HELP- REWARD - Need to repair a QIC backup file!

Here is the clients problem. Friday, on a network, they ran MS Backup on a win98 box to backup a network drive. They created a backup called MYBACKUP.QIC it is 3 gig of files compressed to 1 gb.
The next morning, Sat., an employee ran an incremental backup called. . you guessed it MYBACKUP.
Thinking they had a good backup, the guy reformatted the server to setup mirrors etc.

Only when they tried to restore, they only saw a catalog for saturday and could only restore 2 meg of files. . the files that had changed between Fri, and Sat.

The deal is. . the backup file is STILL 1.1 GB which tells me that the files are there. . I just need to figure out how to recatalog the backup, or crack into it or something.

I tried using Backup exec. . but it only will work with w2k backups not 98.

Any suggestions would be appreciated, no matter how remote. . .They have a backup from the end of OCT, but the files they need are ones they busted butt onb the last 2 weeks and need desperately.

A reward is forthcoming to anyone with a solution! BTW, data recover off the old drive didn't work. . they had overwritten it. . .

Thanks a bunch. . any suggestion no matter how remote is welcome!!!!!!!!!!!!

If it's that important why not send it in to a data recovery specialist and have them retrieve it?

[quote]Originally posted by Gollo:
<strong>If it's that important why not send it in to a data recovery specialist and have them retrieve it?</strong><hr></blockquote>

Agreed. If this is going to be an option, the first thing you want to do is power down the harddrive the data resides on, until you can figure out what you want to do. The longer that system is up, and performing random writes; your chances of recovering anything worth while are slowly diminishing. Because the file was written over, I would think you were screwed. The One Gig file reported may be a false hope, but something to cling to until all efforts are exhausted.

Good luck, I hope there is an easier alternate solution...

try using ontracks easy recovery pro and see what that tells you - the demo version will let you see what you can extract. Buy it only if you see the files that you need...

Pretty good deal if you ask me.

Thanks, the key is that the hard drive is not recoverable. The guy deleted the files, formated over a fat32 with ntfs reformated it, then set it up as as a mirror, then filled it up with other data. . . the hard drive wasn't an option.

The real question is how to crack into a QIC file. I needed a solution within 24 hours, we made other arrangements so that issue is closed. The question remains, is there any utilities for cracking into a qic file that has had a new backup appended to it, but doesn't have a catalog for the first data group. Or software that will recatalog from scratch. There are a lot of people out there that use MS backup and I am slowly discovering that it is crappy.

Thanks!

That is a good question. I know someone that worked for Veritas, and Seagate Software supporting Backup.exe and several other products exclusively. He learned plenty about these third party solutions, and would attest to that last statement you made. :eek: Unfortunately, he is unreachable (vacation), so I can't ask him what Veritas solutions might be available to do that task. Perhaps later this week I can find something out, if someone doesn’t answer it here ahead of time…

Check out this MSKB article...<a href="http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q124/8/03.asp?LN=EN-US&SD=gn&FR=0&qry=qic%20backup&rnk=7&src=DHCS_MSPS S_gn_SRCH&SPR=MSALL">Q124803</a>

Might be of use.

Actually it looks like <a href="http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q155/9/79.asp" target="_blank">this</a> is your problem...

Apparantly the NT/2000 backup program is NOT compatible with Win98's. The article says you will need to install 98 on a machine, restore the data and then copy it over...

Thanks, that MS article was interesting. . .forgive my ignorance but where do I find that utility, it seems to be worth playing with?

Interesting note about Backup Exec. . . it seems to be able to recatalog w2k qic files but not ones created with win98. . .sigh. .

I really want to figure this out. . .so that we have an answer in the future. . . when this happens again. . .thanks for your continued help! <img src="confused.gif" border="0">

Shortly after I posted that comment to look into the lddtu.exe program suggested my MS, I tried looking for the file myself. I could find NO reference to it in the Windows file system, MS KB( except for the article that sugggested it ), Windows help and backup. Google didn't even have information on it. The only reference that google brought up was the KB article itself.

I guess lddtu.exe is one of those mythical creatures like elves, and fairies and virgins. :D