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R-Studio Technical Documentation

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Multi-pass Imaging

Multi-pass imaging is a process of image creation through several passes (phases). Each phase reads data from different areas of a hard drive, starting from areas with good sectors then going to slow sector areas and finishes with bad sector areas. This approach maximizes the amount of data that can be recovered from a failing drive and reduces it chances to fail during this process.

Phase 1. Copying most good data from the drive

In this phase, R‑Studio reads data from drive by sector blocks, or groups of consecutive drive sectors read in one go. The phase is performed in several steps.

Step 1. R‑Studio reads data from the drive until it runs into a block with bad or slow sector(s). Then it drops that block and jumps to another area until it finds a block with no bad or slow sectors. Then it continues reading data until it runs into another bad or slow block, and the process repeats. When this step is finished, most good data from the hard drive has been read, and R‑Studio has detected the front blocks (edges) of bad and slow sector areas.

Step 2. R‑Studio finds the rear edges of bad sector areas. It reads the skipped area from its rear end backwards until it runs into a block with a bad sector. Then R‑Studio jumps to another bad sector area and the process is going on until all bad sector areas have been processed. When this step is finished, some good data from the hard drive has been read, and R‑Studio has detected the rear edges of bad sector areas.

Step 3. R‑Studio reads data from slow sector areas. It does that much the same way as for bad sector areas. When this step is finished, good data from slow sectors on the hard drive has been read, and R‑Studio has detected the rear edges of slow sector areas.

Step 4. R‑Studio finds the rear edges of bad sector areas in slow sector areas. When this step is finished, some new good data from slow sectors on the hard drive has been read, and R‑Studio has detected the rear edges of all bad sectors within slow sector areas.

Step 5. R‑Studio tries to read all skipped sector blocks. This is done without skipping bad sector blocks and checking read speed against minimum I/O rate.

When Phase 1 is completed, R‑Studio has read most of readable data and detected front and rear edges of all bad sector areas.

R‑Studio tries to read the rest of data in the next phases, and does that sector by sector (rather than blocks).

Phase 2. Trimming

R‑Studio detects the front and rear sectors of bad sector areas. When this step is finished, some new good data from bad sector areas has been read, and R‑Studio has detected the front and rear sectors of all bad sector areas.

Phase 3. Scraping

R‑Studio tries to read data from bad sector areas sector by sector.

Phase 4. Retrying (mostly optional)

R‑Studio tries to read data from bad sectors through several attempts.

You may read more about this process in our article Multi-pass imaging in R-Studio

To create an image through multi-pass imaging,

1	Select an object in the R‑Studio 's Drives panel and click the Create Image button

Other ways to create the image

2	Specify image options, a file name, and destination for the image on the Create Image dialog box and click the OK button

Create Image dialog box

Bad sectors processing options

Some options can be changed even during the process of image creation.
Image filename	Specifies the name and path for the image file
Image type:	Compressed image (R-Drive Image compatible): If this option is selected, R‑Studio will create an image file which can be compressed, split into several parts, and password-protected. This image file is fully compatible with the images created by R-Drive Image , but incompatible with very old versions of R‑Studio . Byte by byte image to a file: If this option is selected, R‑Studio will create a simple exact copy of the object. Byte to byte image to a physical disk : R‑Studio will create an exact copy of the disk on another hard drive. Data on the target drive will be overwritten. Available in the Corporate, Technician, and T80+ licenses. Some other image formats are also available in the Technician, and T80+ licenses. You may read more about these formats in the Supported Virtual Disk and Disk Image Formats page.
Drive sector map file	A file with the sector map of the object to image. Optional for the RDI image type, mandatory for the other image types.
Enable multi-pass image creation	Turns multi-pass imaging on and off.
Data to process	All data : All data on the disk will be imaged. Existing files only (FS bitmap) : Only the disk area occupied by the existing files of the file system will be imaged. If there are more than one partition exist on a hard drive, existing files will be imaged from all partitions. Unused clusters only : Only the unused clusters of the file system will be imaged. If there are more than one partition exist on a hard drive, unused clusters will be imaged from all partitions. Existing files + Unused clusters: First the existing files then the unused clusters will be imaged. 2 image files will be created. Unused clusters + Existing files: First the unused clusters then the existing file s will be imaged. 2 image files will be created.
Perform reading in reverse order if possible	Switches the direction of all phases/steps to reverse.
Use less strict options for FS metadata	When this option is selected, the area where FS metadata resides will be treated differently: Block size will be smaller, no skipped blocks, I/O timeout will be increased for devices with support of such features.
Minimum skip size	Minimum size of drive area to skip when a bad sector is encountered.
Maximum skip size	Maximum size of drive area to skip when a bad sector is encountered.
Slow I/O rate	Data read rate from which the block being read will be trated as a slow one. Can be either as % of average speed or in Mb/sec. It can also be turned off.
Number of retries (Retrying phase)	The number of read attempts in the Retrying phase.
Block size	The block size to process as a single unit.
Disable imaging phases	Multi-imaging phases that can be skipped. They can be skipped or added even during image creation
Start runtime imaging	Click this button to switch to runtime imaging .

>	R‑Studio will start creating the image, the Progress showing the progress.

Multi-pass imaging progress

You may change some operation parameters during image creation. Click the Options button and change them accordingly.

Drive Options tab

Multi-pass imaging options tab

Post Actions tab

When the imaging is over, R‑Studio will show its results.

Multi-pass imaging results

Advanced multi-pass imaging settings window

Note: You should completely understand what you are going to do, or you may severe deteriorate R‑Studio performance or even damage the hard drive being imaged. When in doubt, confine yourself to parameters on the Multi-pass imaging options tab.

The Bad sector processing dialog box spe cifies options for all stages of multi-pass imaging. You can perform more versatile control of these options on the Advanced multi-pass imaging settings window. You may add or delete individual phases and steps, change their order, and fine-tune each phase and step separately.

Advanced multi-pass imaging settings

Depending on the phase/step, these options are different. Some of them are described in the Bad sectors processing options tab, some are self-evident, and some are described in the table below.

Advanced bad sectors processing options

Some additional options may appear when third-part hardware is used.

A particular set of these options can be saved as a preset and loaded back when necessary.

The Bad sector processing tabs will look different when the advanced multi-pass imaging settings have been altered.

Multi-pass imaging options tab

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Multi-pass Imaging

Other ways to create the image

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