Source
r/techsupport•
LCFLCF

Bitlocker encrypted hard disk can't be read after I connect it using external enclosure.

Solved

I have an internal hard disk with bitlocker encryted. I used to connect it to my PC USB using a SATA to USB cable with external power source and it worked perfectly fine. I felt it was too bothersome so I decided to buy an external hard disk enclosure.

When I connected it, it said that it needs to be formatted before I can use it. So I tried fixing it using TestDisk but the file system was damaged and can't be recovered. I think I fucked up when I tried to fix it using TestDisk.

I tried to connect it again using my old SATA to USB cable I used earlier but it couldn't be read again.

Any suggestions?

Posted Sep 19, 2015, 4:51 AM UTC

15
kt_datarecovery_comTrusted•

I'd urge you to clone the drive first so that you have a sector by sector backup in case anything else goes wrong. Personally, I like ddrescue, but ther are many other utilities out there... FTK Imager, Clonezilla, etc.

As long as you have saved the Recovery Key, you should be able to recover the data. I'm assuming you have Windows 7 or above. In that case you can try the Bitlocker Repair Tool that comes with Windows. Directions are here: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee523219(v=ws.10).aspx

If you have an older version of Windows you can also download it.

M3 Bitlocker Recovery and DiskInternals EFS Recovery are paid software options.

Edit: Fixed a problem with the link and added the part about M3 and Disk Internals.

1
LCFLCFOP•

I tried the M3. It works! The files can be recovered but the partition still can't be opened by Windows. Well, better than losing all data.

I haven't used the repair-bde because it seems it needs another hard disk as an output volume.

Thanks a lot!

1
LCFLCFOP•

Ok, so I tried the Bitlocker Repair Tool.

The decryption process was finished and it said I had to run chkdsk X: /f

But I got this error:

The type of the file system is NTFS. The first NTFS boot sector is unreadable or corrupt. Reading second NTFS boot sector instead. Unable to determine volume version and state. CHKDSK aborted.

M3 can't recover all the data. Some of it read as 0 byte.

1
kt_datarecovery_comTrusted•

Okay. The Bitlocker repair tool should have output a decrypted clone to another drive. Since it's decrypted, you can use standard recovery software on it.

Recuva is a free option, but you will likely get better results with paid software like R-Studio or ReclaiMe (Both have trial versions).

2
siafuhax•

I'd put my money on bad enclosure. You risk no data loss by opening the enclosure up and testing the drive by locally connecting it via a SATA port on your machine. I wouldn't try to copy the data or clone it first, just get the drive by itself and try BitLocker again.

1