Recovering data from a D-Link NAS DNS-323

[niepelm]

I recently deleted some files from a D-Link NAS DNS-323. It's a dual drive NAS and it was set up in a RAID 1 setup.

Since all the 'undelete' utilities I tried to use are unable to detect mounted NAS drives, I decided to try and connect the disk drive through a SATA->USB2 external enclosure.

Unfortunately, this is not working as planned either. While the disk shows up in the device manager (listed as 'ST332062 0AS USB Device'), it does not have a drive letter assigned, nor does it show up under 'My Computer'.

I have three questions:

1) Is there a utility that can undelete files directly from a NAS?

2) Can I read a hard drive that is formatted by the D-Link NAS DNS-323 in an external enclosure or does this format prevent it from being detected as a normal external drive.

3) Is there any other was I could recover the files.

The files I deleted are pictures that I just recently added to the NAS, so they were not backed up yet.

Thanks for your help.

PS: I am running Windows XP.

 

[IanS]

I can answer questions 2 and 3.

I had this same problem only a few weeks ago with my DNS-323.

I removed the two drives from my DNS-323 and plugged one into an external box, which was attached to a desktop running Windows XP SP3. [the drives were mirrored (RAID 1), so the contents on each drive was the same].

I installed a nifty little freeware onto the desktop called "Linux_Reader", by DiskInternals. It reads the EXT2/3 formatted NAS drives and displays the contents in your windows folders.....just as if it was an NTFS drive. You can then cut/copy/move files from your NAS drives to a drive on your desktop.

The freeware can be downloaded form here:
http://www.download3k.com/Install-DiskInternals-Linux-Reader.html

I can't remember the exact steps I used to configure the software, but it was very easy (and i'm not very IT savvy).

Cheers,
Ian.

 

[niepelm]

Thank you very much, Ian. I ended up purchasing the DiskInternals Uneraser, which solved both the mounting of the RAID 1 drive and the recovery of the files in one fell swoop. Worth the $39.95!

Best... mario

 

[farlen26]

Thank you very much, Ian. I ended up purchasing the DiskInternals Uneraser, which solved both the mounting of the RAID 1 drive and the recovery of the files in one fell swoop. Worth the $39.95!

Best... mario

Can you provide more details of your experience. I have the exact same problem and purchased DiskInternals Uneraser and connected 1 of the drives to my pc directly through a usb to sata cable.
The program detects it and it lists the folders at the root but when I double click it does not show any files. Can you help?

 

[philosurfer]

Can you provide more details of your experience. I have the exact same problem and purchased DiskInternals Uneraser and connected 1 of the drives to my pc directly through a usb to sata cable.
The program detects it and it lists the folders at the root but when I double click it does not show any files. Can you help?

Same equipment, different situation. I had 750 Gb hard drives in my DNS-323 and wanted to move to 1 Tb drives (mirrored). D-LInk said I had to remove the 750's, install the 1000's, then use a utility that would read Linux EXT under Windows (they didn't point me to a product) and copy the 750 from Windows to the 323.

I had the same problem, and the folder that was empty basically had all my downloaded files for the last couple of years! Anyway, I downloaded EXT2 IFS from http://www.fs-driver.org/. You have to have the drive connected before you install this driver (if there's another way to do it, I didn't see it). During installation it asks you to assign drive letters. Once you've done that, you can see the folder contents in Windows Explorer ... but you're not done yet! (BTW, SysInternal's free viewer saw the folder but, just like their Uneraser, indicated it was empty.)

So after this I was able to view all those missing files in Windows Explorer, but when I tried to copy them it indicated there was no data. So I used another utility - Ztree for Windows - and it was able to copy the data to the new drives. I hope this helps.


Rich

 

[farlen26]

Same equipment, different situation. I had 750 Gb hard drives in my DNS-323 and wanted to move to 1 Tb drives (mirrored). D-LInk said I had to remove the 750's, install the 1000's, then use a utility that would read Linux EXT under Windows (they didn't point me to a product) and copy the 750 from Windows to the 323.

I had the same problem, and the folder that was empty basically had all my downloaded files for the last couple of years! Anyway, I downloaded EXT2 IFS from http://www.fs-driver.org/. You have to have the drive connected before you install this driver (if there's another way to do it, I didn't see it). During installation it asks you to assign drive letters. Once you've done that, you can see the folder contents in Windows Explorer ... but you're not done yet! (BTW, SysInternal's free viewer saw the folder but, just like their Uneraser, indicated it was empty.)

So after this I was able to view all those missing files in Windows Explorer, but when I tried to copy them it indicated there was no data. So I used another utility - Ztree for Windows - and it was able to copy the data to the new drives. I hope this helps.


Rich

Thank you for the input. Unfortunately I ended up loosing that info (and spending the $40) this time around but I will keep this info handy should it ever happen again. Thanks again.

 

[Guest]

Hi just Fyi in case somebody needs it had a power outage and lost access to my 323, I wasn't able to access my files the partitions were shown in the disk management as healty unknown with Linux Free Reader I was able to save my files to another location
http://www.download3k.com/Install-DiskInternals-Linux-Reader.html

 

[Guest]

This post helped me so I thought I would provide feedback on what I experienced. First off I deleted my wife's directory with 6+ gigs of files gone in seconds. So the first thing I made sure of was to turn off my 323 and remove one of the hard drives (RAID 1). I have Windows XP on my laptop. So I went to Best Buy and bought a Black Window BlacX SATA usb docking station. There are better prices online, but I didn't have much time to get these files back. I tried Linux Free Reader, but in my situation it didn't work and took several hours to scan. Finally after trying several free products I manage to find (one that worked) a Windows XP program that would read and recover Linux files called - EASEUS Linux File Recovery 2.1.1. The cool part is that I could download and scan for free to see if it could recover the files. The not so cool part was that I had to purchase it if I wanted to actually recover the files. But if you think about it it was well worth the cost of getting 6+ gigs of info back from the brink. I think it cost me $25 for the program. Hopefully this helps someone. Ultimately though wouldn't it be nice if there was an undo option Dlink?

 

[NetworkStorageTips]

Ultimate Boot CD may work also (free download), although I have not specifically tested it on a DNS-323.

Roger.

 

[von Schlieffen]

Here my config :

DNS-323 containt 2 disks Western Digital 2TB configurated as RAID 0 to get 4 TB storage.

I try a lot of free programs but no success to restore anything. I found UFS Explorer. It's a multi platform recover program this can be run as shareware, you can use search option with no restriction but you need to purchase license to can be able to restore a file (big than 64 kb). This license is +/- 50 euros - $ 70,00.


How to recover deleted files :

1. Format a PC by installing Ubuntu on it (I use Kubuntu 10.10 - 64 bit edition for this). My PC has a 120 GB Disk, 4 GB memory and AMD Athlon 64 X2. When you install ubuntu make manual patition. Chose a 5 GB partition for system file and a big partition +100 GB for swap partition. All the process use memory... Connect this pc to internet. More memory you have, less time it takes for process and less swapping.

2. After Ubuntu's installation. Power down your PC.

3. Take your nas DNS-323 and remove the 2 disks. Don't forget to write order of these disks.

4. Install this 2 removed disks on you pc on same order and power on your pc.

5. On Ubuntu take a command prompt and enter :

$ > sudo -i (put your password)
# > apt-get install mdadm
# > mdadm --assemble --scan
# > cat /proc/mdstat

In this state you can see something like this :

Personalities : [linear] [multipath] [raid0] [raid1] [raid6] [raid5] [raid4] [raid10]
md0 : active raid0 sdb1[0] sdc1[1]
........

6. Download program from UFS site : http://www.ufsexplorer.com/download.php select 64 bit version. No license is required to search deleted files but need for restore these.

7. Install this program in command prompt :

# > dpkg -i "path of your downloaded file"

8. Now you cant go to graphical interface and run UFS this is located on system menu.

9. Select a non visible partition : /dev/md0

10. Run "recover" command. Be carefull, this recovery process take 3 complete days... for 2 X 2 TB disks.

11. You will see all files it founds but no more names of these files...

12. After, you need to purchase a license if you want to restore files...

13. Plug a removable storage or another disk (without turn off pc of course) and save recover files on this new storage. This process will take a lot of time too..

Hope this help.

 

[trini00]

Hello all,

Situation:
DNS323 with firmware 1.09 , Raid1 with Auto Rebuild Disabled
Power outage and upon restart all the files show gone.

I tried Linux_Reader for DiskInternals and only one of the drive showed it has EXT partitions but the files wouldn't show up.
I logged in using the Http on the NAS and saw I still had all my accounts and the credentials and settings were still intact.

l looked an account and viewed its file permissions and under the BROWSE options the files showed as being there.
I then started the FTP server and allowed ROOT access and was able to get the files back by ftping them off.

Once all the files are off I will do a Rebuild and see if that fixes it.
At least I got my files back.

Hope this helps someone.

 

[yw3_1999]

Hi Trini00,
Could you please give more details? I access the account but did not find the BROWSE options. And how to FTP them back?

Thanks

YW

Hello all,

Situation:
DNS323 with firmware 1.09 , Raid1 with Auto Rebuild Disabled
Power outage and upon restart all the files show gone.

I tried Linux_Reader for DiskInternals and only one of the drive showed it has EXT partitions but the files wouldn't show up.
I logged in using the Http on the NAS and saw I still had all my accounts and the credentials and settings were still intact.

l looked an account and viewed its file permissions and under the BROWSE options the files showed as being there.
I then started the FTP server and allowed ROOT access and was able to get the files back by ftping them off.

Once all the files are off I will do a Rebuild and see if that fixes it.
At least I got my files back.

Hope this helps someone.

 

[rmckeon]

Hi

I've also discovered that I'm missing a LOT of content from my DNS-323.

After reading this thread I've loaded Linux Reader from: http://www.download3k.com/Install-DiskInternals-Linux-R...
and I still do not see the missing content.

I'm wondering if someone can help guide me to a resolution, as I'm lost...

Thanks.
R.

 

[von Schlieffen]

Hi rmcheon,

Read my tread, it's not enough to mount your disk on a Linux PC, you need a install a lot of config and soft to make it readable and after you make to try recovery.

But for me after more than 20 hours working by the UFS program, I get a lot of lost files but not usable. I don't have any success to restore any files. EXT3 & 4 are not the best files system to make recovery...

Kind regards.