Seeking a professional help in recovering encrypted files

Good Evening\Good Morning

I have A Compaq Presario C700, Windows Vista Home Premium... I keep all my important files encrypted by Ashampoo Magical Security 2 (installed, full and registered version) and the files change into *.*.ppenc (magicalsec document) ex: Landscape.jpg.ppenc.... and then I put those encrypted files inside folder lock 5.8.0 (portable)

Now a couple of month ago my laptop fall hard from me and it took a strong hit... I tried to open the laptop but it refused to work and it said that something is wrong with the windows... I did the hard disk self test (from F10) in short and long and it failed... anyway I managed to make my hard disk work again after 8 or 9 tries through my recovery discs (I made those discs when I first bought my laptop) but of course all the files and pictures are gone... two weeks later I bought a new hard disk (Samsung) because I was afraid that the old hard disk (Toshiba) will stop working and I bought a case to use the old hard disk as external hard disk.. The first time I connected the old hard disk I was able to see it and open it's partitions if I wanted to but now I can't... and the laptop see only 2 of its partitions and the windows open the auto play of those partition easily but 3rd partition (which i keep all my important files on it) is invisible and the windows freeze when it auto play and after awhile it restarts automatically or it show the blue screen then it restarts my windows...

I asked about this problem and I was told that this partition may contain a bad sectors and that's why the windows can't open it (the 3rd partition ) so I downloaded the HDD Regenerator (full and registered version) and made a bootable usb flash and used it... I found a huge number of bad sectors in the old had disk and I tired to regenerate them and I left HDD Regenerator working all night long for more than 15 hours and in the morning I found out that it's still regenerating and the number of regenerated bad sectors is 0 (Zero).. So I canceled the process and to be honest I didn't try to regenerate again

So is there is a way I can recover those encrypted files... those files are extremely important to me and I would like to mention that I still have my password/encryption key that I used in both Ashampoo Magical Security and folder lock... so I just need a way to recover the files itself only...

Thanks for your time in reading...

 

I sincerely doubt it.

You can try testdisk to recover the partition, but even then, the encrypted files on a badly damaged file system does not inspire confidence.

If these files are really critical, your best bet is to contact a company like ontrack

File Recovery Software - File Repair - Easy Recovery - Ontrack Data Recovery

And explain the situation.

We're likely talking thousands of dollars to recover them

 

Well First of all thanks a million for your reply... I appreciate it... I’ll check the link that you posted… but I would like to ask about something... I was surfing through the forum and I read something about the frozen drive trick... it's in the page 7 in Windows OS and Software and its title is (Looking for an HDD sector repair and transferer)... do you think this could work... please tell me your honest opinion... because those fill are really important and I’m willing to do anything to recover those files... they are my work files...

Thanks again

 

Sorry guys. Even if they are legitimately yours, we can't talk about defeating encryption or anything here. Thread closed.

 

Ok, Closing this was our bad. As long as you only talk about recovering files from a dying hd and NOT breaking the encryption, etc, there is no reason the thread should be closed again.

But any talk about breaking encryption thread goes byebye again.

 

MR. Patrick... thanks a million for opening the thread again and i would like you to monitor the thread yourself so you can make sure that there will be no talking about breaking any kind of encryption in any way...

Thanks again

 

Sorry 'bout that. Saw encryption, and it's a knee-jerk

 

Mr.Pitabred.. there is no need to apologize... ... well i believe that I'm the one who should apologize for my tough thread in the site suggestion...

please accept my apologize and i swear that i didn't mean to make you look unprofessional among the other member of the forum...

now what do you mean by Saw encryption, and it's a knee-jerk ... it is a joke?! well I'm sorry but i don't understand this because i have a bad language in English

 

Encryption itself is not the issue--as I recall, Ashampoo encryption is purely software based so as long as he has the software and the key he should be able to unencrypt.

My fear is the bad sectors.

We've got two problems; missing partition and bad sectors.

You mentioned the frozen drive trick...without knowing what thread you are referring to, I can only guess. There are lots of things that can happen to a bad drive: a) physical damage to drive, b) loss of magnetic integrity c) failed circuit board, d) seized bearings, e) head crash....you get the idea.

The frozen drive trick is successful when the bearing are frozen; freezing the drive causes the beearing and lubricant to shrink, allowing the drive to spin up.

You have bad sectors, and the bad sectors have resulted in the loss of a partition and files.

The partition information is kept at the front of the drive and a duplicate of that information is stored in the middle of the drive. If the front part of the drive is damaged, TESTDISK can (CAN, not WILL) recover the partition information from the middle of the drive and restore (at least temporarily) the partition, allowing you to recover data that is not in the lost sectors.

So that would be my first step--use testdisk to see if it can recover the parition.

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk

Testdisk

 

Okay.. i'll do what you said... use the testdisk to recover the partition and tell you what happen so you can tell me the 2nd step....

thank you gerryf19

 

Gerryf19... i did what you told me but this time when i connected the old hard disk... the windows was able to see the 3rd partition... so i ran the testdisk and i chose create a new log file... and it said please wait... and now more than 15 mintues passed and nothing happen... i opend my computer and this is how the partition look like (it's in attachment)

so now what

Note i can open the other 2 partition normally (F,H) and the (C,D,R) are the internal (main hard disk)

 

I would

a) Just grab the files

b) run a chkdsk on the volume

c) grab more files

d) run chkdsk on the volume

e) grab more files

repeat until drive dies

 

okay.. i'll try this now

Well i did what you said twice but every time i click on the G partition... it stand still and the my computer window says not responding and after a couple of moments... another window appear and it says windows explorer is not responding....

 

doesn't sound good

You might try some other software--maybe try easyrecovery pro as a trial to see if it can find anything

Recovery Software - Free Software Downloads Trial Software - Ontrack Data Recovery

 

I tried the easyrecovery pro program as you said but the same thing that happened with the my computer window happened with the program.. it stood still for a while then it said not responding.... is there any other ideas that i can try.... i'm willing to do anything just to get those files back...

 

Try recuva

 

program called spinrite will attempt to recover data from bad sectors, but it can take a loooonnnnnngggg time.

I had a bad FLOPPY drive that I needed some critical data from and spinrite ran for 2 days, eventually recovering half of the files I needed.

 

Will recuva help me recover files from bad sectros... cause i'm sure that i have a lot of them and only a few programs that can recover files from bad sectors

Well i have an old normal pc... and i connected the hard disk to it and after 2 hours... the pc was able to see the damaged partition but i still can't open the partition by simply clicking on it cause whenever i do that the window explorer stop responding... so i tried (recovery my files) program and it's 3 hours now and it still working... i don't see that it recovered files yet... but it's a try.. and i'll also download spinrite and try it... if recover my files program didn't recover anything and i don't care how much time it will take.... even if it took weeks.. i just want the files back
and i'll tell you what happen
gerryf19 thanks you so much for all the help... i really appreciate it... thanks a million

 

Gerryf19... good evening....
22 days ago i posted this reply and said that I'm trying to recover the files by recover my files program on an old normal pc... during this time i found out while I'm trying to recover the files that sometimes the program freezes on my old pc and says not responding and then after a couple of moments it resume searching for the files... now 3 days ago... same thing happen again and my task manger says that the program is not responding again but till now it didn't resume searching for the files... now what should i do and how to see the files that the program found and recover them without ending the program

Note: the mother board of my old pc is build in... i bought it 12 years ago... and still working fine... and the hard disk I'm trying to recover the files from is 160G.B... and that's why it took so much time

 

Well, forgot all about this thread....

First...."NOT RESPONDING" does not equal "FREEZING". Not responding actually means that it will not communicate with windows. Some programs will run, run, run and not interrupt themselves to communicate with windows.

That said, I had an extremely bad span for harddrives since last I visited this thread.

One of the tricks I had some success with on a harddrive with bad sectors was to use testdisk, but in a different way.

Loading testdisk, I scanned the bad drive with testdisk looking for a partition. Once the Partition was found, there is a feature to LIST FILES (click P on the keyboard). This lists directories and files. Select the directory where your files are, and press COPY, then tell the program where to copy them to...

I actually recovered 13 gbs of files this way...most of the files were usable.

 

Well 1ST.. thank you for telling me the difference between not responding and freezing....
2ND... I'll try this way and I'll tell you what happen.. ...
and again thanks for all your help

 

try ubuntu live CD to get access to the drive and copy files , then u ll have one problem left decrypting it

 

Decrypting the files is no problem at all cause i still have the password that i used to encrypt it .... and i'm still trying gerryf19 way and then try your way but what's the ubuntu live CD... can you tell me more about it....
And thanks for your help

 

ok , ubuntu is an OS , like window and mac , its linux based , easy to use for beginners , the best part of ubuntu is that u don't need to install it to try it , you can just pop in the CD and chose try ubuntu , its free and u can downloaded it legally from anywhere ( torrents /direct links ) , just search google for it , i am sure if u run it u will be able to browse ur drives from it , here is a screenshot of ubuntu http://zaqqi.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/ubuntu14.jpg , u will find ur drives under places tab at the upper left of the screen , what u want to do is extremely easy , if every thing went smoothly , and there is no bad case scenarios with ubuntu , just shutdown and remove the CD and ur computer will be untouched , hope i helped ya,
pm me if you encountered any problems , just be sure to download and burn the latest version of ubuntu