dvd data recovery

[thebeyonder]

got some dvd's to recover data from, the owner had put "some videos" on them, too dumb to tell me what he did, what format, what programs used. I don't know if he tried to burn it as a dvd video disk, or as videos (avi, mpg) on a data dvd.

can't read them because no data is recognized by the dvd drive (his or mine) they show up as an empty cd in windows explorer.

there is data on them. I can tell by looking at the data surface. there are no scratches, so it's not a physical issue.

I've tried several different data recovery programs, such as Nero RescueAgent, Recuva, IsoPuzzle, and whatever else I could think of, the problem is that they don't recognize the disk either. they don't even begin to attempt recovery.

what software can I use to get data off a dvd, when it's not recognized by windows? I'm thinking something on the byte level, but the drive still doesn't recognize a disk in the first place. I don't know of anything to try in DOS either, if there are even DOS recovery programs that support dvd's.

looking for some freeware suggestions.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

Boot into Linux and see if that can read it.

 

[thebeyonder]

tried it in DOS, sees the disk, has audio_ts and video_ts folders, sees the files. maybe it's a DRM issue.

test copied some files to a DOS partition, successful except for the >2Gb files, which "copied" (in a few seconds, sure they were copied) but were corrupt.

now I'm guessing a DOS-based DVD ISO writer would solve the problem, since I can't just copy all the files and recreate a video DVD from the folders, because I can't copy the >2Gb files.

know of anything that ISO's a DVD in DOS?

 

[manko]

Try IsoBuster, it can usually show you what's on the disc even if Windows doesn't.

 

[NikoZ]

Try to use Advanced File Recovery software, it works with all types of media. It helped me to recover deleted files from usb flash.