How to recover data from formatted or rebuilt RAID arrays

[Nick_TS]

Hello Dear Data Extractor RAID Edition users,

I'd like to write some words about data recovery from formatted (into new file system) or rebuilt (into new configuration) RAID arrays. This problem is rather common. In many cases it's possible to recover data.

There is general algorithm is following:
I. Define new configuration and estimate damage after formatting and rebuilding. Maybe recovery is meaningless;
II. Define old configuration with needed data. Try to find out possibility to recover overwritten data (in case of RAID5 you can recover data from XOR). There are many cases used to recover data such as: search previous RAID configuration metadata, using old configuration metadata, using files of previous RAID etc.
III. Recover data from old RAID configuration. This is like data recovering from formatted HDD. In this step it's necessary to exclude new RAID configuration data and try to rebuild data based on old RAID redundancy (if this is possible of course)

In your case looks like:
you know new configuration and can definitely rebuild it. It's known that some Gbs of data are rewritten (Windows installation). The fact that TestDisk found other file system means that some data isn't rewritten and there is chance to recover old data;
in case where old and new RAID configurations are RAID 10 (or 01), you have to find out which drives were mirrors before and after rebuilding. For that you can search NTFS boot and ext3 superblocks;
it's necessary to define how data were stored by proxmox. Needed raw-image can be fragmented. If there was host file system (with 1Tb capacity for RAID 10 or 01) then you have to recover it. If image is stored as LVM then you have to find LVM metadata. You can search manually image parties but it can take long time and requires deep knowledge in data recovery;
Ext3 found and it looks like health and you can't open partition. It can be caused by one of three reasons or all three ones together:
1) old RAID parameters are wrong;
2) raw-image are fragmented;
3) ext3 metadata is formatted via Windows installation

To solve pp. 1 and 2 you have to define old RAID parameters and recover host FS proxmox. In p. 3 you can try to recover lost data from old RAID redundancy. And use software to recover data from damaged ext3 (search and analysis of metadata).

You can perform all steps by PC-3000 Data Extractor RAID Edition (http://www.acelaboratory.com/UDMARaidSystem and http://www.acelaboratory.com/ExpressRAIDSystem ). Our advices are based on real data recovery experience. Please contact out TS department and our TS support engineers will help you to recover your RAID case.

[cuumaytinh]

wait for a solution

[Nick_TS]

Hello,

Source of the post wait for a solution

Could you describe your case?