How to separate AVI file?

[realEZE]

Hi all,

Is there a way to separate an AVI file that has been combined improperly?

I took some video on a friend's camcorder while I was visiting him, and had him email me the file. He had chopped it up into 5MB pieces, using some video editing software that came with his camcorder.

So I decide to I don't want 10 files, so I combine them using "copy /b *.avi". I wound up with a file 10 times bigger, so I assumed it worked. It also appeared to play back ok, so I deleted the original files and did not think about it anymore.

Fast forward to now, I try to play back the file and realize that I can only play back the contents of the first file! Instead of a 25 minute file, I have a 2:30 minute file!

Is there any way I can recover the last 22:30 minutes from the file? I'm sure the data is still there, maybe the video header is showing wrong length, so it stops playing?

I don't know enough about AVI files to understand how to fix this...

Anyone can help here?

 

[tk11]

First... using the command line to concatenate files only works for text files.

A video editing program smart enough to recognize the entire contents of the file may be able to repair it. Just try a few.

I don't know how much much trouble your willing to go through to get the data back but another option would be to get a hex editor and manually find the start of each segment. Depending on your technical ability this may not be that bad as hex editors can search for byte patterns and if you can find each of the avi headers you'll be fine.

Another option would be to get data recovery software capable of scanning for media files (I remember I used a free one ages ago that did this but can't remember the name). Copy the file then delete the copy and use the recovery program to scan the disk. If it has the ability to find avi files then it should recover each of the files separately.

Your last option of course is a professional data recovery service that could no doubt recover the files without much trouble but would probably cost quite a bit.

Good luck.