I need help choosing the “right” tool for a specific task.

I have a WD HDD, WD1600AAJS, SATAII 3GB.

WD Data LifeGuard Diagnostic for DOS reports “sector relocation error”.

This error means that the HDD is not suitable for use anymore, but I want to recover the data in it before I discard it.

Additional info:
The disk is recognized by the BIOS and, for now, is still spinning up.

The disk is not stable (for reading) under Windows. I disconnected it from the system, until I have the “right” tool to recover data from it.

I have unallocated space in another (bigger, system) hard disk, so I can try to recover the data by copying it to a new partition in this other hard disk. Since I already have a partition on it, I can't do an entire disk-to-disk cloning.

So the options I have available are:
a) partition to partition recovery, with errors tolerance;
b) file/folder recovery, with errors tolerance.

Since I don't know how much time/opportunities I have until the disk won't be readable at all, I don't want to “try/test” several tools to find out which one is the most suitable for the task of data-recovering.

I don't know which tool is better suited for this situation. I've been reading about the following tools:

1_ MHDD has a backup command, but it seems to me it is better suited for small amounts of data, where the user already knows which specific sectors he wants to recover.

2_ WD Data LifeGuard Tools for DOS has a tool to copy from one disk to another, but I don't know if it is “fault-tolerant”. Also, the name of the command confuses me. It “sounds” like disk-cloning, but according to what I read about it in the manual, it is a file/folder copy.

3_ RoadKill's Unstoppable Copier for Linux. I have no idea if it is suitable for this situation, and I don't know much about Linux commands.

4_ Easeus Disk Copy “sounds” suitable according to what I read about it. Is it “fault-tolerant”? Is it suitable for this situation? I would use the “partition copy” function, if it is fault-tolerant and NTFS compatible.

5_ Photorec/TestDisk/Partimage or other tools included in PartedMagic?

There are probably other tools available. Any suggestions?

I would like to use a floppy-based tool if this is possible, and I am inclined to use a sector-to-sector copy, rather than a “file system” copy. This is not a “must”, of course, and any advice on this matter is very welcome.

I don't really know which tool is the most suitable for this problem. And if there is a better suited tool that I didn't list above, I'll be happy to know about it.

If anyone could give me some tips, comparison or “pros and cons” I'll really appreciate it.

TIA.

Here you have 2 programs, no they are not the same program (Parted Magic):

• dd_rescue: http://www.garloff.de/kurt/linux/ddrescue/
• ddrescue: http://www.gnu.org/software/ddrescue/ddrescue.html

_________________
Download Ultimate Boot CD v5.0: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html
Use Parted Magic for handling all partitioning task: http://partedmagic.com/

Icecube, thank you for the info.

dd_rescue is not listed at http://partedmagic.com/programs.html , and OTOH, there is another one listed there named "myrescue".

BTW, dd_rescue just released a new version, 1.23.

Since I have very little knowledge about Linux commands/tools, I was thinking about using Easeus Disk Copy (using the partition copy mode) first, then check the results, and after identifying bad sectors, only then try to "play around" with those Linux's tools (and their parameters/commands).

Does this sounds like a wise method? Or maybe by using more than one tool I am actually lowering the chances to get more data rescued?

According to what I read about Easeus Disk Copy, it seems it scans the sectors in a linear manner, but I don't know if it uses the same approach as dd_rescue (trying to use little "chunks" to minimize the "bad readings"); or as myrescue (trying to skip problematic areas); or maybe it uses a third approach.

Do you (or anyone else) have any experience / knowledge about Easeus Disk Copy or any of the mentioned tools?

I really appreciate any help/tips. TIA.

Even though Easeus Disk Copy works by copying sector-by-sector, it seems it doesn't handle hard disks that already have problems.

So I am going to "investigate" ddrescue, dd_rescue, and myrescue, until I have very clear the correct procedure. I still have no idea which tool is the most appropriate for my case.

In the meantime, could anyone comment about any of the tools I mentioned before in my first post, or these 3 I mentioned in this one?

Also, does anyone know if the demo version of Diskpatch allows running its copy/cloning functions?

I know these questions are not really about UBCD itself, but I thought that maybe someone here could point me to the right direction, so I can choose the best tool for my situation.

Any help is really appreciate.

TIA.