THE LINUX PARTITION-RESCUE MINI-HOWTO
Rolf Klausen, <rolfk@romsdal.vgs.no>
Version 1.1, 22 Oct 1997
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_This mini-HOWTO document describes how to rescue your Linux partition
if M$-DOG has deleted it for you. _
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1.Introduction
* 1.1 Disclaimer
* 1.2 Legal stuff
2.Some preparations and needs
* 2.1 What you need
* 2.2 I assume that...
3.Let's do it! I want my partition back!
* 3.1 Using the Partition Magic program to recover your partition
* 3.2 Changing the partition type to Linux Native
* 3.3 The final touches
4.Contributors
* 4.1 Authors
* 4.2 Thanx go out to:
* 4.3 Thanx does NOT go out to:
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1. INTRODUCTION
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On my computer I have installed Linux, and I have used it for over an
year now, and I think it is the best OS ever created. I also have
M$-DOG and Windows NT 4.0 installed on my computer. The reason that I
use M$-DOG is simply because, as Lars Wirzenius once wrote: "MS-DOS -
you can't live with it, you can't live without it". I use it to play
games and run demos and stuff with.
But enough about that. I have two DOS partitions, one primary
partition and onelogical drive (I assume you know what a partition is
- if not read the Partition mini-HOWTO. It is located at
sunsite.unc.edu somewhere and probably many other places too.). They
are about 500 MB each (I have one 3.2 GB disk and one 1.2 GB disk :).
My Linux partition is 1200 MB. I have a free space of about 800 MB
which I don't know what do do with yet, and I was wondering about what
I should do if I needed more space for DOS (some large game or
something), because I wasn't sure how many logical drives DOS could
use / access. I don't know why, but for some reason I thought that DOS
could use only one (in addition to the primary DOS partition). So I
thought that I could check out if DOS could access more logical
drives. I fired up fdisk (in DOS), and used the menu system to create
a "logical DOS drive", and that worked fine. I created one with the
size of 100 MB. Then I formatted it and it worked fine! Great! I
thought. Then I knew that! But I didn't need that drive now, so I
decided to delete it. I used DOS' fdisk again, chose "delete DOS
primary partition or logical drive" (or something like that) on the
menu, selected drive E to be deleted, typed the volume label, which
was nothing (I just tapped ENTER) and fdisk told me that the disk was
successfully deleted. Then I rebooted. On my computer I use a program
called System Commander. It is a great program which displays a nice
menu (a la OS/2's Boot Manager) with icons and many nice features. It
detects and removes new/deleted OSes automatically etc. But when I
rebooted, Linux wasn't on the menu anymore! I started DOS, typed e:
and enter, and there it was still! Then I started fdisk. It chose to
print the partition table, and it said that drive E was there, and
where my Linux partition was before, now only a free space was left!
SHOCK! HORROR! I started to sweat and shake! What should I do now! I
couldn't just reinstall everything! It had to be a way to get it all
back. And, yes, it was! Thank God (even though I don't believe in
him), it was! I had lots of useful information and programs on that
partition! Before I figured out how to rescue my partition, I wished
Bill Gates was never even born! Have you experienced the same thing
recently? Don't be afraid! The rescue is here! Just read on a little
bit more...!
Oh, BTW: Due to the fact that I live in Norway, my english is probably
not so good, but I hope you understand it anyway :-)
1.1 Disclaimer
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This mini-HOWTO is Copyright (C) 1997 Rolf Klausen. All rights
reserved. You may do (almost) whatever you want with it. I don't care.
Just be sure to keep my name intact. I just hope it becomes useful for
any person in the Linux community. But please read section 1.2 below.
IMPORTANT!!!!
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I am not responsible of any damage on any computer as a result of
anyone reading this HOWTO. If you do any damage, _it is YOUR fault,
NOT MINE!_ Be careful when partitioning disks, and don't make any
mistakes, because it can be fatal! Backup all your important data and
check that everything you do is correct! What is described here worked
on my computer, but it may or may not work on your computer. Although
it should work for everyone, I can't garantee anything. This is the
last warning you get: _BACKUP IMPORTANT DATA!_ Or, to put it short:
Use at your own risk!
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1.2 LEGAL STUFF
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Unless otherwise stated, Linux HOWTO documents are copyrighted by
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That is, you may not produce a derivative work from a HOWTO and impose
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In short, we wish to promote dissemination of this information through
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If you have any questions, please contact Greg Hankins, the Linux
HOWTO coordinator, at gregh@sunsite.unc.edu via email, or at +1 404
853 9989.
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2 SOME PREPARATIONS AND NEEDS
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2.1 What you need
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OK! So, MS-DOG has deleted your Linux partition? Here is what you need to
bring it back from the dead:
* A working DOS installation, preferrably on a harddrive, maybe a
floppy will work, I don't know.
* A dos program called Partition Magic. It is shareware, afaik, and
you should be able to get it on the net, either one way or the
other ;^)
* A Linux Boot floppy and a Linux Root Floppy. I used the ones from
my Slackware distribution. You must have Linux fdisk on the root
floppy.
2.2 I assume that...
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* ... M$-DOG has deleted your Linux partition (accidently?)
* ... you haven't changed anything in your partition table since
that happened.
* ... you satisfy the needs described in section 2.1
If this suites you, then the chances for succesfully recovering your
partition are very large!
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3. LET'S DO IT! I WANT MY PARTITON BACK!
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OK! Get ready to rescue... grab a cup of coffee, and relax. Everything
will be just fine :)
BTW - Can you imagine how I felt when MeSsy-DOS deleted my partiton? I
have never been so angry in my entire life (almost). But I found a way
to rescue the partition. Here it is...:
3.1 Using the Partition Magic program to recover your partition.
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Get the partition magic program from the internet somewhere. Fire it
up, and you will get a nice win95 look-alike user interface. It is
very easy to use, and if you have used windoze 95, you should be able
to use this program too. Press the OK button, and then a graphical
presentation (is that the right word to use? I'm not so very good in
english.) of your disk should appear on your disk. The different
partitions and filesystems have different colors. I have a DOS primary
partiton, and I assume you have the same. One of my logical drives is
my Linux partition. Where that previously were, now only a grey bar of
free space is left. To the right or left of it you should have a small
logical drive which is you Linux Swap partition. Now right click on
the free space and select "create", or choose from the menus. You
should be able to figure out how it works. It is, as said earlier, a
very easy to use interface. When the create partition dialog box
appears, select "Unformatted" where it says "FAT". You can choose from
"FAT", "HPFS" and "Unformatted". If you choose FAT or HPFS, a FAT or
HPFS filesystem will be created on that partition and your linux
filesystem destroyed, so make sure that you have selected the right
value. Now select OK, and the partition will be created. But the
partition is now marked as a DOS FAT16 partition (in the partition
table, every partition has a mark (a hexadecimal number) which shows
what OS the partition belongs to.). What do you do then? Goes on to
section 3.2 :)
3.2 Changing the partition type to Linux Native
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Now you need the boot and root floppies, so I hope you have them. It
is also possible to use loadlin. Just make sure you can start Linux
and run fdisk under it. First thing to do is login ;). fire up fdisk
by typing fdisk at the shell prompt. If you have more than one hd,
then check that fdisk is using the right one. Type 'p' (only the
letter p) and tap ENTER. You should now get a listing of your
partition table. It should have one "DOS 16-BIT >= 32M" more than
normal. Find out which one is your Linux partition (look at the sizes
etc) and remember its number (i.e. mine is /dev/hda6, so I would have
to remember the number 6 :). Now type 't' and ENTER to change a
partitions type, or ID as it is called in Linux fdisk (i'm not sure
which one is right; type or id, but I use the word type). Now type the
number you should remember and press ENTER. Now you shall type the hex
code of the OS which the partition belongs to. Type the number 83 and
press ENTER. 83 means that the partition is a Linux Native partition.
Linux Swap partitions have the type set to 82. You can type 'L' to see
a list of codes when you are asked to type the hex code of the
partition.
When you have done all this, and when you have done everything right,
your partition shall be OK!! YES! It is true! It did work for me, and
should work for you too! All you now have to do is the final step:
3.3 The final touches
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There are some small details still remaining. First of all, reboot and
fire up Linux the way you usually do it (LILO etc) and see if
everything works. If it doesn't, then you have odne something wrong or
my recovery mothod doesn't work for you :( But if it boots correctly,
then congratulations! You have done everything correctly! Now fsck
will check you filesystem once (it checked mine twice, I dunno why ;),
and then everything shall work fine again! If not, then don't blame
me. As said, it worked for me, but maybe not for you. If I saved your
partition, then a e-mail would be very nice :)
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4. CONTRIBUTORS
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4.1 Authors
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There are only one author, and that one is me:
Rolf Klausen
E-mail: rolfk@romsdal.vgs.no
WWW: http://www2.romsdal.vgs.no/~rolfk/
Snail mail:
Rolf Klausen
Neptunvn. 10
6400 Molde
NORWAY
4.2 Thanx go out to:
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* Eivind Stormyr (eivind@ardata.no) for introducing me to Linux, the
best OS ever created :) and learning me lots of things about
computers.
* Bjorn Olav Stormyr (bjorn@ardata.no) for giving me large discounts
on every part of my computer :) Whitout him I couldn't have
afforded to buy the computer I own :)
* Every other member of the Linux community and everybody who
supports Linux and writes documentation and programs for Linux and
all the authors of the LDP and virtually any person involved in
anything which has to do with Linux. Particularly Linus B.
Thorvalds - he is _The King_ !!!
* And of course:
* Tone B. Skjoelsvik - the most beautiful girl in the world :-)
4.3. Thanx does NOT go out to:
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Bill Gates (bill.gates@microsoft.com (?)) for creating the worst
"operating systems" in the world and for deleting my Linux partition
(Yes, I blame him. If he wasn't born, then my partition wouldn't have
been deleted and I wouldn't have had to recover it or even write this
little HOWTO.