UNDELETE files on a NAS

FatRakoon · 27 Aug 2015 at 02:30

I have done a stupid.

I was copying a whole load of files from the NAS onto a USB Disk, and for some stupid idiotic reason, in some form on mental shutdown, I deleted them instead??? Wahh!!

There is no trashcan or anything on the NAS, so there is nothing to simply undelete them this way.

The NAS inbuit software has no such recovery software either... I have 2 of this type, and I have had a peek on the other NAS just to avoid using the one with the files that I need... Just in case???

Is there any software that is available that can recover files off a NAS?

The software I have tried, only seem to look onto local drives and not on ones on the LAN?

Steveocee · 27 Aug 2015 at 05:09

You could take the hard drive out of the NAS and connect it locally? That would probably work.

***Lesson to be learned, use a 2 drive NAS set up as JBOD with 1 disk as your main storage and the other on incremental r-sync.

a1ex2001 · 27 Aug 2015 at 10:55

Restore from backup if you have one it will be quicker and easier, but I'm guessing you don't have one?

FatRakoon · 27 Aug 2015 at 11:01

I had thought of that yes, the drives are setup as JBOD and so, I could simply access them that way. They are ext2fs and so I have to use my Linux PC to do it, and sure enough, I was fully able to recover them... PHEW!

However... Welcome to yet more proof that I am a bloody idiot...

I have, over the last week or so, been rebuilding my old Server, and I have a great, albeit quite old program called Second Copy, that I absolutely adore, and I had set that up to grab a copy of both my NAS boxes. and by absolute miracle, I must have left it on overnight, and it had copied the files over to the Servers HDs too!

I had simply forgotten all about that, or rather I did not know it had grabbed them while it was on.

For the record, I already do use 2 drives in the NAS, I also used to use them mirrored, but then I ran out of room, so they are now JBODed and I have also re-done the old Server as a master backup, so, when it will be fully finished, I will be using the PC only. I was considering a proper decent NAS that an take 4 drives, but in the end I decided that I might as well just build a PC to do it... At least that way, I have full control over what I am doing ( he says )

a1ex2001 · 27 Aug 2015 at 11:33

That's a decent end result! Time to sort out a backup schedule I back my WHS upto an external USB drive once a week and offsite it to work at regular intervals. I really want to setup a box at my parents house and do nightly synchs of file changes but my broadband really isn't up to it!

neil_g · 27 Aug 2015 at 11:34

FatRakoon said:
I also used to use them mirrored, but then I ran out of room,

mirroring is not a backup anyway.

bledd · 27 Aug 2015 at 14:15

Just restore them from your backu...

Oh, good job

What make is it? I know on Synology you can set up a Recycle Bin

FatRakoon · 27 Aug 2015 at 15:56

a1ex2001 said:
That's a decent end result! Time to sort out a backup schedule I back my WHS upto an external USB drive once a week and offsite it to work at regular intervals. I really want to setup a box at my parents house and do nightly synchs of file changes but my broadband really isn't up to it!

When I first started to get into keeping backups properly, I had my Server in my shed.
Had it there for a good few years actually, but the shed started to get old and leaky and the server failed one day, I went to have a look and it was jus ta rusty pile of junk, and the PSU had obviously got too wet, so that was a great idea, but I just ignored the condition of the shed too much.
I will definitely consider that again however, but do it properly next time.

neil_g said:
mirroring is not a backup anyway.

No, of course not, I never said it was, its more for security, but at the time, I thought I wont fill those drives, but lo and behold, I bloody well did. Its one of those things... You have bigger drives, you just seem to fill them up quicker!!!

bledd. said:
Just restore them from your backu...

Oh, good job

What make is it? I know on Synology you can set up a Recycle Bin

The basic NASes are DLINK ShareCenters... Only cost £40 each but they can only hack 2x2TB Drives, which is why I have wanted to get a proper NAS, but then decided to just use a PC instead... Especially given that I have tons of spare PCs, so seems silly not to use one.

matja · 3 Sep 2015 at 08:57

I know it doesn't help you out now, but in the future it might be good to know that any NAS that uses Samba for file sharing (and that lets you change some settings) supports a recycle bin function via the Samba vfs_recycle module. This works by moving your files into a directory on the share, or a separate share, instead of deleting them immediately.

Additionally, NAS's based on ZFS (FreeNAS) support 'for free' snapshotting, so you tell it to make a point-in-time copy of all your files every hour, and keep a week's worth of snapshots (for example) so even if you do delete something, you can retrieve it from a previous snapshot, perhaps quite a while after you realised it was gone if you have a sufficient snapshot retention period.

Because of my nasty habit of mixing up the 'rm' and 'vim' commands, I use 5-minute auto snapshots - which saves plenty of hair pulling.

FatRakoon · 5 Sep 2015 at 07:04

matja said:
I know it doesn't help you out now, blah blah Samba vfs_recycle module.

Ok thanks, yes, bit late, but I will have a look and see if this supports that... I doubt it very much, but its somethign to see about.

Thanks.

russell664 · 5 Sep 2015 at 12:47

If you have not ran any cleaning utilities, then it should be there, let us know.

FatRakoon · 5 Sep 2015 at 18:46

I will do.
For the time being, that PC is set aside. I'm working through a few of my PCs right now, but I will get back to it in the next few days.