Is there any tool that can recover pretty much ANY type of accidentally partition?

Thanks, RandomTox, for your reply!

I'd previously examined a couple of EaseUS products, both the Data Recovery and Partition Recovery tools. Unfortunately, neither will work for my situation. No file recovery tool can work for this problem, no matter who makes it, because all the files in the lost partitions are non-standard binary files which cannot be identified by such tools.

And as far as the EaseUS Partition recovery tool, just like every other tool I've examined, can only recover the small set of common partition types (and mine are not common). Another limitation of their Partition recovery tool is that it won't work on disks larger than 1TB (at least the free version), but that's actually irrelevant to me because it won't recognize my partition types.

But thanks anyway!

My thanks to you, too, for your reply Bishop696!

I agree with your first sentence that, since none of the actual data in the missing partitions have been corrupted, if I can somehow re-create the partition table, the results will be perfect.

All I need is a tool that can re-create the partition table from the information I already have, but I still haven't seen ANY partition recovery tool that will work with the kind of rare partition types I have on the disk in question. Sadly, the iCare tools you kindly pointed me to are no exception. In fact, it was the worst I've seen when I ran it, because it gave an error message that it "Can not recover dynamic disks", which is doubly bad because the disk in question is NOT a dynamic disk!

As for paid professional disk recovery, the prices are absolutely outrageous, especially if you want them to recover atypical data or partitions, easily reaching at least a few thousand dollars. Furthermore, they're really only useful when the disk itself is physically damaged, such as after a major head crash or the drive was in a fire or dropped from a considerable height. They have clean rooms where they dismantle the disk in a dust-free environment and apply special methods to read the data from the damaged parts of the disk.

Whereas all I need is to fill in the partition location data within a very small number of sectors within a newly constructed GPT partition table. Conceptually, the task is very simple indeed, but in actual practice I don't even dare to try (by using a disk editor manually).

As for your final sentence, I was actually in the very process of backing up the data on those partitions when, due to a mistaken report from a backup tool, I accidentally deleted the partition table!

Oh, well. I'll keep looking....


QUOTED SPAM REDACTED - SS

Hey, I really appreciate you sticking with me on this, RandomTox! Thanks!

Unfortunately, I already own the paid version of Active@ Partition Recovery, but like ALL the other tools I've already tried or researched, it totally ignores any partition types other than the very commonly used ones.

The only thing I've found that might have been even remotely useful is the Disk Editor component of Acronis Disk Director 11, upgrade 2 (I own both the Home version and the Advanced version). That is not a partition recovery tool by any means, but instead it includes a kind of template for manually creating your own partition table. Regrettably, the template only allows you to create an MBR-type partition table, whereas my disk with the problem requires a GPT-type table.

I'll wait some more to see if someone finds something that will work in my situation...

Thanks for taking an interest, zhuzhulianhuanpi. Unfortunately, the <SPAM> tool is just as badly limited as all the rest I've already examined. It can NOT recover anything but the same old small list of very commonly used partition types.

QUOTED SPAM REDACTED - SS

Friend RandomTox, I gladly thank and commend you once again for your amazing perseverance!

I appreciate and thank you for all the good information you've pointed me to. Although I hadn't seen the specific sites you've linked, I'd seen a good deal like it. It wasn't too long before my problem became information overload, especially when it came to all the different commands, switches, and modes and alternatives approaches of using 'gdisk' or Parted Magic ('gpt fdisk'), etc., etc. I tried them, but got lost in all the complexities. My tiny little brain just couldn't cope with it all!

So I decided to forgo, at least for the time being, trying to learn how to use these complicated tools, and instead tried to educate myself regarding GPT partition table structures, as created and used by Windows 7. I found an excellent source of such information at what author Daniel B. Sedory calls "The Starman's Realm", such as An Examination of The Microsoft® Windows™ 7 and 8 GPT 'Protective' MBR and EFI Partitions.

And instead of the complicated tools I mentioned above, I applied the knowledge I gained from The Realm using disk editors (such as LSoft's Active@ Disk Editor (a very nice tool that includes a GPT template), HxD, DMDE, wxHexEditor, etc) to actually look at the data myself.

I'd prefer to manually create a new GPT myself using the data I already have for the start LBA/CHS and size of the lost custom partitions using a disk editor, but that turned out not to work correctly. What I did was read the GPT Protective MBR and a few sectors of the GPT from a known good GPT disk and copied them to the damaged disk, then edited the copied GPT to reflect the start and size of one of the lost partitions. The HxD disk editor allowed me to correctly calculate the necessary CRCs, but what totally stumped me was what to enter as the partition's GUID! I have no idea where this unique ID is supposed to come from or how to generate one myself, so manually editing a GPT turns out to be impossible, given my inadequate knowledge. A key warning about this issue comes from one of the sites you so kindly linked (see this post by srs5694), which warns of improper GUIDs.

So I'll apparently have to spend some weeks(?) to try and understand exactly how to use sgdisk, or a tool that provides an equivalent to "sgdisk's -G/--randomize-guids". (I shudder at the thought!)

I should also add that I had some generally favorable results using TestDisk (which I referred to in my OP). It includes a feature whereby you can manually specify your own partition type code as well as the start LBA and size of a partition. Regrettably, however, the resulting partition wasn't correctly recognized, but that might have been because of a bad GUID or because I don't know exactly what values to enter for start LBA and size...

Sorry for all the verbiage, but perhaps someone who reads this thread might find it useful...

Thanks again, RandomTox, for all your very helpful replies!