MRECOVER XL 1.5
Partition and Data Recovery Software
Made for 8GB+ drives
By Monirul Islam Sharif
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ABOUT THIS DOCUMENT:
This file contains information about the new release of MRECOVER XL.
For uptodate information please visit the web site
http://members.xoom.com/monirdomain.
RELEASE NOTES:
--------------
Finally after a long break of about almost a year I'm releasing a new version
of MRECOVER XL. This new version MRECOVER XL 1.5, is a completely changed
version of the previous release of the XL series.
The XL series of MRECOVER was meant to work with larger drives (8GB+), which
the original MRECOVER series cannot detect correctly. The theme behind this
version is to bypass the BIOS and communicate with the hard disk ports
directly. For this reason, in many cases the software would hang in the drive
selection screen. The last time I worked with I couldn't find out a cure
and I dropped the whole project (being a bit depressed). This year CIH
attacked again, and as the number of large drives have increased in a year
I see, there are a whole lot of people out there who need it. The drives
which I've tested over now don't hang and it works. Still I want to be sure
about it's compatibility. PLEASE INFORM ME ABOUT IT, I DESPERATELY NEED
FEEDBACK.
MRECOVER XL 1.1 is not a replacement of MRECOVER 1.85, I've made it as a
different series and I still recommend the original MRECOVER for harddrives
that are 8GB and less. This is because MRECOVER XL uses some new routines to
access the hard drives and I'm not sure how much compatible it will be
due to this type of low level access.
I'm not changing the readme file much, I'm keeping the rest intact from the
original release, (I'm a in a bit of a hurry to release this version).
So the rest is taken from the readme.txt of MRECOVER 1.85.
INTRODUCTION AND FEATURES:
--------------------------
MRECOVER software was written primarily for recovering data from harddisks
that have been damaged by the CIH virus. This software has been made FREEWARE
So you can freely distribute it. I request to see to it that it is not used
in any money earning activities by others.
The Chernobyl virus, also known as the CIH virus normally destroys the
partition table along with the a vital portion of the first partition.
The partition table stores information that allows access to each individual
partition in the hard disk. Although the partition table is destroyed, MRECOVER
will successfully and automatically rebuild the partition table by searching
the hard disk for valid partition sequences in all hard disks. Although many
other commercial softwares like NDD can rebuild partitions, this job isn't
straightforward.
Now speaking of the data contained in each partition, it is possible to
recover all the data from the partitions except the first one in all cases.
That means if you have not much important data in your first partition then
you are lucky. MRECOVER will be able to recover your first partition too if
it used FAT32 and is greater than 1GB. The loss of vital information prevents
straightforward data recovery from the first partition.
If you had FAT32 in the first partition, after MRECOVER runs and reboots,
you should be able to be in the state before the accident occurs. If not you
shoud be able to access the later partitions.
What's new in MRECOVER XL 1.0:
* The main feature of MRECOVER XL is that it supports large hard drives,
i.e. 8GB+
* MRECOVER XL is almost 10 times faster in searching out partition table
information than MRECOVER 1.85.
The rest of the features are of MRECOVER 1.85
* MRECOVER should now identify and recover LINUX partitions (except the first
one).
* MRECOVER will now try to identify if the first partition's file system is
FAT32 automatically. This means you don't need to enter the type if you're
not sure.
* A bug has been fixed which caused the computer to hang while repairing some
FAT32 primary partitions.
* The messages and instructions inside the program have been made more
informative. The message 'you have to format' has been removed. Well I didn't
mean that you'll have to format if MRECOVER fails, but incase a lot of people
might misunderstand, I've removed it (should've done this a long time ago).
* Last of all although it's not that important, I've optimized the code, so it's
a lot smaller (50KB, compared to 80KB of MRECOVER 1.71)
* /F option has been added to forcefully mark the first partition as FAT32 and
proceed with the recovery of it. You can select this if you've accidentally
selected the first partition as a different type, or you know what you're
doing.
* A bug of MRECOVER 1.8 is fixed which sometimes tells you in Phase 2 that
you don't have a FAT32 even though in Phase 1 it did find one! What a lame
bug... and MRECOVER 1.81 does not reboot when it says it will (another one)
REQUIREMENTS
------------
It is required that after the CIH attack, you have not formatted your harddisk
or changed the contents with other software.
USING THE SOFTWARE
------------------
You will first have to boot from a system disk and run MRECOVER from a floppy.
Please change the boot sequence from the BIOS to boot from the floppy first
if it not booting from the floppy. If you have a damaged BIOS then please
repair it first.
After running MRECOVER you will be provided with necessary information with
how to proceed. You will be asked to select a hard disk from a list (if you
have more than one physical hard disks in your system the list will show you
them). The current status of the selected hard disk will be shown. This
status will include current information about the partitions. Recovery work
will proceed in two phases.
Phase 1: Parition table recovery:
If no valid partition information is found you will be asked if there was
more than one partition in your system. Select 'N' to not proceed with search
and you will be asked if you want to assign all the space to one partition.
Please make sure what you are doing in this stage. But if you accidentally
select that you don't have more than one partition and assign all the space
to one, you can still run the program again and the next time search for
the other partitions. The contents will not be damaged.
You will be prompted for the estimated size of the first partition. This is
asked only in speeding the search and it need not be accurate at all. But
PLEASE REMEMBER TO give a smaller size than the actual one. If you are not
sure then give 0, to search from the beginning.
After finding a partition sequence you will be shown the information. If you
are happy with the searched out partition list then select `Y'. You will be
prompted again to make sure. Then rebuilding the partition table will start.
MRECOVER can automatically check to see if the first partition was FAT32
or not. If you it's not you will be asked for type of the first partition.
FAT32 is a format supported by Windows 95B and later releases (Windows
95B is also called Windows 97 by some people).
Phase 2: Recovery of first partition:
After rebuilding the partition, if the first partition is FAT32, MRECOVER
should be able to recover its contents. If not you will see the drive letter
after rebooting but will not be able to access. Please try other software
to recover data. The contents of that partition are left untouched by
MRECOVER. The problem is my FAT16 version will not be ready for a long time,
and I really apologize for it.
Type MRECOVER /F to forcefully mark the first partition as FAT32 and
proceed with the second phase. Use this option if you have accidentally
selected a wrong type.
CONCLUDING NOTES:
-----------------
In some cases MRECOVER XL might not detect the drive properly i.e. the number
of heads, cylinders etc might be reported wrong. If that is the case, please
inform me. In the next release I'll be adding the features of better
detection.
Please visit my web site for updated information and new releases.
http://members.xoom.com/monirdomain
-Monirul Islam Sharif
Author of MRECOVER
Student, Dept. of Computer Science, Dhaka University, Bangladesh.
E-mail: monir@innocent.com
Update History of MRECOVER:
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28 April 1999 - MRECOVER 1.0 First release
30 April 1999 - MRECOVER 1.05 Bug fixed, and supports 8GB harddrives
01 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.5 Ability to fix FAT32 first partitions.
02 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.51 Minor bug fixed.
04 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.7 Major bug fixed release, tested on a lot
of FAT32 partitions. [the first one
released on the internet]
06 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.71 A good bug fixed version
17 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.8 New features
18 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.81 Lame bug of version 1.8 fixed.
20 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.82 A small bug of version 1.81 fixed.
22 May 1999 - MRECOVER 1.85 Well checked version fixing a major bug
which I overlooked a lot of times.
Update History of MRECOVER XL:
------------------------------
02 June 1999 - MRECOVER XL 1.0 New series that supports large hard drives
06 June 1999 - MRECOVER XL 1.1 A bug fixed release of MRECOVER XL
03 May 2000 - MRECOVER XL 1.5 A version I found that I had to release
hope it works...
