Non-Amiga geeks make a boo boo

[James]

HAHAHAHAHAAH... priceless.

[Rabbi]

I feel bad for you guys.  I'd recommend AmiBack Tools for disk problems.

I'd recommend you also get DirectoryOpus as a file manager.

What model Amiga is it?  A Big Box (A2000, A3000, or A4000)?  Or is it a "keyboard type" computer, the A1200? (The others I've eliminated, as they've not got HDs).  My bet is that it's an A2000, as it was common to have multiple partitions that size (small by today's standards) on 1 HD (or multiple small SCSI HDs).

I'd wish I could help you.  Whereabouts are you located.  Amigans like to support each other, especially in times of crisis.

BTW, if you ever end up working on someone's older Mac, would you know how to eject the floppy after formatting it?  :lol:

[Boot_WB]

Amiga folk are, in my experience, generous and happy to help out.

James wrote:
HAHAHAHAHAAH... priceless.

With some exceptions  :roll:

[RoseDreamJ]

ok, I think our first plan of attack then will be to try to use the quarterback utility app mentioned.  If this does not work, we will try to restore the backup files that we saw that are still present.  We weren't really sure today how to take that backup path and place it in the partition that we formatted.  Any advice on this would be appreciated.  Also in the backup location that they showed us, it wasn't clear to us if this was backups of just the program files or the data as well.  

When we first try the quarterback utilyity app how do we use it?  Is it fairly intuitive with windows like prompts and menus or is it all command based?  Also, from the posts everyone made, it is not clear to me if this problem should be something that we can expect to be resolved with this quarterback retrieval program or not.  A few of the early responses made it sound like this should be farily easy to retrieve but then some of the later posts made it sound like we may be screwed.  What gives?

[RoseDreamJ]

we are in Jamestown, Ny in the US.  Close to buffalo, NY.

[huronking]

This is too brutal...

[weirdami]

I think it's cool that a church is using Amiga stuff and still is.

[weirdami]

it is not clear to me if this problem should be something that we can expect to be resolved with this quarterback retrieval program or not.

I've never known anyone to say that Quarterback did undelete stuff. I'd recommend trying to undelete the files with DiskSalv before making it worse by copying files onto the formatted drive. You can at least see the files there were on there (assuming the format wasn't really really effective) before trying to copy them back from the backups. If you don't have them on the backups, then you can go ahead and undelete them.

Really, though, if you have the program disks handy, all you really need to restore are the files people made themselves.

[RoseDreamJ]

I've never known anyone to say that Quarterback did undelete stuff. I'd recommend trying to undelete the files with DiskSalv before making it worse by copying files onto the formatted drive. You can at least see the files there were on there (assuming the format wasn't really really effective) before trying to copy them back from the backups. If you don't have them on the backups, then you can go ahead and undelete them.

Really, though, if you have the program disks handy, all you really need to restore are the files people made themselves.

Thanks for that.  I've been thinking along the same lines.  Once we copy anything back or re-create that partition all hopes for restoring files is lost, right?

If that's the case, the best option seems to be to try a restoration / recovery tool like DiskSalv first.  If that fails, then we should move to copying back over the applications from their disks or from the second cloned amiga and restoring the data from backup.

If that seems about right, the question becomes how do we get a copy of DiskSalv?  We're in a pretty small area with little to no chance of finding any amiga apps for sale.  Buying them and waiting for shipping may be way too long since payroll data is needed this week.  Are these types of applications available as shareware anywhere?  And if so, is there is a simple method of buying and downloading via PC and then transferring them via floppy to the Amiga?  We may be dealing with a location that has no Internet access at all.  If there is, we're fairly certain that it is limited to the PC.

BTW, we both thank you all for all the input and beginner type Amiga info.  For us, this is like getting in a car where the instruments are all in the trunk and laden with foreign symbols.  We really appreciate it...even the laughs.  We'll laugh with you someday.

[James]

Boot_WB wrote:

Amiga folk are, in my experience, generous and happy to help out.

James wrote:
HAHAHAHAHAAH... priceless.

With some exceptions  :roll:

LOL! Hehe I didn't mean to be rude, but I find it incredibly funny. A little research on the web would have avoided a lot of problems

But seriously now... look up on Aminet. You'll find a number of utilities there that will help you.

[Rabbi]

Well, a slow format actually does destroy data, making retrieval of the data highly unlikely.  Your best bet is to take whatever back-ups you have and replace what is missing with the back-up files.  Do you know how to take the back-ups & copy it over to the HD areas you hosed?  If it's on another Amiga computer, you could do the "Floppy & Sneakernet" thing, but you'd need to first get a list of all files missing on the hosed system.  Then you'd get a list of all files on the b/u system & identify which files are only on the b/u system & copy those ones over to the hosed system.

Program data on Amigas are almost invariably within the app's main drawer.  It's really better to have apps & data on separate physical drives, but I'm guessing you have an A2000, an older system, when HDs cost a major amount, where the apps & data are together.

I'm unfamiliar with the Quarterback program, but I believe it's GUI-based, not a command line interface.  See, if you had done a "Quick Format", all that would've affected was table entries of file pointers & your actual programs & data would've remained untouched & been able to be retrieved with proper data retrieval programs, such as AmiBack Tools that I use.  DiskSalv4 is not as intuitive, I feel.  With a slow format, your data is in all practical purposes gone to that great Archive in the Sky, barring any high-priced forensic data retrieval techniques.

I'm going to be driving to NYC this Thursday to pick up my son to bring him back here for the Passover holiday, then driving him back after the holiday.  If you could wait until April 12 in the evening, I'd be passing by, although I'd have to take I-90 instead, I could set you straight & fix it.

[amigakid]

Try using aminet to download amiga files.  And maybe you should pick up a second hand Amiga from like Ebay or something (A1200 is good for beginners) to play with and expand your knowledge of alternative OS's and machines.  Heck you may become an Amiga nut too lol

[guru-666]

these things happen.  I don't think you can restore the data after a slow format.  Forget it.  It's more important to figure out what program was used to make the backups.  or just do a fresh install. Maybe the data is on another partition.
Give us more info.  What kind of amiga do you have.. How many drives are in there,  what kind of files are there on there?
 

[Plaz]

QuarterBack Tools is a set of HD utilities for Amiga. One of them works much like undelete utils for Dos and windows. Once you launch Quarterback, I think you'll choose the "Recover" option and then it will prompt for additional info. (Been a while since I used it) As for being intuitive.... I would say ehhhhhh, more so for some than others. But it should'nt be hard to work it out.

Since you aborted a slow copy, not all of the data may be recoverable though. How are your backups stored? I'm guessing it's your data only on floppies and the apps weren't backed up.

Hey, look what I found.... Quarterback on Ebay
But that seems pricey to me for an older version. Maybe some one here has a better deal.

Looks like Software Hut still carries both utilities.... DiskSalv 4
And the same site with QuarterBack... Quarterback 6.1 ... bit more $$ for the new copy.
I think each will run directly from the floppy once your booted up.

You say you have another Amiga with the same data. It's not hard to move data from one drive/system when you know how. But as a newbie, you need find some one local to help you or maybe think about shipping the drive/computer to an expert if the data is that critical. I wouldn't recommend risking the data on the second system trying to figure it out.

BTW, my in-laws are originally from Jamestown. Lots of snow there in the winter I understand. :-P

Plaz

[Matt_H]

I think we're making this a lot more complicated than it has to be. :crazy:
Be kind, remember these folks are completely new to this.

@ RoseDreamJ

You said all the data was backed up weekly? To what? Using what? On the Amiga, while you can use a dedicated backup program, creating backups really is as simple as copying files to another device and then copying them back if the need arises.

Do you have access to the backed up files? It sounds like they're elsewhere on the hard drive.

Can you describe the now-missing Main icon? Was it a white rectangular box with a little checkmark in it? That indicates a hard drive partition. Amiga drives can be accessed by either their device name or their volume name. It sounds like you formatted device DH2: which had the volume name of Main. Did anything else disappear from the desktop (we call it Workbench)? Those were probably files or programs on DH2: that had been "left out" for faster access. Formatting their home caused them to disappear.

It's also possible that Main was a drawer somewhere on DH2: that had been left out, in which case we still need to discover what volume name DH2: corresponded to.

[Plaz]

Hey, I just relized that we've missed some thing important here as we're all focused on helping with this data retrieval......

Their system was set up by a man who recently passed away.

:-(

Did our fellow Amigan have a name? We've sadly lost a few other members over the past few months as well.

Plaz