PS3 Corrupted data on PS3, recovery?

[TheLightningStrikes]

Photorec is fine but he have some disadvantages like no support for loop, mappers and nbd, so to read anything by it, You need make SBS copy from "/dev/mapper/ps3hdd2" (this is the mapper with exposed decrypted and byte swapped UFS2 partition for NOR models, for NAND it will be ps3hdd1) and write it back to a real device, and only then scan. Quite annoying... Or maybe I don't know how to make mapper visible? :P

Oh, I did do it on the mapper! I basically went through the steps you listed before to mount the HDD, then tried PhotoRec on one of the mappers. From what I can remember it wasn't PS3HDD2, you can try out all the mappers you have in TestDisk and it will tell you it detected a partition. If TestDisk detected it, then that is the correct mapper

Anyway, signature scan cannot be used for saves from PS3 and PSP games because they don't have any signature. SFO and PFD alone are useless. You can however retrieve PS2 and PSX saves that way using my signatures for Photorec. Better is IsoBuster because have more advanced scripting (but needs paid license for that feature).

If the savegame files don't have signatures, then how do we retrieve them?

 

[Berion]

You did? So why my testdisk and photorec don't see any mappers? The same with /dev/loop's and /dev/nbd's. This would save a lot of hassle for signature scanning.

If not /dev/mapper/ps3hdd2, then probably /dev/mapper/dm-4. If You do:

sudo ls -la /dev/mapper

It should show real names.

From backup nodes in UFS2 fs table. It is like FAT table copy on i.e FAT32 fs. But this depend on how PS3 creating partitions (in CellOS nomenclature, regions, because each region can have its own partition table like in case of VFLASH and Other OS). If PS3 overwriting it by clean one, then You are doomed.

 

[Berion]

@TheLightningStrikes Hi, sorry that this took me so long to reply. I brings bad news... PS3 creating totally clean UFS2, so it overwrites everything in old fs table.

Saves itself are fully encrypted so no magic number by which can be found in signature scan (writing of course custom rule). The only thing from save which could be retrieved are PARAM.SFO, PARAM.PFD and ICONs, useless of course.

 

[TheLightningStrikes]

Hi! Sorry for the late reply, I didn't get an email this time.
That's too bad! But I thank you very much for all your effort you have put into this <3
It's good to know that a format makes it irrecoverable, and people should never do so.

 

[haxxxen]

nvm, haven't read the whole thread at first. can be removed (or not)