top bottom">ReiserFS ( versions 1 and 2 )</li><li class="tightenable top">UFS ( FreeBSD/OpenBSD/NetBSD )</li></ul><p class=tightenable>TestDisk queries the BIOS ( DOS/Win9x) or the OS ( Linux, FreeBSD) in order to
find the Hard Disks and their characteristics ( LBA size and CHS geometry).
TestDisk does a quick check of your disk's structure and compares it with your
Partition Table for entry errors. If the Partition Table has entry errors,
TestDisk can repair them. If you have missing partitions or a completely empty
Partition Table, TestDisk can search for partitions and create a new Table or
even a new MBR if necessary.</p><p class=tightenable><i>However</i>, it's up to the user to look over the list of <i>possible</i>
partitions found by TestDisk and to select the one(s) which were being used
just before the drive failed to boot or the partition(s) were <i>lost</i>. In
some cases, especially after initiating a detailed search for lost partitions,
TestDisk may show partition data which is simply from the <i>remnants</i> of
a partition that had been deleted and overwritten long ago.</p><p class=tightenable>TestDisk has features for both novices and experts. For those who know little
or nothing about data recovery techniques, the command line parameters
<b>/log</b> and <b>/debug</b> can be used to collect detailed information about
a non-booting drive which can then be sent to a tech for further analysis.
Those more familiar with such procedures should find TestDisk a handy tool in
