[Q] Lost.dir on ext sdcard? - Galaxy S III Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hi there is there anyone else that have issues with their extsdcard?
I get the folder "LOST.DIR" all the time i boot, anyone know how to fix this?
The sdcard is an Adata 32gb class 10

it's normal, I had it with all my android phones.

That folder is from the filesystem.
If the filesystem should loose any files (meaning loose it's name and folder location) it will put it in there for you to recover.

d4fseeker said:
That folder is from the filesystem.
If the filesystem should loose any files (meaning loose it's name and folder location) it will put it in there for you to recover.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
how will the filesystem loose any file in the first place.. just curious

Its not lose a file as such .
Its corrupt file folder use the phone with USB connected or pull battery during use and files corrupted get placed there as damaged . Dont think you can recover them .
jje

how will the filesystem loose any file in the first place.. just curious
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Filesystems are a rather complicated thing.
Modern filesystems such as NTFS, EXT3/EXT4, ZFS, ... all use a so-called Journal in which, as the name implies, they write "I'm now going to create file X in the folder Y", then they create file. Afterwards the entry is removed from the Journal.
If -for whatever reason- the computer or filesystem crashes, on next startup it will look at the entries in the journal and try to roll them back. This MAY cause your computer to loose the data of the last seconds before the crash but it ensres that the filesystem has it's full integrity and won't cause further trouble.
Old filesystems such as EXT2, FAT16, FAT32, exFAT do not have this technology.
If the system had an unclean shutdown it will need to scan the whole filesystem (which can take several hours for modern disk capacities) for any files that have not been completely written or have mismatching entries in the index.
These (partial) files will then be written to the LOST.FOUND folder for Linux-OS's (Windows has other recovery methods)
On EXT3, ... the folder thus seems obsolete but will still be used to recover files which have been corrupted by low-level software issues or hardware failure.
Hope this clarifies it =)

Thankyou eveybody now i can relax!

Related

[SOLVED]Windows/Android Partitions(Worked)

Hello all,
Is it possible to create 2 partitions on your sd card? One for WinMo and one for Android. To keep it all separated.
It doesn´t have to be partition it may also be a trick or something. For the root in android begins in /sdcard and in winmo /sdcard/winmo. As long the 2 different systems are separated.
But a lot of searching, read something about linux swap and ext2 partitions(but i believe it's for real roms not ports). And that winmo won't see any multi partition sd cards.
Thx in advance
Answer in the 5th post
You can simply create a folder called andboot and put all the android stuff in that folder and keep "winmo-stuff" in the root of your sd
wavesshock said:
You can simply create a folder called andboot and put all the android stuff in that folder and keep "winmo-stuff" in the root of your sd
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know that, but a lot android apps are also creating folders in the root.
Christiaan91 said:
I know that, but a lot android apps are also creating folders in the root.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea they kinda need to.
You can try to do two FAT32 partitions, but I don't think Windows/WinMo will see/understand the second partition - even if it is FAT32.
So you'd be kinda SOL trying to boot Android if WinMo can't see the partition... It might work, if you kick haret off from one partition to boot on the other... but kinda odd.
The ext2 solution isn't really a complete solution as it also depends on a FAT32 partition - I assume Android would still create folders on it in other words.
Just use separate SD's, problem solved .
Got it
It worked.
I made 2 FAT32 partitions. Primary for Android and Logical for WinMo.
WinMo recognizes them both, in file explorer as Storage card(Android) and Storage Card2(WinMo).
When you install an app in WinMo you get 3 choices, internal, SDcard and SDcard2.
The only problem you got is that Windows(PC) don't recognize the WinMo partition(it will recognize in activesync mode). So you first have to put all you WinMo apps on the android partition. And copy them to the WinMo partition in WinMo.
AFAIK everything is working fine.
Android doesn't see the WinMo partition
You can also try it. (I'm not responsible if anything goes wrong)
- Did it with this tool.
- I put my sd card in my computer (don't know if it works when you do it through your phone).
- MAKE A BACK-UP CUZ EVERYTHING IS GONE AFTER THIS!
- Delete the whole partition.
- Make a new partition, first the Android one*. Adjust the settings what you like, but put the partition primary.
- Then the WinMo partition. Adjust the settings what you like, but put the partition Logical.
- Now you're done. Put all the files on the android partition.
- SD card back in your phone and reboot.
- Now you can move the WinMo files, on your android partition, to the WinMo partition.
*When you do the WinMo Partition first and the android second, android will not boot.
Cool, glad you got it working. I'm certainly not going to do it, but perhaps others might!

[SOLVED] GParted Damaged SD Files

So I repartitioned my SD card yesterday with GParted in Ubuntu, and I ended up coming out with a couple FSCK files (FSCK0000.000, FSCK0000.001, etc.) which replaced actual files I had on the card.
I'm not really familar with File System Check, but I'm wondering if it's possible to restore the FSCK files to their original state to make them usuable again. Not a huge deal, but it would save me a few hours for sure. Let me know if you have any ideas.
Solar.Plexus said:
So I repartitioned my SD card yesterday with GParted in Ubuntu, and I ended up coming out with a couple FSCK files (FSCK0000.000, FSCK0000.001, etc.) which replaced actual files I had on the card.
I'm not really familar with File System Check, but I'm wondering if it's possible to restore the FSCK files to their original state to make them usuable again. Not a huge deal, but it would save me a few hours for sure. Let me know if you have any ideas.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No ideas and that's bad luck. I had a couple of cards go bad, but not because of Gparted. Made me learn the hard way to back everything on the SD card up before repartitioning.
Yeah, I've repartitioned many times before and never had troubles. Definitely my own fault for not backing up. Not all of my files were damaged though, just a few which is good.
And I'm almost 100% sure the data inside the files are still intact, because I found an affected folder containing my wallpapers, and was still able to view the images inside even though they were the FSCK0000 files.
It turns out I was right in assuming the data in the FSCK files were still there.
I was able to recover the files again by simply renaming with the correct file extension. I imagine they just weren't readable by the programs I was trying to open them with.

CWM - can't see SDCard (except under "Install zip from SDCard")

Weird,
Android says my SD card is corrupt and only offers to format it.
Windows says the same.
CWM doesn't, as far as I can see, see it either, EXCEPT when I ask it to install a zip from it... it can see everything on the SD card and installs successfully from it!
Problem is, I need to copy stuff from the card before reformatting it.
Any ideas on how I might do that?
P.S. Yes, it is definitely the SD card and not the internal one
P.P.S. Windows doesn't see the phone when connecting under CWM...should do though shouldn't it. Perhaps that's my problem..?
Thanks.
Are you rooted? If yes, maybe running e2fsck on the command-line will sufficiently recover it to be mounted.
Alternatively you can use Recuva under Windows to find and rescue the files you need, or chkdsk to attempt a repair.
Is it a Fat32 or exFat (Fat64) filesystem and is there any reason such as removing it without ejecting, that could have caused this?
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium
d4fseeker said:
Are you rooted? If yes, maybe running e2fsck on the command-line will sufficiently recover it to be mounted.
Alternatively you can use Recuva under Windows to find and rescue the files you need, or chkdsk to attempt a repair.
Is it a Fat32 or exFat (Fat64) filesystem and is there any reason such as removing it without ejecting, that could have caused this?
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the prompt reply.
It is rooted, although I tried to install this e2fsck through CWM and it gave me generic errors. Not being a Linux man I wouldn't feel that comfy with stuff like that anyway though.
The card is exFAT so I think Chkdsk (Win7) won't fix anything IFAIK. Oh, Windows says the card isn't formatted though, so won't do anything.
Recuva is unable to determine the file system.
:-(
I installed CM9 from the card, which then couldn't read it (I didn't know CM9 didn't support exFAT), so I restored my previous backup from the Sammy rom so it would be back to normal. But when it booted up the first time post-restore, it said the card was corrupted.
The kernel is what defines whether a filesystem can be or can't be mounted since it includes the filesystem logic. So replacing the kernel always helps if a ROM cannot mount the filesystem.
(Except for special userland filesystem based on Fuse)
It sounds like the partition table got badly corrupted, either by software or hardware.
I'm sure it didn't give you the output "generic errors". We're here to help guide you through the process if you have not enough knowledge but you'll at least have to try. However I don't know how I managed to type e2fsck, since that one is for Ext2 filesystems which has nothing in common with Fat64. You'll have to use a computer to repair it...
After having plugged in the card, could you please go to the Start menu and type 'diskmgmt.msc', then hit ENTER.
Check if the removable disk is initialized and contains a partition (aswell as what the type of the partition is)
It probably shows an unitialized disk, a disk with a RAW partition or a disk without any partitions.
If that is the case, try http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk
You'll find a reference to a lot of other (free and paid) tools on this page: http://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd in the Section "Recovery Tools"
Depending of what your data is worth to you, you'll want to get a bitwise backup of the content first so if you screw up during recovery nothing is really lost.
I wasn't being lazy, just keeping in mind how important the data is and how much effort it's worth expending.
The answer was 'not that important' and I ended up formatting it using the very brilliant fat32format.exe (after trying with Windows Pish 7).
It must have been pretty screwed as TestDisk found nothing of any value there at all. (It was RAW in Windows).
But the upshot is I now have a FAT32 formatted 64GB (hopefully, unless it's a dodgy one) SD card that will work on Sammy and AOSP roms.
Thanks for your time, d4f.

How to recover deleted videos on internal ad card?

Anyone know about this? I download a lot of recovery software but all can't detect my sd card. It shows portable devices in pc. Is it because of this?
Sent from my GT - I9300 on Omega Rom
Deleted means gone .
jje
johnkhor123 said:
Anyone know about this? I download a lot of recovery software but all can't detect my sd card. It shows portable devices in pc. Is it because of this?
Sent from my GT - I9300 on Omega Rom
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's because the internal sdcard is in fact a subfolder of /data partition, formatted in ext 4 file system format. So to be readable by all computers, it's mounted as a virtual fat disk using fuse kernel module.
Recovering data needs a full raw access to the file system, that is not possible here with mtp protocol.
There must be ways to recover but needing probably heavy console use and I don't have much idea about this.
And no, erasing doesn't mean it's gone, simple erasing just remove the file name from the allocation table, but the file is still there. So by reading directly the blocks you can recover files as long as the they have not been overwritten.
A real erase means overwriting the blocks with random data at least 7 times (nsa protocol).
And no, erasing doesn't mean it's gone, simple erasing just remove the file name from the allocation table, but the file is still there. So by reading directly the blocks you can recover files as long as the they have not been overwritten.
As you say but as nobody has yet succeed in recovery for all intents and purpose they are gone .Hence my reply in the negative as per multiple posts all asking the same question and failing to recover by standard methods .
jje
Striatum_bdr said:
It's because the internal sdcard is in fact a subfolder of /data partition, formatted in ext 4 file system format. So to be readable by all computers, it's mounted as a virtual fat disk using fuse kernel module.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's mounted through fuse but not as a Fat device. Why should it if you got Mtp (yuck) which deals with the transfers.
And no, erasing doesn't mean it's gone, simple erasing just remove the file name from the allocation table
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
With Ssd's it's far more complicated than with Hdd's since they have features such as trim. Additionally having Ext doesn't help either since it's notoriously hard to recover files from it due to it's inner workings
A real erase means overwriting the blocks with random data at least 7 times (nsa protocol).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nsa recommends something around 35 for secret informations. High-tech Labs are capable to restore up to 8 overwrites at least partially.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium

[HOWTO] Use external SD card as internal storage in KitKat

Beware, this guide is more or less untested, it will interfere with stuff like memory encryption and OTA or other firmware updates. You have been warned, I assume no warranties for bricked phones, SD cards or lost data.
Many cheap-ass Mediatek phones ship with Android 4.4.2 or later and only ridiculous amounts of internal storage (2GB in my case, CAT B15Q). That may be enough for basic apps, but as soon as you install Navigon or other data-heavy apps (or WhatsApp with a load of videos) you're going to run out of space in no time - and because Google is a bunch of fools, they disallowed app installations to SD cards entirely in 4.4!
So, we're going to move /data in its entirety to our nice huge SD card and be able to use even bigger apps on small phones. It might be possible that this guide works on other phones, but that depends on how they boot and where the fstab and init.rc reside!
Prerequisites:
Mediatek-based 4.4.2 or later phone with root access in recovery (boot it in recovery, run adb shell, therein run id. If it says root, all fine. If not, install CWM)
A large enough SD card (I chose a 32GB card with a 50:50 split between /data and the "external sd card")
Solid Linux knowledge, one Linux PC and one Windows PCs. I urge you to NOT use any kind of VM unless you have experience with USB passthrough.
spFlashTool and the Mediatek drivers from http://forum.xda-developers.com/general/general/stock-rom-cat-b15q-rom-development-t2988774, for a flashing guide see http://forum.xda-developers.com/android/help/howto-firmware-flashing-cat-b15q-t2989627
mtkdroidtools from https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=23501681358558543 on the Windows PC
mtk-tools from https://github.com/bgcngm/mtk-tools on the Linux PC (no, Cygwin does not work, it messes up the permission bits), cloned on an ext4 partition (not sure if ext2/3 can handle the extended permission bits...)
a network connection between the PCs or a USB stick to transfer files
Take the sd card out of the phone and insert it into your computer. Many laptop SD slots don't like SDXC (>4GB), you might need e.g. a Huawei 3G stick or a SDXC-compatible USB dongle.
Repartition the SD card using Acronis Disk Director, gparted or whatever you're familiar with. The first partition must only be resized (this is the FAT partition), the second partition is a ext4 (!) partition. Both MUST be primary partitions. Acronis and other tools on Windows might require a reboot to repartition SD cards. I recommend a 50:50% split, but if you're heavy on apps or their data, you might go for a 25% FAT: 75% EXT4 split.
Boot your phone into recovery, connect to it with adb in a root shell.
Assuming your data partition is at /dev/mmcblk0p8 (look in /fstab to find it out, followed by mount /data and ls /data to verify), execute the command "dd if=/dev/mmcblk0p8 of=/dev/mmcblk1p2", wait until it is finished. This can take up to ten minutes or more, depending how much data there is.
Shut down the phone, take out battery and SD card.
Insert the SD card into your Linux machine, run resize2fs /dev/sdb2 (or wherever the ext4 sd card partition ended up, check it in dmesg) as root so that the filesystem grows; then eject the SD card and put it back into your phone
Readback your BOOTIMG partition, transfer it to the linux PC (or, if you already have a boot.img for your current firmware, use this one)
On the Linux PC, open a rootshell (to avoid permission issues when building the ramdisk).
Run "./unpack-MTK.pl /path/to/bootimg"
"cd boot.img-ramdisk" (directory might be named different, depending on how you named the bootimg dump file)
Using a text editor, edit the "fstab" file(s) (there might be multiple, with suffixes): From (adjust if needed)
Code:
/[email protected] /data ext4 noatime,nosuid,nodev,noauto_da_alloc wait,check,encryptable=footer
to:
Code:
/dev/block/mmcblk1p2 /data ext4 noatime,nosuid,nodev,noauto_da_alloc wait,check,encryptable=footer
Now, edit the init.rc file (beware, other .rc files in the ramdisk root might also contain mount commands!).
Search for "on fs_property:ro.mount.fs=EXT4" and again replace /[email protected] (or whatever the node for /data had been) with /dev/block/mmcblk1p2 in the commands in this block (should be fsck, tune2fs,ext4_resize and mount).
Repack the boot image: ./repack-MTK.pl -boot boot.img-kernel.img boot.img-ramdisk/ /path/to/newboot.img
Transfer newboot.img to the Windows PC and flash it using spFlashTool
boot your phone, look in Settings->Memory to see if it went OK!
If the memory view didn't change, also modify the other blocks of on fs_property, in case your device does not use an ext4 rootfs (but yaffs or ubifs instead).
Functionality
It is a good idea, but
Are I still have part of it as external storage?
If yes, it means I can not remove it because there are some apps used it.
If no, it means I will not have external storage anymore!
e.ahmedmahfouz said:
It is a good idea, but
Are I still have part of it as external storage?
If yes, it means I can not remove it because there are some apps used it.
If no, it means I will not have external storage anymore!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The SD card is now both internal and external storage! You are not able to remove it because else your system will not boot anymore.
harddisk_wp said:
The SD card is now both internal and external storage! You are not able to remove it because else your system will not boot anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what if the sd card is damaged ?
Can my phone boot again..or will booltloop
madthinker said:
what if the sd card is damaged ?
Can my phone boot again..or will booltloop
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you manage to kill your sdcard while you have my sdcard hack installed, then the phone will bootloop until you insert a new sd card partitioned just like the old one. Then it will act like you had factory-resetted it.
Alternatively you can always reflash original boot.img/recovery.img and use the phone with limited internal memory.
harddisk_wp said:
If you manage to kill your sdcard while you have my sdcard hack installed, then the phone will bootloop until you insert a new sd card partitioned just like the old one. Then it will act like you had factory-resetted it.
Alternatively you can always reflash original boot.img/recovery.img and use the phone with limited internal memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i see, thanks to explain me :good:
There is another way to get more space: Link2SD (2.- euros) with a second partition on your external SD-card exactly like shown above (ext4 partition, primary).
The advantage is, that if the sdcard is faulty the system still runs, just the apps which are symlinked to the ext4 partition won't run.
So I use this for all these not absolutely important apps which needs lots of internal memory, e.g. kindle bookreader, Amazon, WhatsApp etc. I dont use it for all apps, most importantly not for any app, where there is no alternative. Last week my two years old 64 GB MicroSD card (SanDisk, with warranty 10 years) in my SGS4 stopped working and this could happen all the time. They are not that reliable I think, that I would put my system on it.
I did this now with the Cat B15Q of my friend.
EDIT: and she has now more than 1 GB free internal space
I think this is the best solution, 2 GB for the pure ROM and the system apps is more than enough and all user apps go to the external sd-card (2nd partition).
good day!
hope you can help me.
what if i want vice versa? because my phone's default storage (0) is sd card.and i want my default storage will be its internal since it is 32gb rom. tried all ways but i think the answer is its boot.img. thank you..hoping for a help

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