AAAAAAA!!!!! HELP! HELP! HELP! Partitioning problem!!!

[Calum]

hello, last night i used the dos version of partitionmagic on my drive because i needed to resize my linux partition because the windows one had 2Gb spare and the linux partition needed an extra 2Gb.

To cut a long story short my final partition (a FAT32 partition has been changed by partitionmagic into a 'PcRP' type: 60 partition magic recovery partition. This is not accessible using either linux or windows, or even by using any of the 3 versions of partition magic that i have. I suspect there is a  way to compile support for this partition type into the kernel but WHAT IS IT!?!?!?? a google search tells me little, and what it does tell me seems to be in german, or something.

How do we do this? how do we recompile our kernel? what needs to be installed to do this and what is the syntax needed. Also, does anybody happen to know if this type 60 partition is supported in any way? ye gods, this is the worst time too. All the data for an article that my girlfriend needs to write is on there and it needs to be done today. We are having to do the research and so on again. Even so it would be nice to recover this data for a number of reasons.

I know this is a bit of a specialised subject but please help on anything i have raised here if you can, maybe i can piece together the information and come up with a solution.

Thank you very much in advance.

[Master of Reality]

What the hell did you do??!#$%%#@*&%#$@#!!!?
Thats what you get for using a windows product rather than fdisk in Linux.

[ September 29, 2002: Message edited by: The Master of Reality / Bob ]

[KernelPanic]

I cant help Calum, but I lost 8Gb (Yes 8Gb!) of data this friday. What I'm saying is, I know how you feel  

[Pantso]

JESUS Calum, how did you do that  :eek:  ? This is a very specialised question indeed, to which I'm afraid that I don't have the answer, sorry  :rolleyes:  . Perhaps, void main can help.

[voidmain]

Well I don't know what that type of partition is, but I would venture to guess that if Parition Magic changed that partition to a different type, chances are that it also messed with the underlying file system.  You may get lucky and hope Parition Magic did not mess with the data. If it did not, then all you should have to do is boot into Linux type "# fdisk /dev/hda" (if that's the drive you screwed up your partition on), and change the "type" back to FAT32 and "w"rite the changes. If the partition in question is the second partion on the first disk your fdisk session might go like this:

Code: [Select]

Now, there are a couple of FAT32 types I used "b" from the list but unless you know what the type was before it could be "b", "c", or if it's an extended partition it might be "f". Try "b" first, if that don't work try the others. But I wouldn't hold my breath that Partition Magic didn't f00k it up.

[rtgwbmsr]

Are you getting an error?
Partiton Magic's "Master Error List" !
http://www.partitionmagic.com/support/primus/id817.cfm

Their FAQ's
http://www.powerquest.com/support/primus/id311.cfm

Erm...did you call/e-mail support or RTFM? Sorry to say it, but it helps usually. Especially when the site says dick about anything...even just "recovery partition"

Sorry to be of so little help

     

Edit: Ah, here we go:
http://www.powerquest.com/support/primus/id335.cfm

If that doesn't help, try this:
http://www.tek-tips.com/gviewthread.cfm/lev2/7/lev3/50/pid/528/qid/273634

[ September 29, 2002: Message edited by: The_Muffin_Man/B0b ]

[Calum]

thank you very much, guys, for rallying round like this. Muffin man, your third link appears to detail exactly what is wrong with my partition, i will try that method when i get home this evening. If not, i will move on to the other solutions you guys postulated. It never actually ocurred to me to go to power quest for an answer! To be safe i am downloading pqedit from ftp://FTP.PowerQuest.com/pub/utilities/ for this purpose. Not really willing to trust my old partitionmagic disks...

We had to do the work from scratch as it was due today, and in an effort to recompile my kernel i have now made my linux side practically unbootable too (thankfully used the bootdisk to recover the files once we realised the kernel was not booting.

Mandrake CD not too helpful when it comes to reinstalling kernel on its own, so maybe a reinstall is necessary <sigh> i love computers...

once again, thanks guys, for going to the effort to help me.

Re: fdisk (for linux) how nondestructive is it? can it be used on a system that is running off the hard drive or need the system be running off a floppy or CD to use fdisk? I seem to remember deciding not to use fdisk in favour of pqmagic a long time ago, and i haven't thought about it since. Maybe now is time for a rethink...

[ September 30, 2002: Message edited by: Calum ]

[Master of Reality]

Fdisk is great. It is non-destructive if used properly and it can be run on the harddrive and even delete the partition you are running on (changes wont start till you restart though).

All you gotta do to fix your problem is exactly what void main told you in fdisk.

[creedon]

quote:Originally posted by Calum:
thank you very much, guys, for rallying round like this. Muffin man, your third link appears to detail exactly what is wrong with my partition, i will try that method when i get home this evening. If not, i will move on to the other solutions you guys postulated. It never actually ocurred to me to go to power quest for an answer! To be safe i am downloading pqedit from ftp://FTP.PowerQuest.com/pub/utilities/ for this purpose. Not really willing to trust my old partitionmagic disks...

We had to do the work from scratch as it was due today, and in an effort to recompile my kernel i have now made my linux side practically unbootable too (thankfully used the bootdisk to recover the files once we realised the kernel was not booting.

Mandrake CD not too helpful when it comes to reinstalling kernel on its own, so maybe a reinstall is necessary <sigh> i love computers...

once again, thanks guys, for going to the effort to help me.

Re: fdisk (for linux) how nondestructive is it? can it be used on a system that is running off the hard drive or need the system be running off a floppy or CD to use fdisk? I seem to remember deciding not to use fdisk in favour of pqmagic a long time ago, and i haven't thought about it since. Maybe now is time for a rethink...

[ September 30, 2002: Message edited by: Calum ]

I hope we learned from this experience; DON"T fuck with a working system unless it's unavoidable; DO backup everything you consider to be something you don't want to loose BEFORE you press 'ENTER'.